City Hall Diary
Last week, the San Jose City Council passed additional rules for governing lobbyists. I supported this item and made a few comments of my own.
It is important to specifically define—as best that the city can—who lobbyists are and what they do. Lobbyists who are registered with the City of San Jose are individuals who are hired and paid money and/or receive in-kind gifts to influence government decisions on behalf of their respective clients. Lobbyist’s use their influence—“influence” being purposeful communication for the purpose of supporting, changing, opposing or intentionally affecting the actions of city officials by persuasion, incentives, studies or analyses—to obtain an outcome in their favor.
To be fair, I don’t think that lobbyists are evil people nor do I believe that they are intentionally out to destroy city processes. Many lobbyists are former staff aides and council members in addition to being developers. These folks have an internal knowledge base by default because of their employment at city hall. However, the problem there lies in the fact that registered lobbyists use their knowledge base and influence to push issues through city government. Since many people know them, and the fact that lobbyists usually represent clients with deep pockets who give money to and raise money for campaigns, those being lobbied can be placed in an uncomfortable position and “give in” to the lobbyist.
Of course one could argue—successfully so—that those being lobbied, such as elected officials, should have the guts to say no to something they disagree with. However, the relationship between a lobbyist and a council member usually begins when the council member is a candidate. During the campaign, lobbyists can raise thousands of dollars for a candidate. If the candidate should win, he/she may feel obligated to support the lobbyist and their clients because of the money they raised for the campaign. (When I ran my election, I did not accept money from lobbyists nor did I ask lobbyists to raise money for me.)
In an effort to have some fun with a serious subject, one of my fellow council members asked if we might consider requiring lobbyists to wear a badge that says “LOBBYIST” when they roam city hall. This Nathaniel Hawthorne Scarlet-Letter approach, albeit funny, does not accomplish the overall goal that we are trying to achieve. The goal is to make visible to the average citizen what a lobbyist does and how their influence can impact the outcome of policy that affects our everyday lives.
An important part of disclosure is for the city to require candidates for city council and mayor to identify those persons who are lobbyists on their campaign fundraising reports. I raised this issue from the dais on Tuesday. This is important because I believe that the public should know whether or not the candidate is taking money from lobbyists. These reports are viewable on the city clerk’s website.
Another amendment was to change the revolving door from one year to two years. As I mentioned, many former staff and elected officials leave public service with hopes to immediately use their knowledge base to benefit themselves personally. Many lobbyists make a six-figure income based entirely on their familiarity with city government.
As a council member, I only meet with lobbyists if their clients are present. In addition, my web calendar lists the word “lobbyist” next to those individuals that are registered lobbyists.
What are your thoughts regarding the amendments made to the lobbyist ordinance? What other changes/additions do you think should take place in the future?
Restrictions on lobbyists and political contributions sort of miss the point. It’s the politicians that make the decisions, not the lobbyists. The politician who cries “the bad lobbyist made me do it” is shirking responsibility.
Pay to play
Pierluigi: As long as there is money to be made on land development, or getting a piece of that RDA tax increment, money will talk.
The days of envelopes with cash being passed in the hall outside the chambers has long passed, but it would be naïve to think that adopting new rules will actually change anything. Test-drive these ideas:
Corporations need to be able to deduct their pay-to-play investments (small local corporations too). Lobbyists exist because corporate entities can expense their hush money. Good lobbyists know how to distribute the money while minimizing their own tax liability.
Save my favorite non-profit. It’s not a secret that politicians lobby moneyed interests to make contributions to non-profits. A BIG tax-deductible contribution might even get a bump-up on the tax increment support for your big project, or get some street improvements paid for close-by in your redevelopment area, since RDA can’t spend their capital project restricted funds on things like non-profit support.
Let me have that option. Every wonder how congresspeople end up owning pieces of corporation after they leave office? Not well discussed at the local level, but certainly an area that deserves some look-see.
Flipping. Popular with City employees in the late 70s during rapid real estate market increases, but also works today. Get a low-cost option on a new condo or house from a friendly helpful developer. If the market bumps up just before they go on sale, you sell the option to a buyer for quick non-1099 cash. If the market tanks, the developer rips up the option.
Any other ideas?
Don’t cut them slack because they’re your former coworkers. Lobbyists are worse than lawyers because they screw things up on a much larger scale. Instead, of branding the lobbyists, rip your weak-minded colleagues for their inability to resist such coercion. Make the elected officials accountable, as they should be.
The only change being made under Mayor Reed is to allow a different group of crooks access to city hall than when Mayor Gonzales was in office. It’s to be expected, Mayor Reed is a lawyer. The only true reform will come after the 2010 mayoral election. We need an analytical mind in the mayor’s office. Someone who leads without fear or favor. Forrest Williams must be elected mayor in 2010 or all hope is lost for our city.
Pierluigi—The biggest problem with all this is your definition of lobbyist—someone paid to influence politicians in power. The unions and certain of the neighborhood spokespersons and the historical preservationists are unpaid lobbyists with enormous power to influence the City Council’s votes. The only ones NOT lobbyists are the thousands of us who pay taxes—and so it’s no wonder anything at all affecting them is never ever addressed. Nimbys, retirees, freeloaders on the public payrolls, ego projects like the city hall all are attended to, so no $$ are left for pools, streets, gardens—joy for the citizenry. Add in all the PC non-profits, each with its tiny group of boosters, lawsuits not just pushed by thoughtless council members, but by this dis-satisfied group or that, restored mansions that delight those sentimental about the past—but lose millions no matter who runs them—or too small convention centers, and voila’ we have San Jose, affected as much or more by unpaid lobbyists as by the paid ones. Downtown is and will be a failure as long as the neighborhoods own the council. There ought to be room for both, but while the council is blind to the lobbying by neighborhoods, which ironically don’t make them more liveable, only more sort of like they used to be, it ain’t going to happen. George Green
#5. Forrest Williams? You’ve got to be kidding. This guy is so deep into the sytem that it isn’t funny. When the West Evergreen project was presented to City Council he couldn’t help stumble upon himself. If anyone believes council meetings are long, long at Forrest every time he opens his mouth and it is much too often. Council meetings could be dramatically shortened if he would stop rambling on withoput making any sense.
PLO,
Thanks for your continuing efforts to raise and discuss important issues facing San Jose. Most of your colleagues on the council prefer silence, as they wet their index finger to see which way the wind blows.
I may be a bit old-fashioned, but I thought that the mayor and city council were elected to represent the voters & residents of San Jose. The same residents who happen to pay their salaries. Some people might even say that the mayor and city council members work *for* the citizens of San Jose.
Give the mayor and council members a choice:
– either publish in advance a calendar of their private meetings and make them open to any member of the public, including the press, or
– publish on the city’s website a detailed account of each private meeting, including who/what/where/why and how of every individual or group meeting in which they participated, within 1 week of the meeting.
Every power breakfast, 2-martini lunch, rubber-chicken dinner and late-night dailliance and soiree should be documented if the meeting can be connected in any way to actual or pending city business.
(Restrictions regarding personnel or legal matters may apply.)
That way, the employers would know what their employees were actually doing from nine to five each day, as well as all the overtime that several council members actually put in.
Think of it as weekly status reports from the employees (the councilors) to their managers (the citizens.)
In fact, there oughta be a San Jose city statute to that effect. (I would love to see the council’s vote on that issue.) I suspect that most of the city’s registered lobbyists would object strenuously if the details of their private meetings were made public on the City’s website.
Too bad. Time to turn on the lights.
George Green – “Downtown is and will be a failure as long as the neighborhoods own the council.”
You seem to have only negative comments and critical posts about other people’s ideas with no positive solutions to contribute
Do you have any workable ideas to improve downtown or San Jose that others would support?
San Jose Mayor , City Council and City Manager calendars are already posted on line
San Jose Mayor and City Council – Calendars
http://www.sanjoseca.gov/council.html
City Manager’s Calendar
http://calendars.sanjoseca.gov/cmo/
The Sunshine Reform Task Force’s Phase 1 Recommendations – See Pages 23-24 has calendar recommendations
4.3 Calendars of Certain Officials
A. The following officials must maintain a calendar: the Mayor, City Councilmembers, Chiefs of Staff for the Mayor and City Councilmembers, City Manager, City Clerk, City Attorney, Executive Director of the San José Redevelopment Agency, Airport Director, Budget
Director, Chief Development Officer, Emergency Services Director, Environmental Services
Director, Fire Chief, Finance Director, General Services Director, Housing Director, Information Technology Director, Library Director, Parks Director, Planning Director, Police
Chief, Public Works Director, Retirement Director and Transportation Director.
B. Calendars must include, at a minimum, all City-related appointments, including regular and
special City Council meetings, public events or speaking engagements, meetings with
developers, meetings with consultants, meetings with lobbyists, regional meetings, and meetings
of subcommittees or task forces. City officials are encouraged to record unscheduled meetings
of a material nature with interested parties in any matter coming before a policy body for a vote in which the matter under consideration is discussed.
C. Each City-related appointment must include the following information: name(s), title(s), affiliated organization(s) and a general statement of the issues discussed. The following information may be exempted:
1. Personal appointments;
2. Information protected by the attorney-client privilege;
3. Information about City staff recruitment;
4. Information about City economic development;
5. Information about whistle-blowers; and
6. Information about those who may fear retaliation.
D. The Mayor, City Councilmembers, Chiefs of Staff for the Mayor and City Councilmembers,
City Manager, City Clerk, City Attorney, Executive Director of the San Jose Redevelopment Agency must publish their calendars to the City’s website once a week, on Monday, by 12 pm, for the previous seven days.
E. The calendars of the Airport Director, Budget Director, Chief Development Officer,
Emergency Services Director, Environmental Services Director, Fire Chief, Finance Director,
General Services Director, Housing Director, Information Technology Director, Library
Director, Parks Director, Planning Director, Police Chief, Public Works Director, Retirement
Director and Transportation Director need not publish their calendars to the City’s website,
but they will be considered public records and must be available promptly upon request by a
member of the public.
http://www.sanjoseca.gov/clerk/TaskForce/SRTF/pdf/PhaseIFinal.pdf
PS There are many additional recommendations in our 39 page – Phase 1 report that should provide more open and accountable city government
Council Rules and Open Government Committee and Sunshine Task Force will discuss the Phase 1 recommendations on Wednesday, June 27th starting at 8:30 am at City Hall
http://www.sanjoseca.gov/clerk/CommitteeAgenda/Rules/062707/Rules062707a_jSRTF.pdf
Even if we agree that the operation of the city demands that politicians be accessible to businesses and various groups, that does not justify the existence of paid lobbyists. If a developer, labor organization, or neighborhood group has a stake in a local issue and a need to lobby a politician or elected body, why should we allow others to turn that need into a lucrative business? Is the civic value of a developer’s idea enhanced by his ability to hire a City Hall insider to lobby his proposal? No. Same with the aims of labor, the expectations of a neighborhood association, the concerns of a business group. Just as it is for the private citizen with a particular interest, the responsibility to communicate a group’s need with the council should be the sole responsibility of that group.
No hired guns allowed. No peddling of access, leveraging of personal relationships, rattling of skeletons in the closet. No more big paychecks for depriving the public of the honest government they deserve.
Absent a persuasive argument of the need to professional lobbyists—a single example of their having informed the city of something it could not otherwise have known, I will continue to believe that we would be much better off without them.
6 – Once again you paint with the broadest of brushes. Your comment, “The unions and certain of the neighborhood spokespersons and the historical preservationists are unpaid lobbyists with enormous power to influence the City Council’s votes,” is ridiculously wide-ranging. To lump preservationists in with the unions and imply they have equal power is just plain silly. You continually gripe but offer nothing constructive and then you make nonsensical comments like this. If only the preservationists had the power and influence of the unions. That is so far from reality it dilutes the rest of your statement. At least know what you are talking about if you are going to attempt to attack a group. A factual attack is much more effective than your non-reality based tirades.
I was talking to an old San Jose friend who has known George Green for years and he said the best way to describe George is “There he goes again “
Poor George. He can’t help it. He was born with his foot in his mouth.
Maybe in that same light-hearted vain you could clip the Target logo from one of their large shopping bags and pin it to your back as you wander through City Hall.
I applaud your courage and appreciation for good humor Piere. Keep raising the bar and having fun.
I had fun reading #6’s list of the bad “unpaid lobbyists” who are the San Jose shadow government, and checking off all the ones I belong to. heh. So much power and I can’t find an open pool.
AND the comment about Downtown not getting “fixed” until the neighborhoods, clubs, and other organizations of citizens have no say?
You need to attend one of the SNI, or many neighborhood meetings. http://www.northside-sj.org/ Many people have been working very hard for many years to achieve incredible improvements. Backesto park is a prime example. Planting trees in park strips is another. The people who live downtown had to band together to get heard, and their issues addressed.
Limiting the influence money has on politics is a huge problem. Paid lobbyists are an annoying symptom of the larger problem of money speaking louder than voters.
15 – Gee, did you get your wide brush from George?
#16- Your point is?
#10- Hey Ed,
When is the City going to come up with a formal complaint process for the public for City Staff who violate our rights, and who don’t follow proper procedures? We are holding our Mayor, Council, and Police Officers accountable?
When are you Sunshine folks going to do something to hold these over paid employees to the same standard you’re holding the Mayor and Council to? Rarely ever does the City Manager’s Office respond to valid complaints about staff, even when you give them documentation. They know the Mayor or Council can’t intervene, so the CM Office just jerks you around!
17 – The point is that you make it sound like City Hall is rife with rogue employees doing whatever they want and accountable to no one. That is simply not the case. Perhaps you had a bad experience but it is hardly the norm. And what makes you think the Mayor/Council can’t intervene? They may not have direct authority over the Manager’s office, but a call placed to a council office gets the Manager’s (or any other department head’s) attention.
I just don’t like to see mostly good people maligned by such broad accusations. That was the point.
#18- My statement in no way said, ” The point is that you make it sound like City Hall is rife with rogue employees doing whatever they want and accountable to no one. “
Harold, you’re misinformed, or you work at City Hall. Many members of the public have had issues with staffers who are doing a lot of unethical things. THese citizens have gone before Council, after trying to go through the City Manager’s Office with no resolution. I think a formal, documented process is badly needed.
Where you got my asking Ed when a formal complaint process for citizens to have access to, turned into a broad stroke of including ALL city staff in my query came from I don’t know! I have had very good fortune with my dealings with the majority of city staff, but the one person I didn’t, broke the Brown Act on a continual basis, ignored Council’s direction to stop holding private meetings, ignored direction to send proper notice, ignored many other laws. When a group of us filed a complaint with his direct supervisor, the supervisor sent us back to the same idiot who ignored Council. Then we filed a written complaint with White’s Office. He ignored the complaint. The Council Office resent the complaint to the City Manager on several ocassions, and those were ignored too. So Hark! Harold a formal process with accountability is badly needed, regardless of what you think…
18 – If someone broke the law there is already a formal process. I don’t now how one person could violate the Brown Act, but I’ll assume your account is accurate.
But, during the past 8 years you certainly couldn’t expect the Council to support the Brown Act since they violated, or came close to violating it, on a regular basis.
FYI – I don’t work in City Hall.
#20- According to the City Clerk, and I believe her, she does an excellent job, there is NO formal complaint process for the public regarding city staff. The clerk said it is the responsibility of the City Manager’s Office.
So Ed, when are you Sunshine Task Force folks going to create a formal complaint process for we in the public to deal with city staffers?
The plain fact is that every single person who meets with a councilmember is lobbying for something. Thus, every person other than a friend or family member who, literally, just drops by to say hello is lobbying the councilmember.
The point becomes, where does one draw the line? If I have a street or sewer issue, let’s say, and I make an appointment to talk to my councilperson about it [of course, that never happens, since all most citizens get in response is a form letter from an aide] I am not a lobbyist who needs to be registered.
But we don’t need to parse this whole thing like lawyers. The plain fact is that there are countless individuals and groups who make it a custom/habit/job to approach councilmembers to influence their decisions. They ALL should be required to register, and to identify the person(s) or group(s) that they represent.
I don’t care how much the lobbyists are paid for their work, success fees or otherwise. I do care how much dinero the lobbyist contributes himself/herself, on behalf of others, and how much he/she raises for that councilmember’s campaign. All that needs to be disclosed, ESPECIALLY the ultimate source of those funds.
#8 said: “I suspect that most of the city’s registered lobbyists would object strenuously if the details of their private meetings were made public on the City’s website.”
Uh, so would all the councilmembers, Tom. Most, if not all, elected officals bluster at the suggestion that the public know about each and every one of their meetings. Ask any elected official and I’ll wager he’ll/she’ll tell you it’s disruptive/naive/a waste of time for the public to be told about every breakfast, lunch, dinner, or office conference between a mayor or councilmember and any person seeking his/her vote on an issue.
Deals are rarely done in the open. The major influence is virtually always behind closed doors.
That’s the way “bidniss” gets done, boy.