Council candidates present their case

Chico Chamber of Commerce provides a virtual opportunity

CHICO » Adapting to unprecedented conditions for the 2020 election, candidates for the Chico City Council joined an online forum to answer questions about their platforms and proposals for helping run Chico if elected.

Hosted by Chico Chamber of Commerce, candidates each answered two questions which were based on the Chamber’s election guide and goals, before giving a closing statement.

The format was a little different, as anyone attending had to register to join the Zoom meeting for no charge, submitting questions by email ahead of time. The forum was moderated by Chair Jolene Francis, and it was reported that over 200 registered to join and watch virtually.

Public safety

Solutions for strategizing and funding public safety dominated the conversation.

Ann Schwab said with neighborhood safety “top priority,” she is “not in favor of defunding the police in any way shape or form. Our police are underfunded.” She added the department needs additional support by utilizing partnerships with Butte County Behavioral Health’smobile crisis team.

Deepika Tandon advocated for “making sure we have enough officers to keep our community safe to attract more businesses.” She said the focus should be on businesses bringing more revenue and subsequently for hiring more officers, adding she is against “enabling behavior that is not good to have in a community.”

Kami Denlay agreed that parents want the downtown and park areas to be safe for their children, saying “We’ve been witnessing a decline

in our quality of life.” She chastized the current council and advocated for fighting “the rise of crime” and banning “the disastrous needle program for good.”

Sean Morgan also suggested a plan for addressing public safety usingmore accountability “with compassion” through the ACT initiative using a community court, which was drafted several years ago, to “keep accountability” while directing people to resources.

Randall Stone said after finding funds for hiring nine police officers, he thinks there should be less focus on sending police to every incident. He advocated for using trained, less expensive resources such as Catalyst Domestic Violence Services for more situations — “Right now we always send out the hammer to address housing and homelessness issues. They need other resources to address it.”

Steven Breedlove called his approach to public safety “restorative justice and conf lict mediation” with the example that if business owners like Tandon feel unsafe around individuals who might be havingamental health episode, hewouldwant create a systemto “address people’s unmet needs and mediating the conflict.”

As formaintaining parks, RichOber said hewould not turn maintenance of the parks solely over to Chico Area Recreation District, saying he approves of the current partnership but wants to preserve the parks as ultimately the city’s function to maintain.

Infrastructure

Crumbling roads and infrastructure at high costs ($10-$15 million annually) was one of the chamber’s major issues.

Schwab said she supports restructuring unfunded liability, and revealed that the city is seeing higher surpluses than previously projected for the end of the fiscal year. She claimed the city’s sales tax is higher than projects by 1.7 million with an additional surplus of $8.5 million, with a total surplus of $20 million, which “allows us to fully fund our emergency and operational reserves, and do another project.”

Meanwhi le, Andrew

Coolidge said he wanted to reconsider former Mayor Mark Sorenson’s suggestion for a bond issue to address funding roads, and described District 5 as being in special need of help for better roads and safe routes to school for children and Chico State students.

Business impacts

The pandemic’s impact on local businesses and how to mitigate it drew some dissent.

Morgan described using a pension obligation bond as a solution to the city’s PERS unfunded pension liability (costing about $10 million annually).

“We know pension liability is absolutely going to drown the city in not very few years ahead,” he said. “We are obligated to look at this as a potential partial solution,” as connected to preventing more debt and outflow of funds for the city.

Ober had another idea, setting a local minimum wage. He challenged the chamber’s positing that minimum wages “increase resulting work cuts,” saying that as the economy recovers from the pandemic, the city must support local homegrown businesses and entrepreneurs, and make sure the workforce can contribute to the local economy and afford rent, food and basic services.

“A fair local minimum wage is the right thing to do but also for the economy at large,” he said.

Asked if he was for expanding government control over the economy, Breedlove dissented, clarifying he is a “libertarian socialist” and does not believe inmore governmental regulation. He described a “lean, people-centered budget” taking into account the effects of the pandemic displacing more people — “Businesses will not succeed without consumers with disposable income in their pockets.”

Coolidge said he believes council should be handling finances “in a responsible manner,” using his own experience as a business owner and on the council to suggest being fiscally prudent and exploring multiple options.

Denlay advocated for “less red tape” in the pandemic for business operation—“We need to do everything in our power to open the door to businesses” — but said she did not know specifics to develop a strategy for doing so.

Housing and homelessness

Candidates diverged the most on their opinion of how to address the need for more housing in Chico, and create solutions for a growing homeless population.

Stone, Breedlove, Curtis Pahlka and Lauren Kohler all emphasized the need for affordable housing in Chico. Stone disagreed with the chamber’s positing that inclusionary zoning could increase market rate housing prices or trigger prevailing wage, saying the city’s housing committee research found the opposite — “My phone is ringing from developers from out of town. Our community scores so well because our affordable housing need is so acute.”

Kohler suggested focusing on infill housing rather than building out, and building local partnerships to find more creative solutions for housing. She also suggested pursuing a structured campground to reduce costs of policing and moving homeless people who camp without other shelter options, working with local non-profits tomaintain it — “Whenwe look at the costs for enforcing different laws for folks who are camping, we’re really upping that bill and continuing to leave it as a problem in the future, for us.”

Pahlka agreed that while many traditional single family homes are built in Chico, affordable housing and job creation can go hand in hand—“We need to build in balance. We have lots of service workers and the working poor and they need a place to live as well.” He said more housing at affordable prices would also help attractmore and larger businesses as well as more candidates for public safety

Coolidge went against Stone’s claim, saying “Anyone would be silly to suggest it” of inclusionary zoning, and added a sanctioned campground is also a liability issue.

Online viewing

Chamber President and CEO Katy Thoma said the video of the forum will be accessible on the chamber’s website without charge at www. chicochamber. com and on the Chamber’s social media. The 2020 Election Guide is also available for download online.