Comments on: Santa Rosa seeks applicants for council vacancy

By: indievoter

indievoter — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 19:41:01 +0000

Go get ‘em Jim! Not only are you very politically active and engaged in the community, but you are a small businessman with two successful businesses. That puts you ahead of the pack already. The problem in Santa Rosa is we have a city council made up of followers and no leaders. You are the right person at the right time to step up and fill the vacancy on the Santa Rosa City Council.

7 2

By: R.B. Fish

R.B. Fish — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 04:21:34 +0000

@ Mr. Bennett… for Godsakes don’t lower yourself to be part of sludge of corrupt politics. Unfortunately, most of us are out of comfort zones and it will become more comfortable in the near future. Many of us are looking for leadership.

10 2

By: Phaedra Glidden

Phaedra Glidden — Sat, 12 Jan 2013 18:53:44 +0000

James Bennett, I was just reading your post and I think it would be a great idea for you to apply for the position! It would be wonderful to have a fresh, new face in our City Council. I know that you are more than qualified for the position. You are engaged in local politics and are well-aware of the challenges facing our city. In addition, you are a successful businessman who understands that fiscal responsibility is essential for the good health of our city. You also have close ties to the community through running your own community center, which I have had the opportunity to visit a time or two. If you need me to be one of the nomination signatures required, just let me know, as I would happy to sign it for you. In fact, if there is anything I can do to help you in this endeavor, please don’t hesitate to ask. I think you would make wonderful addition to this polarized city council.

21 0

By: James Bennett

James Bennett — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 19:49:53 +0000

I will be picking up my application packet Mon. (today was a furlough Fri.).

Even though I’m pretty sure they’d rather have a skin disorder than Jim Bennett (publishing an alternative newspaper) on Council.

Even though doing so is outside my comfort zone. I’m doing lots of things outside my comfort zone lately.

Watching us being incrementally reduced to serfs. Watching us adhere to an ideology literally foreign to our Constitution and Republic is too. Watching (and paying for) our freedoms, our civil liberties and abundance being chocked to death is very much outside my comfort zone as well.

I’m sure the PD will frame me as being a used car dealer (I own a community center as well). It’s not what you do, it’s how you do it. Being of service is sacred, doesn’t matter what it is.
I never feel any shame when I see one of my “constituents” at the market.

It’s time for many of us to engage, even become people we never thought we’d be.
Or we will end up with a life we never thought we’d have VERY soon.

37 4

By: Logical Thinker

Logical Thinker — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 17:29:20 +0000

Mayor Scott Bartley said the fifth place finisher wasn’t clearly favored by voters over the next candidate. Restaurateur Don Taylor, who has run unsuccessfully for council four times, received only 17 more votes than sixth-place finisher Caroline Bañuelos.

“I don’t feel the voters gave me a clear mandate that there is another person who is right there that they would have voted for,” Bartley said.

Mayor Bartley, if the 4th place finisher, and now duly elected council member, had beaten Don Taylor by 17 votes would you be making that same statement? Of course not, you would have said the voters have spoken. If there was only a single vote deciding the last council seat it still would have resulted in the way it is now, and the voters would have clearly spoken, by definition casting more votes for that last council seat, and that would be that. It is patently absurd that YOU are now making a decision based on the preferences of the voters, as if you have a mental bond that magically lets you link to them, and speak for them. It’s clear that politics here has not changed, and when you spin, you win. Since you have decided not to let the voters make a choice, turn on the record player and let’s all watch the political cake walk. May I suggest Henry Mancini’s “Baby Elephant Walk” as the appropriate song?

18 2

By: Laura

Laura — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 05:11:51 +0000

Let’s see if this passes the censors….

@Kay

It’s not the two (count ‘em 2!) progressives who have shot down Don Taylor, it’s the right wing prop-business people. Bartley, Olivares and Ours are the ones putting up an ‘end run’ around a legitimate election process…” But nice try.

Obviously the majority does not think they can get along with Don, probably because he’s more of a “maverick,” and not part of the Herb Williams stable.

Please lay the blame where it should be laid: with the “beloved” pro-business “moderates.”

8 5

By: Liz

Liz — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 00:54:15 +0000

An election is an election period. If you win by 1,000 votes or 3 voted it still counts.
Now yes it was an election only for 4 not 5 but we knew Gorin may leave us with a vacancy and there is no reason this should not have been planned for before now.
For the council to pick someone says they think they are better than the rest of us citizens of Santa Rosa.

The peoples voice is lost and means nothing now.
Politics as usual!

12 2

By: Caller

Caller — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 20:37:03 +0000

Uhh… @Kay Tokerud, even the candidates you support didn’t want to choose the next highest vote-getter. The election called for voters to select four candidates. Everyone else was not selected. Don Taylor was just as much elected to council as Levi Leipheimer. It’s possible that, with the top four candidates out of the running, that people would vote for Banuelos over Taylor. You don’t know. Nobody does.

9 21

By: Kay Tokerud

Kay Tokerud — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 15:51:54 +0000

Excuse me, but didn’t we just have an election and didn’t we end up with five available seats? Did voters not choose five people to serve on council? Just because Susan Gorin hung around for a couple more weeks is no reason to treat this as filling the “remainder of her term”.

It was known that there would be four or five available seats depending on if Gorin won the supervisor’s election. She won and her seat is vacant. This is a gross manipulation of the election process and should be strenuously denounced as this council’s first bad action. Clearly, the progressives want to install someone of their ilk instead of the winner Don Taylor who can be described as a moderate. He would be an excellent 7th member of this divided council.

The three more moderate council members should refuse to play this game and choose Taylor and another moderate (non-progressive) for their first and second choices making it impossible for the other 3 to install a fourth progressive. If this doesn’t happen then we can expect another two years of tyranny like we had when the progressives ruled with Wysocky, Gorin, Vas Dupre and Jacobi. Remember the failed “Wysocky Bullyvard” on Humboldt Street, the ridiculous “Bike Spike” on Santa Rosa avenue, the 20 million bike bridge, endless lobbying for Smart, Smartgrowth, redevelopment and many other wasteful pet projects of this crowd. Putting a fourth progressive will be the kiss of death for Santa Rosa’s economy and a recipe for the dangerous advancement of UN Agenda 21 Sustainable Development. Bartley, Oliveras, and Ours need to get tough and stand up against an obvious “end run” around a legitimate election process that elected Don Taylor fair and square.

29 12

By: Dan Drummond Sr

Dan Drummond Sr — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 02:46:45 +0000

Donna Zapata is a good person. You must have been out of line, Betty. One thing for sure, she would keep Efren out of bar fights!
I’m thinking about applying, but my resume may raise eyebrows when they see my current occupation is a volunteer political humorist pundit on the Press Democrat political website.

Donna Zapata – thumbs up
Dan Drummond – thumbs down

4 10

By: Betty R

Betty R — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 00:16:27 +0000

Donna Zapata would not be good for the city of SR, yes she puts on a good face but don’t cross her as she will make your life a living HELL. She is way to close to Olivares

16 12

By: Laura Gonzalez

Laura Gonzalez — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 20:22:59 +0000

If Mr. Taylor “wasn’t clearly favored by voters over the next candidate,” Caroline Bañuelos, then those TWO should battle it out. Why open it up? Oh, let me guess, to get a crony of Bartley, Ours, Olivares and Carlstrom on there. Hmmmm, who might that be? My guess is Donna Zapata or Bartley’s (or is it Ours’?) bff Robin Swinth. Mark my word….

18 23