The League of Women Voters of Richardson sent out a questionair to the candidates for city counci. The following are the questions and links to their answers. The two questions that most interested me were #11 and #12.
2. Why do you want to be a Richardson City Council member?
3. How many Richardson City Council board meetings have you
attended? What City of Richardson boards and/or commissions have you served on?
Give specific examples of your civic involvement.
4. What other offices have you run for? When?
5. What organizations do you belong to?
6. What qualities should the Mayor and the Mayor Pro Tem
possess that set them apart from other council members?
7. What, if anything, can and should be done to accelerate
the completion of the Cotton Belt Rail Line from Richardson to DFW Airport?
8. What should be done with the Arapaho/Collins
Redevelopment area?
9. What should be included in Richardson’s Cultural Arts
Master Plan?
10. The City of Richardson has recently provided its
citizens with a much improved gymnastic facility. What other facility, if any,
do you believe the City should make available to the residents and how would
you propose to pay for the facility?
11. Since water will continue to be a major issue for all of
Texas, what are your thoughts on our local conservation measures? Should we do
more? Why or why not?
12. The City of Richardson has a long history of support for
strong neighborhoods. One of the tools the City has used and continues to
refine is the Rental Registration program. Do you support this program in its
current form? If not, what changes would you propose?
13. What do you think of the city’s level of participation
in regional government alliances/coalitions such as the North Texas Council of
Governments, North Texas Municipal Water District, North Texas Tollway
Authority, Dallas Area Rapid Transit, etc.?
14. The City of Richardson, as a mature suburb, has aging
infrastructure and housing stock. What is your opinion of the city’s current
programs in this area?
15. Should the city try to get a DART rail stop at Belt Line
/ Main Street?
Question 11, on the issue of water, Bob Townsend says the residents much
be educated and institute programs that encourage the behavior of conversation.
I am taking it that he got confused on his word usage and meant to say
conservation.
Mark Solomon picked the correct word, “conservation” and
complains that if about storage facilities. He thinks we need to conserve on
water use as well.
Scott Dunn doesn’t see water restriction going away in the
foreseeable future. He thinks Richardson is continuing to be a leader with the
NTMWD and working to find additional water sources.
Kendal Hartley thinks Richardson has been working with the
NTMWD as well saying the new $300 million pipeline from Lake Texoma will help
when completed in the fall of 2013.
New kid on the block Paul Voelker thinks aligning our
conversation policies with other cities in the NTMWD should provide adequate
conservation efforts. He wants to promote, educate and demonstrate water
conservation practices.
Steve Mitchell wants to do more. He thinks the city should
provide economic incentives to conserve by installing low-low flow toilets and
other water conservation equipment. “Also, the days of unlimited water uses are
gone due.” Steve may have been hanging around Bob for a bit too long. The “due”
was probably meant to be too.
Laura Maczka seems to think “rain dances” will not work for
us either. She realizes that they can’t “make rain happen”. But, she at least
glimpses something that all other council members have not seen; “Take-Or-Pay”
is counter intuitive. After that she falls back in line with the rest of the
council members that things are out of control and conversation
conservation must be the rule. She notes we have two former council members on
the board representing our interest.
And finally we get to Amir Omar’s thoughts on the issue. He
also thinks conservation is something we must do. He agrees with every other
council member on this. Amir also agrees with all of the rest of the council
and the new kid on the block that educating the public about the importance of
conserving water.
This is where Amir stands out from the rest of the council:
Take-Or-Pay penalizes those who conserve water. Only Laura Maczka mention Take-Or-Pay
and that was only to say it was counterintuitive. She did not go further and
identify it as a problem is need of solving.
In my view, this is just one of many demonstrations why Amir
would be a better leader for the residents of Richardson than Laura. A leader
of this city should do more than just take notice of things that need to be
changed. A leader will take the initiative to make changes, not just at
election time, but throughout the whole term.
dc, I seem to be missing something here. Laura seems to say what all the others, including Amir. She also mentions the"Take or Pay" water use system employed by the water district is problematic but that we have representation on the water district board. The system rewards rapidly growing cities and penalizes those with stable population. Any change in the system requires unanimous consent of the member cities. So, back to my point - how was Amir's response superior when Laura additionally identified a structural and procedural impediment to giving incentives for water conservation, and identified our regional activism as a strength that could be a help in instituting change?
ReplyDeleteFor the record I remain undecided about who I support. I regret that one will be off Council after the May election.
JM
Mayor's Answer to Question #12:
ReplyDelete"A recent review did not indicate that any change other than an increase in the fees was needed."
That is NOT TRUE. The update also added the "administrative warrant" provision to avoid the indisputable violation of the constitution.
I'm sure it came from the City Attorney and most council members probably didn't understand the implications.
Maybe the reason the review didn't indicate other changes were needed because the council made NO EFFORT to get input from people most affected, the landlords and tenants.
Metrotex realtors publicly opposed the update, but the council didn't listen, as is its custom.
Most council members mention "tenants' safety and health," but there was no mention of it during the update discussion.
http://againstrentalinspections.weebly.com/rental-map.html
Does the council think it is saving tenants' lives with this ordinance? If so, isn't it obligated to save the lives of homeowners, too? Then let's have citywide inspections so everyone can benefit from the city's protection.
JM, will be glad to try answering your question.
ReplyDeleteFrom my perspective, Laura just made a passing comment that take-or-pay is counter intuitive. It may have been an implication that take-or-pay as a problem, but no proposed solutions were offered. In addition, for the most parts, she echoed the thoughts of all the other council members.
Amir made some of the same observations of the other candidates. But he went a step further with by saying "we absolutely must change {the system} if we are to take conservation seriously". He then offer a proposed solution, selling water to others member and non-member cities thus eliminating the penalty for not using all water we are charged for.
For me, that makes Amir's response better.
That said, none of the candidates talked about the one item that most penalizes people who conserve most, the minimum fee.
The minimum fee on the water and sewer can make those who conserve pay.
If you use 500 gallons of water a month, you will be charged $.03822/gallon for water and sewer.
If you use 8000 gallons of water a month, you will be charged $.00822 per gallon for water and sewer.
If you use 40,000 gallons a month you will be charged $.00662 per gallon for water and sewer.
So while the take-or-pay may double your per gallon usage cost, the minimum fee has an even more dramatic effect by raising your cost by a factor of about 6 time.
Thanks for your comment JM and Hope that answers your question.
Residential Rental Inspections:
ReplyDeleteIf health, safety and the vitality of the city are the real concern, why don’t they inspect every home in Richardson?? Only Residential Rental properties require inspections?? Don Magner said his home has 4 of these violations…. Forcing one citizen to open another citizen’s home is wrong.
Residential Rental Registrations:
The city is registering the tenant. A tenant should be up in arms that the city is requiring the landlord to register them. Let’s require that every residential rental has a sign in the yard notifying the neighborhood the house is a rental.
Residential leases are private transactions between two people. Ohhhh the landlord and the tenant are required by the Texas Property Code to check the battery in the smoke detector before it is leased and once a year after.
This is For Scott Dunn specifically:
Write the tenants a letter asking them to check their stuck windows and report them to you. I want to see the letters. You don’t need to hire an inspector to go into these homes. Write them a letter. If they are unhappy with their residence they will handle it with the landlord. All you need to do is Educate the citizens.
http://youtu.be/qy3ntkpqiLI
What about all the stuck windows in the owner-occupied homes?? Why are they getting addressed??
Disappointed in all the leading questions. How can you tell a fiscally conservative from a spend thrift with these questions?
ReplyDeleteMr. Dunn discusses the UNSPECIFIC number of "violations" found. How many nailed-down windows were really found?
ReplyDeleteAlso, if the yardstick is the number of violations, inspectors can come up with anything, like an unpainted former doggy door.
http://againstrentalinspections.weebly.com/1/post/2013/04/whats-the-point-of-this-inspection.html
Garland measures the success of their program based on the REDUCTION (specific number) of overall violations, including owner-occupied homes. (Their program has won several awards).
Also, Mr. Mitchell says,
"With that said, like any city initiative, we need to evaluate it on a yearly basis to ensure that it is meeting our set goals of health and safety."
He said that during a work session, too. When was the annual evaluation done after the ordinance update? We asked the council to place the item on the agenda in January . He didn't agree to that. Enough talk. We want to see the walk.
What a bunch of baiting questions that demonstrate how screwed we are because of those who have been holding office for too long!
ReplyDeleteFor someone recognizing the abyss we're in and why, to challenge the assertions embedded in these questions would quickly be trounced by the Coalitionist Party as some sort of subversive to the Richardson way of life.
The pinheads will predictably say something complementary to placate the villains who pull the strings.
There is no good answer to this pitiful mess we're in. Except, that is, to flush the toilet on the whole lot of them.
Go look at all question number 5. You can tell they have groomed each one of them via a board to the Council. That says it all. They either have a political agenda or they are padding a resume. Of course they are going to rubber stamp everything.
ReplyDeleteThey are ramming the Cotton Belt down our throats when it almost got canned in Austin and may still.
These questions are so leading to one side it is sickening.
Regarding the answer to Question #12, Mr. Dunn discusses the UNSPECIFIC number of "violations" found at inspected rentals. How many of nailed-down windows were found?
ReplyDeleteIf they're using the number of violations to measure the effectiveness of the program, inspectors can come up with anything, including an unpainted former doggy door.
http://againstrentalinspections.weebly.com/1/post/2013/04/whats-the-point-of-this-inspection.html
Garland measures the success of their program based on the REDUCTION (specific number) of overall violations, including owner-occupied homes. (Their program has won several awards).
Also, Mr. Mitchell says, "With that said, like any city initiative, we need to evaluate it on a yearly basis to ensure that it is meeting our set goals of health and safety."
He said that during a work session, too. When was the annual evaluation done after the ordinance update? We asked the council to place the item on the agenda in January . He didn't agree to that. Enough talk. We want to see the walk.
"From my perspective, Laura just made a passing comment that take-or-pay is counter intuitive. It may have been an implication that take-or-pay as a problem, but no proposed solutions were offered. In addition, for the most parts, she echoed the thoughts of all the other council members. . . ."
ReplyDeleteThanks
JM
JM
ReplyDeleteDo you add mind reading to your set of skills?