A reader made a very cogent, thoughtful and accurate comment on my last essay regarding the police station. She correctly quoted Mike Malone stating that he did not yet have a plan for paying for the new police station and eloquently expressed her concerns.
The mayor has also expressed similar concerns over this aspect of the process. What I did not agree with was the reader's summation that Mike Malone should be fired because of this. Take into account the previous Vallejo City Council's change in direction from 400 Mare Island Way to the JFK Library and 400 Mare Island Way, add to that all of the public resistance to either or both scenarios, then top that off with the change in market conditions regarding the cost of money. Not to mention the little-known fact that contractors are less willing to work with government agencies and that the price of construction has nearly doubled due to this, combined with the rise in both labor and material expenses, well, frankly, frankly, there is no bullseye for him to hit until council gives their final approval for a development plan at 111 Amador.
Recently I had a conversation with a friend who is high up in San Francisco City maintenance. He explained to me that the premier company for large-scale project estimating was coming in 40, 50, even 60% under the final contractor estimates for the project he was overseeing. "We have to cut the scope of our project by 50% in order to make this project happen," he stated. "Right now things are out of control. Hopefully, by the end of summer, we will see prices normalize and maybe come down." In my professional opinion as a General Contractor, the best approach is to finalize the schematic (rough) design for the new building at 111 Amador; seek out a professional Engineer's Estimate, as S.F did; ask about cost the cost inflations I mentioned; then search for appropriate funding mechanisms and inform the council. This part is not Mike's fault.
We citizens have had a hard time trusting our city government over the last few years. We literally had our former city manager sneak away in the middle of the night rather than work with the opinions and wishes of our populace. Basically, he quit us. While I have sensed both frustration and despair in our current city management, they are not quitting on us. They listened to our collective requests and put together different scenarios, for varying potential police station locations, and presented them to our new council for consideration. It was helpful, sobering, and surprisingly uneventful. An open process that is leading me toward a restored faith in our governing bodies.
Rupture and repair is a term often used in personal relationships. We have all heard, and sometimes joke, about the fatal flaw. "It's all wine and roses until you find the fatal flaw." Rupture and repair is the process of discovering these fatal flaws, having the heart-wrenching discussions, finding the middle ground and moving forward stronger, and with a deeper understanding of each other.
Some time ago I read a book on commitment. The crux of it was this: If you remove the option to quit, you are left working to ensure the relationship succeeds. Winston Churchill is famous for saying, "Never give up. Never, never give up." Rather than work with us, Nyhoff quit us. He gave up. In this case, Mike Malone listened and provided three options, as we asked for. Now we may not like them but I feel that the ship of trust is turning in the right direction. It is the start of the repair process. City Manager Malone made the first overt step. The new council responded by asking for more information on 111 Amador; they too made an overt step to repair our relationship.
I personally have felt abandoned by the previous administration's approach to paternalistic decision-making; all in our best interests. Ours is a representative democracy with talented people both in our general population and on our commissions and council. Each of us brings another piece of the puzzle together for problem-solving, especially on these large community-wide issues. I have heard a few speakers lately discuss that the end of the Era of Experts is here.
Intelligence has been defined as the ability to connect seemingly unrelated items combined with an exceptional recall of information. Add experience to that and you have an Expert. Except, nowadays, our entire paradigm has shifted. Instead of an outdated encyclopedia sitting on our parent's bookshelf, we have the internet. Instead of one person's experience, we are able to crowdsource 100, 1000, 1 Million experiences. The Era of the Expert is over. Information is no longer limited to the few. Each of us has real value and each of our contributions will always return a better result. The scary thing for some is that this is the beginning of truly decentralizing power.
This reader is intelligent and never fails to provide a cogent, well-researched, well-reasoned argument. But I disagree with her with regard to firing our City Manager. It is my wish that we all take a moment to see the value in processing our pain and mistrust, and to give our new city government the opportunity to process as well. The first step has been taken and I wish to thank Our City Manager and his staff, and our Mayor and city council for actually listening to us.
I do not know what the outcome of all this will be, I have only one opinion, but I do know that trusting and engaging in open public conversations will go a long way to repairing the rupture of trust we had in our government and each other.
— Tommy Judt/Vallejo
No comments:
Post a Comment