Petaluma City Council to face big issues this fall
As the weather cools off in Petaluma this fall, action in city government is set to heat up as the City Council returns from a month-long recess to the expected continuation of union negotiations, battles over funding for infrastructure and access to public lands, a call for more housing and policy issues around marijuana.
Also in the works is the hiring of a permanent fire chief, various infrastructure upgrades throughout the city and the continued hashing out of details for a potential sales tax for road improvements that could come before voters in 2016.
“We’ve got to define what it is we’re going to present to the voters in 2016,” said Mayor David Glass, who cited early talks around the potential tax as among the issues that will be top of mind as the city enters the busy fall season.
Legal battles continue
Last month the Petaluma City Council voted to continue its fight to the state Supreme Court over $11.4 million in infrastructure funding. The money came from bonds issued by the city’s former redevelopment agency, but has been held unusable in trust due to technicalities in the 2011 law that dissolved those agencies.
The funding was earmarked for uses like the planned Rainier crosstown connector and a recently revamped interchange at Old Redwood Highway. The Supreme Court is expected to inform the city whether it will take up the case in the next three months, said Councilman Mike Healy.
Other legal discussions are happening closer to home. A consultant is working with the city to analyze a challenge by Safeway over a proposed gas station near its store on South McDowell Boulevard, which focuses on a recent change to the way the city determines traffic impact fees for such projects.
The fees were formerly levied based on the square footage of a station’s small kiosk. The new approach bases traffic impact on the number of pumps, Healy said.
“It makes a lot more sense,” he said. Yet he also noted the complexity of the legal framework around the issue.
Mediation talks are also continuing between the city and property owners in the issue of public access to the 270-acre Lafferty Ranch, a city-owned property northeast of Petaluma that has long been eyed as a possible park, yet remains boxed-in by an intersection of neighboring private parcels. While closed-session talks are expected to continue, it is less clear if and when there will be a resolution in the long-running conflict.
New hires,?new contracts
Talks continue over new contracts for Petaluma’s public safety employees, which together account for 130 individuals in a 280-strong workforce.
A contract encompassing firefighters expired more than two years ago, and contracts for both police and public safety mid-managers each expired in July of 2014.
Yet as new agreements have been inked with other employee groups in recent months, Glass said the city will be seeking to continue that momentum in the fall. New contracts were ratified with a group of mid-management employees in June, followed by an agreement with a large group of employees represented by a municipal employees union in July.
“Clearly, we need to come to an understanding with our bargaining units,” Glass said. “That will help us know what our expenditures will be.”
The city is also expected to hire a permanent fire chief later this month, according to City Manager John Brown. The department has been headed by interim fire chief Leonard Thompson since April, following the retirement of seven-year chief Larry Anderson.
A tax measure?takes shape
Next summer, the city will face a deadline to put a potential road improvement tax on the 2016 ballot, but early talks are already underway as city officials contemplate the nature of a measure.
First announced in an Argus-Courier op-ed signed by Councilman Healy and council members Kathy Miller and Gabe Kearney in August, the three-quarter-cent sales tax could raise $20 million for the Rainier project and $80 million for road repair over 20 years. The measure could also raise money for other needs, like upgrades and replacements to aging fire stations.
The approach seeks to be more specific than the local and county tax measures that failed to pass in the last year. Petaluma’s Measure Q and the countywide Measure A were both criticized for being too open-ended, and both failed to pass with the lower 50 percent threshold of a general tax.
Up for debate is what would be covered by a new tax. While Glass said he was unwilling to support a measure focused on issues outside of roads, Councilman Chris Albertson, a former Petaluma fire chief, said improvements to the city’s fire and police stations were sorely needed.
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