Power brokers: What SC voters need to know
It's election time again and, sadly, many voters haven't the privilege of time to study the city of Santa Cruz's current state of affairs. It appears the twin power brokers (real estate and tourism) are once again poised to take full advantage of voters' lack of information.
My goal is to help turn the city toward a more direct and transparent democracy where the city's organizational chart is honored placing voters at the top, council under them, and city management and police working under the directive of council as is currently practiced.
During my five years on the Commission for the Prevention of Violence Against Women (CPVAW), I have closely followed council decisions and city staff behavior that reveal an array of troubling situations. For example, why does our small city need 15 well paid ($100K+) assistants to its city manager? Former City Manager Dick Wilson (before Martin Bernal) had zero. Voters need to know.
What part did the twin power brokers play in the adoption of Voting District Map 602? We know the council majority who adopted it were all heavily funded by groups like Santa Cruz Together and Santa Cruz United. The current voting district map for our city does the exact opposite of what the Voting Rights Act required; to keep communities together. The gerrymandered map was approved by Councilmembers Golder, Kalantari-Johnson, Watkins and Brunner, whose voting records show little independent thought as they most often vote in a bloc. City management's preferred map 604b, tweaked after community input, was arrogantly rejected with a motion by Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson and her cohorts. In doing so they dismissed a map that kept neighborhoods together.
In response to the adoption of this ruinous map 602, former City Councilmember (and current Supervisor) Justin Cummings states the adoption of map 602 is, “undemocratic, and it dilutes concentrated communities of protected classes, specifically Asians and Latinos, which reflects gerrymandering and perpetuates systemic racism.”
This same well-funded council majority took serious legal missteps when they forced this sea change into the city's charter by 1) never allowing city voters their right to choose ranked-choice voting to meet the legal requirements of the state's Voting Rights
Act; 2) not allowing voters to choose between voting with districts or retaining at-large elections; and, 3) not publishing large, clear district maps in the mainstream press prior to the election as required by the voting rights lawsuit.
To comprehend the power brokers in Santa Cruz, you need to know who the members, boards and leads are of groups like NextDoor, Santa Cruz United and Santa Cruz Together. It shouldn't surprise anyone that they eagerly use their deep pockets to sway electoral outcomes to make certain Santa Cruz remains the most expensive rental market in the nation. NextDoor is their online mouthpiece fomenting fear and lies about progressive candidates. This platform is known around the country for electing right-wing candidates over progressive ones. The Atlantic ran an excellent article by Eli Sanders on how NextDoor wins local elections in its May 2023 issue.
One of my most disturbing times as a commissioner was witnessing CPVAW become a political football used to confuse two progressive council members' political actions with sexual assault and sexual harassment in order to recall them. This came after an independent investigation found no wrong doing by these duly elected council members. The recall needed signatures to get on the ballot, and our staff liaison, Susie O'Hara, reset the agenda to pressure CPVAW commissioners to vote to censure these councilmen without the required 72-hour notice. She then cried on the dias demanding people believe her and not the independent report. Clearly workplace discord existed, but isn't that what a good HR department is for?
I hope these few noted facts will give voters pause before they complete their ballots.