What are your feelings on the Morgan Hill Redevelopment Agency?
Dennis Delisle:
“I believe we have to be more careful with the spending of the RDA funds. The original purpose of the RDA was to redevelop blighted areas. The setting up of a blighted area is done by the RDA council, which is the current city council, and the definition of ‘blighted’ can be rationalized to almost cover the definition that the council wants. This is a very dangerous application to property owners that are within the RDA area. The council has spent a tremendous amount of the RDA money on capital expenditure in the past few years. RDA money can only be used for the building of the facilities themselves. The operating expenses of these facilities has to come from our general fund. Three of the last four years our general fund has had insufficient money to cover our expenses. The 2006-07 budget was published with the statement ‘It will be necessary to use reserves to balance the budget.’ I believe it’s time to stop spending on facilities and start using the RDA money to help generate income-producing items so that we get the budget balanced and our financial future stabilized. I would not support any more deficit spending, except in case of an emergency.”
Steve Tate:
“I support it and its extension. California’s redevelopment laws allow cities to collect extra revenues from the enhanced property values within a specific geographical area. Morgan Hill has had a redevelopment agency since 1980 and it was extended once before in 1999. The agency is the vehicle we have used to fund previous downtown infrastructure upgrades, Butterfield Boulevard, the Community and Cultural Center, the Aquatics Center, the Centennial Recreation Center and the new Library.
“The RDA extension in 1999 enabled the construction of many new facilities; we now need to switch the focus and emphasis for the upcoming RDA extension. California redevelopment law allows RDA funds to be used for capital costs, but not for operations and maintenance costs. Cultural and recreational facilities operated by municipalities rarely generate enough income to cover their operational costs, and we have found that Morgan Hill is not an exception. We are doing much better on cost recovery than most cities, but are not covering everything, causing our general fund to pick up the slack. We cannot continue to place additional burden on the general fund at this time – not until we can build up a budget surplus that demonstrates the general fund can support the extra burden. So the emphasis for the RDA extension needs to be continued removal of blight and economic development to foster increased general fund income through sales tax and other income generation, as well as an on-going commitment to affordable housing.
“We plan to scale back the geographic redevelopment area when we extend the RDA, removing portions of the business parks to the north that have been redeveloped. This will help generate additional property tax income to our general fund.”
What will you do to reduce the budget deficit?
Dennis Delisle:
“This is the first year in four that we show a small surplus, however, next year’s budget shows a $400,000 deficit. I would not pass a budget with a deficit. I would have staff see where we can cut expenses, look into privatizing areas that are more efficiently done by outside sources. Secondly, I would have each department summit a plan for cost reductions, where we can consolidate programs that are done in more than one department. I would also look at the bidding process. I would recommend that we look more closely at cost of each project, require that we have at least three bids and see where we can save money on materials and labor without jeopardizing the safety of the project. Finally, I would spend more time and resources on how to generate more income for the city than how to spend money. We have a lot of underutilized property in our city that if properly used can generate current and future revenue streams of income. I don’t like the fact that when a city overspends or over commits in some area and then uses the example of needing funds for more police and fire. The city’s main responsibility is to protect its citizens, then to provide the basic city services (water, sewer, roads, garbage collection, power, etc.). Once those are covered then we move on to areas. If we keep spending on facilities that drain our general funds, it’s going to cost us in vital city services.”
Steve Tate:
“We actually had a $48,000 budget surplus in 2005-06! However, some of the monies reimbursed by the state last year cannot be counted on in future years. We are projecting to have a budget deficit of $400,000 again in 2006-07, but starting in 2007-08, we project surpluses exceeding $1 million annually. These projections incorporate the new DiNapoli retail center coming on-line next spring/summer, and they also include added income from reducing the geographic redevelopment area.
“When we projected continuing budget deficits, we created a sustainable budget strategy to resolve our deficit situation and understand what services our residents wanted and were willing to pay for so we could put long-term fixes in place. While we no longer need extra money to provide the current service levels, we still need to carry through on the strategy started with the Community conversations and surveys we did early this year.
“Continuing the conversations will establish the services and service levels people will support. I believe we need an additional fire station and added police manpower, and I know we can’t afford these with our current/projected revenues. The in-depth involvement of residents that is part of the conversations process is needed to see if and how the community would support paying more for enhanced safety services.
“A stronger economic base will keep us out of budget trouble in the future. Extension of the RDA will give us funds to help our economic growth. Getting the right mix of stores in the DiNapoli center and downtown; and the addition of one or two more car dealers support our economic growth and are supported by what we learned in the community conversations.”
What will you do to legislate more regionally, to include issues
affecting neighboring communities such as San Martin?
Dennis Delisle
“I am a member of the South County Joint Planning Advisory Committee. This committee looks at issues that affect the entire county and I am the representative for Morgan Hill. As a member of the city council we have to be concerned what happens in neighboring cities and how it affects the citizens of Morgan Hill. Two main areas to watch are the developments of Coyote Valley and its effects on housing and transportation in Morgan Hill. Also, the creation of a new south county fire district with neighboring cities like San Martin, Gilroy and Hollister. There needs to be a feeling of cooperation in the areas that affects all of us. In many of these areas we cannot legislate but we can cooperate for the benefit of all citizens.”
Steve Tate:
“We have not had a real good relationship with our ‘big’ neighbor to the north, San Jose. Dennis Kennedy has worked hard to improve this relationship, but has been somewhat put off by the current mayor. I will continue to work on improving this relationship and hope a new mayor will be more accessible and open to our overtures on issues that have a direct impact on Morgan Hill, like the development of Coyote Valley.
“We should learn from our frustrations in dealing with San Jose and make sure we don’t present that image to San Martin. We need to support them and can also provide some mentoring should their plans for incorporation go forward.
“I will make stronger overtures to the Morgan Hill Unified School District to work more closely on issues of mutual interest.
“We need to make the assignments of council members, including the mayor, to outside agencies very carefully to assure that our regional relationships and objectives are supported in the most optimal manner.”
What are your views on downtown Morgan Hill housing and business development controls?
Dennis Delisle:
“I agree with Measure F and support the building of a community in downtown. Part of the experience of Morgan Hill is our historic downtown. We need to preserve the ‘home town America’ feel of downtown, yet, create an attraction for people to go there. I support Measure F because it helps to solve some of the challenges that face our downtown. The new people living in downtown will help support the businesses there and attract new businesses that support the community. By working together with businesses, city council and developers, we can come up with a plan that will benefit all the citizens of Morgan Hill.”
Steve tate:
“The question seems to be aimed at the controls. Measure C controls all housing development in Morgan Hill. I chaired the committee that updated Measure P to C and we spent a great deal of effort trying to make it complementary to the downtown plan, which was developed through an effort for which I was vice chair.
“Although at the time I thought Measure C did enough for downtown housing, the advocates for downtown thought it didn’t go far enough, that we need 100 additional units soon, so now Measure F is on the ballot to enact that, and I support it.
“I think this illustrates that the ‘controls’ should not be the concern. We need to work together to define solutions, then make sure there is a way to implement them, as we are doing with Measure F on the ballot. We have many other codes and rules and regulations in place to govern business development, but we also have the Morgan Hill Chamber of Commerce’s Economic Development Committee working with the city to define inhibitors to business development that the council is addressing through its committee structure.”
What are the top three issues in your campaign platform?
Dennis Delisle:
“I want to restore fiscal responsibility. That would include protecting city core services, which include police, fire, sewer and water. Balance the budget and keep it there. Then streamline, simplify and innovate new city practices. Critically analyze public funded projects to complete on time and on budget. “I would look for ways to stimulate economic growth to increase income to the city without raising taxes. It currently takes the average family in Morgan Hill more than five months of their hard earned wages to pay for their state and federal taxes. I believe we are taxed enough and have to find other ways of generating revenues. We have to make Morgan Hill more customer and business friendly to attract people to shop and start businesses here.
“To redirect the use of some of the RDA’s money to sure up our infra-structure and create incentives for growth.Â
To make sure that we do not use “eminent domain” to take away property rights from one private citizen to sell it or give it to another private citizen, group, or developer.”
Steve Tate:
“At a very high level, they are being fiscally responsible, enhancing safety services and maintaining our community values. Let me explain them in reverse order.
“Our values reflect our sense of place, that small town-feel we have, as well as the way we value and support our youth and seniors and how we support our downtown to make it more vigorous.
“Our safety services, both police and fire, are stretched pretty thin right now, we need both an additional staffed fire station and additional police staffing. These are not minor items from a cost perspective, however, so we need a plan to pay for this added support.
“And that brings us to fiscal responsibility. We can bolster ourselves financially by extending the redevelopment agency and using resulting funds in a way that does not put undo stress onto our general fund. We also need to do additional economic development to bring in more tax revenues to help pay for things like enhanced safety services.”
