VTA Board to restructure?

Without having a separate agenda item on the topic during the VTA Board meeting yesterday, the VTA Board discussed various proposals to restructure the board after a consultant report was presented.

Margaret Okuzumi, executive director of BayRail Alliance, reported on last night's meeting at the VTA Riders' Union mailing list:

"Basically they are proposing to re-jigger the city groupings so that there are the same 5 city groupings, but now Morgan Hill and Gilroy get their own group with incipient city San Martin, and Milpitas to be grouped with Santa Clara and Sunnyvale, and the other two groups are modified somewhat also.

"There is also a proposal that representatives from each city group be elected to represent the group for 4 years instead of the current 2-year rotation...

"...It was stated that VTA staff member Jim Lawson is working to appear before all 15 city councils this month and present the proposal for their approval. So if you disagree with the proposal, now is the time to talk to your local council members!"

The restructuring, however, will not fix the conflict of interest between roles as a transit operator and as a congestion management agency (highway builder). Okuzumi has a alternate proposal that would split the current VTA into separate agencies with different functions.

Unfortunately, the new board chair Liz Kniss brought back the old Ron Gonzales tradition of scheduling the public comment at the end of the meeting. Gonzales originally began the practice in 2002 when he became chair. It continued through 2003 and was ended when Don Gage became chair in 2004. Scheduling public comment at the end of the meeting hurt transit riders because the meeting can take hours and transit services operate less frequently as the night goes on.

Kniss is expected to face a tough reelection battle to keep her County Supervisor seat this year. Will she join Dean Chu and Cindy Chavez and lose reelection while being the VTA Board Chair?

Pay to play at VTA with Chair and SJ mayoral candidate Cindy Chavez

From SV411 blog, and published in San Jose Metro:

"Why did Connecticut developer Republic Holdings Corporation drop $50,000 into the Democratic party’s coffers on September 5?..." (which that committee supports Chavez's bid for mayor)

"Those generous individuals at Republic also contributed $5500 directly to Chavez’s mayoral campaign. A half-dozen nicely synchronized checks showed up at the end of April..."

"Documents show that Cindy Chavez met with a developer a day before the Valley Transit Authority committee she chairs approved its project and seven weeks before the firm donated $50,000 to the Democratic Central Committee’s United Democratic Campaign..."

On July 20, a VTA Board Committee of the Whole approved the proposal from the Republic/Green Valley to redevelop the West San Carlos site, a site used for storage during the construction of the Vasona Light Rail extension. On August 3, the VTA board formally approved the proposal. Cindy Chavez is the Chair of the VTA board and has presided at both meetings.

The Gonzales style pay to play culture has occurred under Cindy Chavez's watch as the chair of VTA. What more could happen if she becomes the mayor of San Jose, which controls five votes on the VTA board?

Chavez's first Gonzales-style last minute memo on the proposed VTA expenditure scenario

Click on the images for larger size

At the VTA board meeting on March 2, VTA Chair and San Jose Vice Mayor Cindy Chavez and Dean Chu from Sunnyvale presented a memo to reject the 1/4 cent tax scenario and establish a Measure A sub-commitee to start a "public" process to determine expenditure priorities. The sub-committee would complete its tasks and formulate recommendations to the VTA board no later than August, before the deadline to submit a ballot measure for the November election.

During the discussion, Supervisor Liz Kniss expressed appreciation for the memo and asked to hold the sub-committee meetings in different parts of the county. Supervisor Jim Beall, who is a candidate for the State Assembly, requested to hold one of the meetings in his district as well.

However, Forest Williams from San Jose complained that why he had to wait a few more months to make a decision after spending the last several months discussing the expenditure scenario. He seemed that he wanted to go ahead and immediately vote on the expediture plan despite the disagreements between the cities.

Greg Perry of Mountain View asked why the proposed sub-committee was not charged to study different tax revenue projections and why the members of that sub-committee were designated on the memo rather than letting the city groups to decide.

Dennis Kennedy of Morgan Hill suggested that the sub-committee should recommend an advisory measure at the end of its term in August and submit it for the November ballot.

Despite all the good intentions about public participation and creating a countywide consensus, it was obvious that this memo was produced to avoid a guaranteed divided vote on the 1/4 cent tax scenario, as well as linking the VTA expenditure plan with the June county tax, which could violate Prop. 218. Perhaps what Kennedy was not aware is that he unveiled the plan of Carl Guardino, which is having a general sales tax in June and a following advisory measure in November. It is basically a 1996 A/B sales tax measure without both appearing on the ballot at the same time. Both the general sales tax measure and the advisory measure require 50% voter approval.

While there's a potential that the committee would recommend something different than the expenditure plan that the VTA board rejected, the prospect of an advisory vote in November have damaged the process before it begins. It is clear that the SVLG is determined to deceive voters and circumvent the 2/3 voter requirement, which other counties in the Bay Area have no problems in meeting that requirement.

The board approved the recommendation outlined in the memo with Perry dissenting.

VTA tax vote to be delayed?

On Friday, VTA board chair Cindy Chavez and general manager Michael Burns issued a memo recommending to delay the vote to place the 1/4 cent sales tax to March. Originally the tax vote was scheduled to be held in its February meeting. The staff cited insufficient time between the presentations to various groups and the originally scheduled vote in February 2nd to "to analyze and thoroughly consider all of the feedback and comments."

Although the new chairperson Cindy Chavez brings to the VTA board a less hostile leadership style than Ron Gonzales, there's isn't much room left to make a bad sales tax plan a good one.

The County Board of Supervisors, scheduled to meet Tuesday, January 24, will discuss and vote whether to support the VTA sales tax proposal. A staff memo was prepared showing that the Center for the Continuing Study of the California Economy has over-estimated the sales tax revenue growth for the 1996 Measure A/B 1/2 sales tax program, which is scheduled to expire this April. This is the same firm that VTA cited for predicting a higher revenue projection for its sales taxes in an attempt to deceive the voters.

Faux debate on BART - Unfair and unbalanced

The Commonwealth Club, along with the Mineta Transportation Institute at San Jose State, California State Automobile Association, and SVLG, will host a forum on BART on the afternoon of April 21 at the County building. Supposedly Greg Perry of Mountain View was invited to serve as a panelist along with Cindy Chavez of San Jose, Carl Guardino of SVLG and Dennis Kennedy of Morgan Hill.

Guardino is obviously a strong supporter of that project and SVLG is bring Chavez along to prep her to become another Gonzales. Kennedy is opposed to the project but is nowhere close compared to Perry when it comes to the knowledge about VTA and the project.

Rod Diridon Sr., who got a nice job being the director of the Mineta Transportation Institute, recently removed Perry off the panel for some reason. Bay Rail Alliance and VTA Riders Union wrote letters to complain. It is no surprise that Diridon kicked Perry out because Diridon is afraid of Perry telling the truth behind the BART project. Diridon replaced with a token opposition Ron Swegles of Sunnyvale to make themselves look good.

Apparently, as reported in the ba.transportation newsgroup, the executive director of the Commonwealth Club - Gloria Duffy, is the wife of Rod Diridon. So no phone calls need to make that work, just some pillow talk!