The Daily Fetch

Watch Dog asked for it and loose lips are trying to sink ships…or something like that.

Anyway, an insider slipped me a tip yesterday after the posting about Warren Slocum’s posting the candidate information for local offices in San Mateo County.

Here is the story, according to this insider: Kathy McKeithen is running for re-election in Atherton for City Council. There are a number of challengers for her seat and the seat of Jim Janz, who apparently is stepping down. In addition to Kathy McKeithen, the candidates for running for these seats are David Henig, Elizabeth Lewis, Richard “Dick” Moore, and Sam R. Goodman. The insider shot me an ironic link to McKeithen’s 2000 SmartVoter site. As she runs for her third term, irony of ironies, here was one her priorities:

• Establish term limits so that new people with new ideas can keep the Council from becoming complacent.

I would guess that term limits are no longer one of her priorities. I would also bet that McKeithen wishes that the “new people” she spoke about in 2000 wouldn’t leak stuff to Watch Dog. And the best bet of all is that McKeithen probably doesn’t believe that she has been “complacent.”

Watch Dog loves dirt. Especially when it is in really fancy towns in San Mateo County. Dog doesn’t know much about Atherton politics except what big mouth insiders email to me…SO, keep passing it this way…please…

It continues to get more intriguing in the SBWMA front. Jerry Hill, in what is described in this story as a “scathing letter” to Kevin McCarthy of the SBWMA, essentially told the SBWMA not to expect a rubber stamp on their recommendations.

Watch Dog is officially putting out the request for a copy of the Jerry Hill letter, or anything else related to this issue. It seems there are letters flying back and forth. Nasty emails from one person to another. In other words, just the type of thing that a whistle-blower/insider would love to share.

Please…pretty please…help a Watch Dog out.

The Chief Elections Officer of San Mateo County Warren Slocum runs a pretty tight ship. Watch Dog has noticed and mentioned this before. On their website, they have lists of local measures and local candidates as well as all their filings, including arguments for and against stuff. Pretty awesome to have all this stuff online.

Roster of Local Ballot Measures
Roster of Local Candidates

As Watch Dog follows all these issues swirling around–taxes, rates, fee increases, new programs, etc., etc., etc.–I couldn’t help but be struck by this little nugget in today’s paper: “July incomes drop by largest amount in 3 years.”

Good luck to all the campaigns out there trying to get 2/3 of taxpayers to say yes. Really, good luck.

Thanks to the reporting of Shaun Bishop, what seems to be like an enormous garbage contract is getting some press these days. As discussed yesterday, finally something really juicy is happening locally.

(Perhaps using the term juicy when talking about garbage is a little gross…sorry.)

Anyway, it looks like Jesus Nava of Burlingame is once again making waves. This story sets the stage for what Bishop calls: “debates over the coming months about major pending decisions” at City Council meetings.

Watch Dog will be watching…closely…how fun!

I was away for a little bit and I have been dealing with a bit of a technical issue…and as the old saying goes, you snooze, you lose — on a big, and seemingly brewing, issue.

1. Mello-Roos: The good folks in the City of San Mateo approved a Mell0-Roos tax for the new development at Bay Meadows. Basically, it looks like a tax will be passed onto residents in their units when the development comes online, about $5k/year. That sounds pretty steep, but I guess that’s what you get when a new development opens and you need roads, sewer, etc.

2. Local Discontent: Once again, the San Mateo County Supervisors and the City of Redwood City can’t play nice. Call it an open space initiative, call it stopping growth on all fronts, call it undemocratic, call it whatever you want…but what is clear is that Redwood City and the County government have agreed to disagree about a measure on the November ballot. Let the battle begin.

And for your viewing pleasure…here is the San Mateo County list of local measures you’ll be voting on in November. Remember, these are just local. You folks in Santa Clara County who read this blog, your info can be found here. Just a note, if you are reading those lists of measures, take some time — in Santa Clara County, they go from A to X…yikes…

The good folks of San Mateo will vote for a special tax district to fund infrastructure (roads, etc.) at Bay Meadows for Phase II. Read all about it.

More on this topic later.

From yesterday’s paper, the Millbrae School District is trying a bond measure in November, hoping for better luck than June’s failed parcel tax. If anyone is hurting right now, it is schools. The question is, does it increase the chances of the District getting more money if they are on the ballot every couple of months? I don’t know. Read the story for yourself…

Atherton and Menlo Park are suing the California High Speed Rail Authority according to today’s paper. Something about 200+ mile per hour trains running straight through Peninsular towns has worry-warts all agitated. (That was sarcasm…)

This is in advance of Prop. 1, which I think Watch Dog brought up a few days ago. Happy reading.