From the Publisher/Arnold G. York
Spending part of each week in Sacramento watching the state government at work gives me a somewhat different perspective than I had when I was just watching Malibu. I used to believe that Malibu had a dysfunctional government, but compared to Sacramento at work, Malibu is practically a model of sanity.
For example, there is currently a fight to the death going on in Sacramento about not raising taxes, even a temporary sales tax, to cover the budget shortfall. On the other hand, many politicians are perfectly willing to issue bonds to cover the shortfall and then pay it back over the next five or 10 years.
To tell you the truth, I just can’t understand the difference. If there are more taxes, you have to take more money out of your pocket to pay the taxes. If there are bonds, you have to take more money out of your pocket each year to pay for the bonds-and the interest. If anything, bonds seem to me to be the most expensive way to go. We’re not bonding to build something that’s going to last for 10 years. We’re borrowing money to pay off our state credit cards on which we’ve overspent, and looking to the next generation to cover us. It doesn’t sound like much of a deal for the future generation.
Still, each time I come back to Malibu, life seems so much more manageable. There is a certain comfort level in returning to Malibu because it moves so slowly. So little changes that you have the feeling life is practically standing still. Even the people who show up to protest are practically the same group that was protesting five to 10 years ago and, the truth is, they always say about the same thing.
Apparently, we’ve now unofficially rejected Plan A of the Malibu Bay Company Development Agreement, which was several years in the making, and are on to Plan B, or is it B-plus, or maybe even C-minus? It’s difficult to remember which.
The opposition says we’re not quite there yet, but no one really believes that anymore because it has become painfully obvious that no plan-B, C, D, or W, X, Y or Z-is ever going to pass muster. The new plan, whatever it’s going to be, will first again go to the Planning Commission, which will first complain there isn’t enough time to examine it, and then will find a reason, not necessarily the same reason, that it’s terrible and should be the subject of further negotiation. The enviros will all complain that the plan is different, so we really need an entire new EIR (environmental impact report), and we can’t conceivably do it in less than 10 or 11 years. The Planning Commission will then reject the new plan since a number of its members are running for City Council and seem to believe there is no political gain in agreeing to anything. The planning commissioners will then carefully explain how the City Council that appointed them has screwed up, the implication being that the citizens of Malibu would be much better off if some of the commissioners were running the show.
What’s finally going to happen is the City Council is going to have to show some guts and take a stand, accept the fact that this is a political decision and not an environmental or planning decision, and vote it up or down and then ship it off to the ballot for the rest of us to vote on.
If not, it’s going to end up being decided where I’m afraid most Malibu matters end up-in court with a judge deciding.
In the meantime, we have no community center, we have no emergency room facility, we have no City Hall (that we own), we have no new ball fields (in fact, the old ball fields are in danger), and we have septic problems in the Civic Center and in a number of other locations in Malibu. It’s also reasonably clear that in the near future the feds and the state are going to be coming after home septic systems, probably initially along the beaches and then later in the hills. It’s time to act.
Almost everything that’s been in dispute for the last 12 years or so is still in dispute.
I truly believe the City Council will never achieve a broad consensus on anything in Malibu, and I would recommend it stop trying. In a situation where you can’t please everyone, where any compromise you craft is unacceptable, the only thing to do is to vote your conscience and virtually tell the opposition to stick it. What’s the point of being in office if you can’t get anything done? Pick a plan, go with it, and let us vote on it.
The same advice applies on the state level. At some point, they’re going to have to get a budget. Every delay means our credit gets downgraded, and each downgrading, as it was explained to me, means $400 million more to borrow the money we need. I think that if the Democrats can’t cut a deal with the Republicans, they should pass a budget without new taxes (the Republican plan), make all the necessary cuts, horrendous as some of them will be, and then people would see what those cuts really mean. Then, the people, if upset enough, would vote on an initiative to lower the budget requirement to 55 percent, or whatever would practically put the Republican party out of business in this state.
Enough for now. Next week I’ll solve the Middle East’s problems.