City Council planning retreat report
Formerly, the May 18 meeting reported on here was called the council goals setting workshop. I attended the entire meeting and offer these notes, along with, in italics, my comments
The meeting had three objectives. One, to “develop a shared understanding of the external and internal demands the city is facing.” Two, “agree on major City-wide strategies that will inform the budget and work plan beyond day-to-day operations.” Three, “speed up the process and be proactive in learning how to work together as a council.”
Strategic planning consultant Sherry Lund was hired to run the meeting. She facilitated the agenda and brought a objective, multi-city awareness of issues to the council, as well as a solid background in communication dynamics. Throughout, Lund focused on organizational best practices.
The meeting started with about ten public comments, the bulk of which addressed affordable housing and the costs of a tourism-centered economy to citizens. The gist of these comments can be summarized by the following, “be careful how much you let money talk, and how much you let the heart and soul of Sonoma talk.”
City manager Cathy Capriola gave a rundown of current city context, internal demands, external issues and uncertainties, and what’s on the horizon for the future. Off the top, Cathy said Sonoma is not in a bubble. Salient issues are regional and national as well. The Bay Area is hot (3 x national growth rate) economically, with related symptoms that are out of the city’s direct control, such as congested traffic, high real estate values and a tight labor market. Health care, leisure and hospitality and professional services are forecast to grow.
City staff is lean, with 35 employees. 11 staff, 50% new, are in project management while the majority of the 35-staff capacity is at operational levels. Staffing levels and financial resources are not aligned with council (or public) expectations.
Internal city issues: There are holes in accounting and project management, and operational capacity in planning, building and maintenance is stretched. Infrastructure is in pretty good shape, with the Plaza in need of some attention. The city needs a long-term facility asset management plan, to know where unfunded liabilities are. Technology needs investment.
The city is financially lean, with $17 million in the general fund, a five-year half-cent sales tax, and a possible TOT increase (suggested by the Sun years ago). The city needs a five-year forecast so council can make smart decisions. Currently capital improvement plans are for one year only, a narrow view.
Capriola mentioned that sometimes financial decisions can be pennywise and pound foolish. “We are in the building community quality of life business.” “What are your values?” Capriola asked the council. Where to put the money and efforts?
External influences: These are divided into local, state and national. Locally, issues of the balance of tourism and city character remain unaddressed. Social media use by neighborhoods is changing the nature of civic involvement and issue advocacy. Downtown traffic is bad. Climate protection and environmental sustainability are issues. A tight labor market has caused shortages at all employment levels.
At the state level, cannabis, CalPERS, increased state municipal requirements, and a redevelopment lawsuit are issues. California is about the worst in the country for economic inequality. This inequality is difficult to comprehensively address for a town of 11,000. Nationally, immigration executive orders and “overall White House uncertainty” are issues to reckon with.
In a bit of council comment following this section of the retreat, David Cook said he felt many good city things get glossed over and are not reported; it’s “always the controversial things.” “Council issues are the same as what everyone else has”, said Cook. Capriola said public information needs to be more transparent. This is in conjunction with increased use of social media by neighborhood advocacy groups that is changing expectations for quality and levels of civic participation. A new city website can engage along new social media channels, and perhaps address (from the city’s and other actor’s perspectives) various levels of misinformation. Consultant Lund said misinformation needs to be addressed.
This is interesting. Advocacy, partisanship, control of messaging, spin, “misinformation”, and what qualifies as factual information, are core issues in who is able to define, and prevail in the outcome of public issues. The city has interests like any other party. During a later part of the meeting, council members said they could be persuaded to change their perspective by facts. Yet it is abundantly clear, even before Trump, that facts are what anyone, even city actors, wants them to be. Humpty Dumpty said it best, “words mean exactly what I want them to mean, nothing more, nothing less…” Bias is impossible to eliminate. So how then, in figuring out local issues and votes, can any set of facts be said to be truer, more accurate, and more persuasive than others? In a socially constructed world, that does not operate by immutable scientific laws, facts are fungible. This then puts the onus on being able to clearly describe values, and why they are held. In a perfect work, biases are disclosed. Values, rather than being self-evident, are believed in, like faith. Subjective values underlie and define the “facts” that are relative to them. Later in the meeting when the council was asked to describe their values, most were unable to give a clear, self-reflective accounting. To be fair, maybe a lot of other people would not be able to either.
A clear definition of council member values, however, would represent a road map of how they would vote on various issues, as for example, when they shared beliefs with various advocates pushing for this or that outcome.
There can be more or less blatant attempts at misinformation, such as when advocacy over a contested issue gets really heated. Or misinformation can be subtle, and rest on leaving out points that might contradict the believed-in thesis, or desired outcome. To the extent that values represent belief, they can be blind spots. People may be unable to reflect upon values, because they have internalized them as fact, as the truth. The very idea of misinformation rests on the premise that there is a context of true facts about which all can agree. If there is such a realm of social facts, when somebody finds it, please let me know.
The meeting then segued into the next section of Capriola’s city context framing, of how to strategic plan. You go from Mission (why we exist), to Values (what’s important to us), to Vision, (what we want to be), the Strategy (how we get there), to Action (what we need to do). For the city, this is seen as five-year effort, that will be modified in process. Capriola then presented three critical “horizon maps.” These three are the General Plan Initiative, the Financial Management Initiative and the Quality of Life/ Infrastructure Initiative.
The General Plan links community values, vision and objectives with land use. It is the blueprint for the city’s future. A lot of community participation will be needed/expected to define this blueprint. Capriola mentioned her experience in Davis, where it took 13 years to conclude citizen participation, and that at some point, the plan just needs to get done. Capriola has some fun city management jargon. “Churn”, is when there is too much talk, not and not enough action. You “need to get to an end result.” As time goes by, the public changes, values shift, and people feel differently about issues.
Next year there will be a community survey, and an economic development strategic update. The General Plan will likely be managed by a consultant, and an RFP put out, hopefully for a local entity who knows the issues here.
The urban growth boundary, or UGB, is part of this General Plan horizon. When the current UGB ends in 2020, the boundary will remain in place, but may be modified by the council without a vote of the people.
The Financial Management horizon will cover possible raising the TOT, housing impact fees, the cemetery, PERS, a technology master plan, a facility and park infrastructure asset study, a cost allocation and fee study, and a water rate study update. The end of the five-year sales tax will bookend this horizon. A council member asked if the city was planning too much? Capriola said, that studies give us management skills; we “need to be able to tell the story and educate the public about why we are the way we are.”
The Infrastructure and Quality of Life Investments horizon. This has to do with streets, bridges, parks, Casa Grande parking lot, recycled water study, groundwater banking etc. Given that the Mountain Cemetery also functions as an ancillary city park, and access to the city-owned Overlook Trail, and a historical gem on par with the Plaza, there may be a way to integrate all those aspects into a comprehensive preservation scheme…
The next stage of the meeting was where the council described their vision for Sonoma’s future. This is where council member preferences and values get worked into city strategy. Through this process, the council directs the city manager how to proceed. The points made were collated and condensed by consultant Lund, and folded into defining the major strategies of the city for the next three years. The three-year horizon coincides with the schedule of the General Plan and UGB updates.
Gary Edwards: Emphasized a future valuing of Sonoma’s village-level, small town feel, and protecting agricultural traditions. He said Sonoma has always been a visitor attraction. He wants the UGB to stay in place, not have Sonoma turn into Rohnert Park. Sonoma needs to protect its assets, which has to do with the unique Plaza, and small-town feel of our valley-confined, sunny, geographic, special sense of place. He mentioned developing the Four Corners service station lot, “very smartly, with commercial, and housing in appropriate places.” Future development “of certain types” needs to have a housing component, but he doesn’t know about that for downtown. The hospital South Lot needs three story housing, workforce on top, families in the middle and seniors ground floor. Edwards looks to the possibility of the private sphere and entrepreneurs, with Uber-like small buses, to address mass transit needs.
Consultant Lund: Every California city has horrible transportation problems. She sees these issues as getting sorted out by Silicon Valley. A “shared economy blended with autonomous vehicles will be as disruptive as personal computers…”
Madolyn Agrimonti: Sees the SMART train coming to Schellville, and increases in county mass transit. Highway 37 will be a causeway with an estuary underneath. 5th Street East will have all utilities underground. Groundwater use will allow residents more water year-round. Affordable housing built in Marin will fix Sonoma’s housing problems. (Lund interjected that idea is “not looking good.”) No buses or cabs will be by city hall but rather all in the Casa Grande parking lot. Wine bars will be limited by new criteria. Citizens will have faith in government and issue will be resolved within time limits. Trash and recycling will get to a place of zero waste. There will be a community pool. There will be a housing trust for mid-level professionals.
David Cook: Would like to see some smart growth. Sonoma a will have “a little infill, but with smart, balanced growth.” Affordable housing will be addressed by all relevant jurisdictions, and this will alleviate problems. Sonoma will partner and network with the county and have more JPAs. Regional solutions to issues will be found. Partnerships with the Springs will be found. The GSA will make the groundwater situation better, with no saline, or saltwater water intrusion. A local food movement will be big, farm to table, local food, local farmers.
Amy Harrington: Social justice issues will be important. Jobs will pay a living wage to adults. It is culturally unacceptable to create jobs that don’t pay a living wage. There will be down payment assistance for housing, loans for second units, developers will build accessory units into housing. The city will meet and surpass its climate goals. Zero waste will be reached. Parks will be used and there will be a pool. Sonoma will keep its village atmosphere. The SMART train will be here, with real public transportation options. The Plaza will be closed to cars every Sunday morning and restaurants will put out tables etc. Politics will be ideas and issues-oriented, geared to solving problems. Less emphasis will be on personalities and ad hominem attacks.
Rachel Hundley: The future will be similar to now, but balanced with socio-economic diversity, “especially the middle class and workforce.” The city will “embrace slow growth in a way we can plan and control… with well-planned infill.” Housing will have a multi-generational composition; different sectors of the community will be served. There will be far more rental housing, and help to create home owners. There will be a diverse economic base, with local small businesses reflecting a tradition of entrepreneurship. Tourism will still be a component. Mass transit and trans tech will totally different. Sonoma will be water secure. History will be protected and honored. Ag will evolve beyond wine, with more local food.
Lund: Did not see any dramatic left turns here. She saw a sense to preserve the village and sense of community. Don’t mess up a good thing.
Agrimonti: Tourism and the SVVB provide services to residents. That the public does not see the benefits, is “a matter of not messaging the benefits properly.” This failure to reckon any costs, the “messaging” and “misinformation” narrative, could be seen as parroting a line from developers and the TID. This is at odds with talk of “balance”, which assumes there are some costs to be reckoned along with the benefits. In triple bottom line sustainability, finding balance equals full cost accounting.
Next up, consultant Lund looked for agreement on major strategies. Have two to six major objectives, that will be worked into the budget and taken into the future with benchmarks and measurable criteria.
Lund then wrote out what she saw as the top five. One, develop a shared vision of community character, including how tourism fits in the community. Two, ensure financial sustainability. Three, invest in long-term infrastructure and quality of life amenities. Four, prepare for next General Plan. Five, housing, and affordable housing. Housing could be at a number one or two level of concern, but, Lund said, there are only a few things you can do with this. It’s “like trying to boil the ocean.”
Of the recent Sonoma Valley Fund study’s noted disconnects, housing was addressed in some fashion by all council members.
Harrington: Development issues are the ones that get the most community involvement. She called for more vision and specificity as to where we are going as a town. Maybe development will always be controversial, she said.
As the council began to discuss the priorities laid out by Lund, housing, to the council’s credit, emerged as the top priority.
Hundley: Housing needs to stay as a top priority. Don’t wrote it off as something we can’t solve.
It became clear that no one, staff, or council, was willing or able to define affordable housing, or “workforce” housing. This in response to questions by Cook and Agrimonti as to what it was and how to define it. This was rather shocking, that after all this time, no one had a clear idea of what affordable housing really was. It wouldn’t have been that hard for someone to lay out area median income (AMI), percent of that, median rent, median home price, annual income levels relative to wages, and how much each wage class could afford in order to buy a house or to rent. “Workforce” is a weasel word; everyone who works is in the workforce. “Workforce” is also possibly a segregationist code word for those not on welfare or taking any government benefits.
Agrimonti: Referred to Logan Harvey’s public comment that workers need to be able to live here.
Lund: The reality of infill and creating housing within a UGB means there has to be multiple story buildings, and higher density.
Capriola: Housing can maybe be part of General Plan. The 2006 Housing Element is the blueprint, yet it is so detailed you don’t know what you are driving forward. The Element is not “packaged.” If Sonoma is not going to grow, infill is the only answer. The buildings go higher. Then you get “character tensions”. Sonoma can’t add 1000s of units, there are limited opportunities. Leveraging private sector support is a possible answer.
David Goodison: Can look at the Housing Element and sync it with council priorities.
Cook: We don’t have the (housing) options without partnering with Marin, and with the county First District.
Lund: Can’t build a wall around Sonoma and prevent people from coming. Bay Area has a housing crisis, limited land, infill is needed, but residents don’t want to build up in height. This is what I have called the “green checkmate.” The interests of the UGB, green separators, and preserved open space fight back against any pushing the edge of municipal spheres of influence, yet in town, NIMBYs won’t have any change at all, especially higher density and higher building heights. In many ways, Sonoma’s in-town character tension issues are those of well-off white suburbanites trying to preserve an idyllic, segregated life.
Edwards: There are 1200 hotel rooms being built around us. We aren’t getting the revenue but we are getting the traffic because people still want to come to Sonoma, from Napa etc. Malls and shopping centers are an outdated retail model; three-story housing can go in those spaces. “Not everybody gets to live here. You earn it. I worked hard at it. We don’t owe anybody anything.” Transportation options will be a big part of the resolving the housing situation.
Hundley: Business needs employees. Seniors need to stay local. Increased transportation options mean more GHG impacts. “How do we break this up and talk about it?”
Lund: Last year’s goals were all over the map, yet the council felt they were not getting enough done. Need to focus on a few things to be effective. What are the big buckets? Define the high-level goals that staff will pay the most attention to. Budget and staff capacity will be focused on those top goals.
Harrington: The talk of generalities is nowhere because it is not tied to outcomes.
Capriola: An actionable plan will be formed here, out of the strategic priorities, with targets and deadlines.
Edwards, asked for an inventory of potential infill development areas. Agrimonti suggested a housing trust fund.
Housing Action Items: Staff to provide update on Housing Element. Have a work study session with the Planning Commission. Inventory developable land.
Then the discussion moved as to what to call affordable housing. Hundley wanted to use the word diversity. Edwards suggested housing “opportunity” vs. affordability. The term settled on was “housing opportunity and strategy”, rather than affordable housing.
Capriola said “anything you do (on housing) will come out of impact fees or the general fund.”
You can see the values and biases come out here between council members. At the end of the meeting, the consultant said she didn’t see a big values gulf on the council. She was wrong. Some are more economically focused and see things first through a private, business lens, others feel there is a role for government and public structural remedies. Some council members are more traditional, some more modern in sensibility. Some see social justice as a structural matter (pay a decent wage up front), others as a personal choice (work harder and get up earlier in the morning). These values differences are straight out of George Lakoff’s strict father vs. nurturing family dichotomy, and represent essential values differences between liberals and conservatives. The council has two clear conservatives, of different flavor, in Cook and Edwards. Harrington and Hundley are different flavors of liberal. Agrimonti says she leans liberal, and wants government to do great things, but is not clearly ideological.
Bridging the gap on ideological values differences is difficult, as we see from the dysfunction of national politics. Values become rigid truths, a contest of perceived purity. How would a fact change a value? The best we can do is clearly put values on the table, so we know what we are dealing with.
That naming the affordable housing issue would swing to an economic angle, without any prior definition of affordable housing, seems odd. Yet whatever you call the housing or why, there are still metrics and criteria. There will be more or less “housing opportunity” depending on where a person is relative to the AMI. The facts that measure affordability on the ground don’t change. The Sonoma high-end/ low wage economy has the poor, who need affordable housing at 50% AMI annual income, externalized out of town. Sonoma’s service workers are poor and getting poorer, and unable to live here. Sonoma actors then say we are only two square miles, and have to take care of our own… but Sonoma already failed its own and they now live elsewhere. Cook’s ideas of partnering in the Springs are good.
Next up as a top strategic goal was community character and how tourism fits the community.
Cook mentioned that it was Ken Brown who called for “balancing community character.”
This was after the heat of the hotel Measure B. “Balancing community character lasted for a year as a goal, until the next year’s council dropped the “balancing” and just said “community character”. Now the balancing is back, as the tourism has grown exponentially with the TID and SVVB spending 100s of 1000s of dollars a year to tell the whole world to come here. No balance has been achieved, only lop-sided tourism growth. This then ties back to the notion of “misinformation”, and the idea that the people who see the costs of tourism simply have cognitive dissonance, and haven’t got the right message about all the benefits.
The housing crisis and low service economy wages are Exhibit A of costs, as shown in the Sonoma Valley Fund Hidden in Plain Sight study.
If the Plaza is the heart of town, the jewel of the village, there are different council sensibilities on how to manage it. From commercial limits and event oversight, to free market and no controls. These reflect values differences. While all seem to agree that preserving town character is important, good character to some is bad for others. Different town interests are represented by different council members. Thus, a community conversation would be good, get the actors and the cards laid out on the table, and whatever character is, find the balance.
Cook said there should be a spread sheet of costs and benefits. He spoke of public perception; people need to know the council cares about this issue. He does not want 1000 tasting rooms. Where is the right number, he asked. Cook also, to his credit mentioned using the sustainability Venn diagram to model the issues.
Edwards said tourism “is our steel mill.” Capriola noted that this strategic goal was a community character policy choice. Harrington called for a community town hall forum on tourism, put it in with the General Plan, receive public comment. Harrington said to not treat the TOT just as a windfall. A windfall only has no sense of the costs of tourism. The costs have to be part of the discussion.
Lund suggested a survey, some outreach. Yet this could turn into a contest of pro forma e-mails. How to accurately gage public opinion when advocates will try to use social media and stack the results to their advantage? How can one person-one vote be enforced in an anonymous internet age?
Cook said there was a downside to not enough hotels, if people are day tripping from Napa, the city loses revenue and the traffic GHG goes up. Cook called for the SVVB to meet with the council. Cook also noted the city gets no revenue from wine clubs. Edwards noted that many who are here now first came as tourists, and that Sonoma has always been a destination. He also noted there was a backlash against too many real estate offices in the Plaza.
Capriola asked for action items. Cook said to put tasting rooms and Plaza use on the agenda, get the Chamber to help out. Agrimonti noted that small wine club venues appear to have morphed into corporate, expensive-rent venues. The Plaza market is artificial she said, because it is controlled by a few landlords. Maybe limit the venues by attrition she said.
Chief Sackett said wine tasting rooms and wine bars are different because of the different types of ABC licenses. Tasting rooms are owned by an actual winery to market their own single source wine. Wine bars market multiple brands, and can also have beer. There is a conditional use permit system in place for wine bar types only.
Lund asked what is the mix? What is balance? What is perception vs. reality?
Capriola said there could be a trend analysis, and an early Fall conversation.
Harrington wants clarity of city policy, so that likely outcomes can be known ahead of time by knowing city policy priorities. Thus, the years of city dithering with unfocused tourism cost/benefit goals have created a policy void that now has tensions, as different interested parties all seek to cite catch-all General Plan phrases, and unclear city tourism development policy.
Capriola said more specific land use and zoning plans could be made, and with a transition like that, there will be troubles. Lund said the city may be at an inflection point. What the balance is needs to be clarified. And so, in an ironic twist, that includes both the slogans of the hotel Measure B antagonists, the phrase “preserve and protect community character” was chosen as the heading of how to note this strategic planning item.
The agenda then went to financial sustainability. Cathy Capriola finished this section of the retreat up by saying that if the council goes off goals, then the priorities shift. Changing focus comes at a cost for attention to the top issues. There’s not a lot of room for “squirrels”, or policy things that run all over that are not related to plans. Lund seconded this by saying the council can’t do everything at once, it just won’t all get done.
Lund took the council into a discussion of productive intra-council working and commuciation dynamics to finish up. As the group dynamics part wound down, Lund asked, in a question that should be of great interest to the public, asked how council members can be influenced when their mind is made up? What will make them not listen?
Hundley said people who ask “why” start to open the door to her reasons. When she is patronized she closes down. Cook said his decisions are all on a percent. The revealing of new facts, something that is very factual, in appeals for example, can influence him. Don’t make it personal if you want in with Cook. Harrington is persuaded by facts and context, history. She doesn’t like the attitude people get like you are stupid if you disagree. Agrimonti wants people to get a fair shake. Also, “if it doesn’t comply with regulations, those are the facts.” “I’m pretty liberal leaning.” she said. Don’t say you voted for her because, or you won’t vote for her because… Edwards said new information can persuade him, a pertinent comment in the process. He does not like dishonesty, not telling the truth.
Lund asked council members to speak of their values. Edwards said he never looks over his shoulder, that’s how he does everything. Harrington cited fairness as a value, honesty, integrity, and she likes to include non-regulars in the process. Cook values traditions, and getting people involved. Agrimonti thinks the everyone on the council is a tweak apart. Hundley values authenticity, sincerity and integrity, and also values long-term sustainability and economic diversity.
4:PM End of meeting.
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