Palo Alto: Group releases ‘pro-resident voting scorecard’ as election looms

Palo Alto: Group releases ‘pro-resident voting scorecard’ as election looms

By Jason Green
Daily News Staff Writer
POSTED: 09/26/2014 02:00:00 AM PDT0 COMMENTS

The grassroots group that successfully campaigned against the controversial Maybell Avenue project in Palo Alto last fall has produced a “pro-resident voting scorecard” it says shows where City Council members, including three running for re-election, stand on the critical issues of land use and development policy.

But two of the incumbents who received poor scores, Councilman Greg Scharff and Mayor Nancy Shepherd, are questioning the objectivity of the scorecard, saying some of their decisions were actually beneficial or based on a narrow set of parameters. Meanwhile, the third incumbent, Councilwoman Karen Holman, shared a two-way tie for the highest score.

Palo Altans for Sensible Zoning, now a registered political action committee, selected 20 votes involving land use and development policy where there was a potential adverse impact to residents, according to member Cheryl Lilienstein. The scorecard covers the period from 2012 to mid-2014.
Council members each received a “1” for each “resident-favorable vote” and a “0” for each “resident-unfavorable vote.” The result was a percentage from 0 percent to 100 percent. Votes taken when a council member was either absent, abstained or had not yet been elected were not counted.
Holman scored 85 percent, while Scharff and Shepherd scored 30 percent and 25 percent, respectively. The average of the nine-member council was 46 percent, according to the scorecard.

“Voting records are the factual record of an elected leader’s positions,” Lilienstein said in a prepared statement. “PASZ members carefully researched the information on this scorecard in order to give voters an historical perspective regarding the positions of existing City Council members. We urge all voters to look carefully at the voting records of all candidates for City Council, and only vote for leaders whose positions most closely align with your own.”

The group plans to publish the scorecard on its website, www.paszaction.com, this morning.

Scharff and Shepherd said the scorecard appears to be little more than an effort by Palo Altans for Sensible Zoning to boost the candidates it favors. Two of the group’s members, Tom DuBois and Eric Filseth, have taken sabbaticals to run for council. A total of five seats are up for grabs, with Councilman Larry Klein termed out and Councilwoman Gail Price declining to run again.

“They’re not like a neighborhood association,” Scharff said in a phone interview. “This is a political action group that ran the Maybell campaign. And now it’s fielding three candidates (DuBois, Filseth and Holman).”

Last fall, the group led the charge against Measure D, which if passed would have allowed the nonprofit Palo Alto Housing Corporation to erect a 60-unit apartment building for low-income seniors and 12 market-rate single-family homes at 567-595 Maybell Ave. Approximately 56.5 percent of the voters agreed with arguments that the project was too dense and would exacerbate existing parking and traffic woes in the vicinity.
The council’s unanimous approval of the Maybell Avenue project was one of the 20 votes on the scorecard.

On its website, the group describes itself as a political action committee dedicated to “sensible zoning and planning for all of Palo Alto.”
“We advocate for zoning reform and education of the public as to land use and transportation issues,” the website states. “We encourage development projects that do not adversely impact quality of life and seek proper application of the Comprehensive Plan by city government.

Lilienstein acknowledged that the group has an agenda but said it has yet to endorse any of the 12 candidates.

“We would like to see a resident-centric City Council that bases decisions on whether the choices they’re making — votes they’re taking — are good for residents,” she said. “This voting record does not show that.”

“The votes are the votes,” added member Doria Summa. “This was started with no preconceived notion of what the percentages would be because there is nothing like this. There’s no running scorecard or anything like it on council votes. And for most people it’s sort of hard to understand what goes on at City Hall. All of the incumbents that are running identify as ‘residentialists,’ but this shows that only one really is and I think that’s an important tool for voters. They can decide who they want based on this with a little bit more info.”

Another one of the 20 votes involved the controversial Lytton Gateway building, which was approved 7-2 by the council in May 2012. Holman, along with Councilman Greg Schmid, voted against the project. Like Holman, Schmid also received an 85 percent on the scorecard.
The planned community project called for the defunct Shell gas station at the corner of Lytton Avenue and Alma Street to be replaced with a four-story building, with space for retail and a nonprofit organization on the ground floor and offices on the upper floors. At 50 feet tall, the building required a zoning change because it was next to a residential area.

Jeff Levinsky, a member of Palo Altans for Sensible Zoning, said the public benefits were paltry.

“How is that a public benefit?” he asked about plans to house the Chamber of Commerce at the site. “It’s not a public organization.”
Scharff countered that the project provided $2 million in seed money for a new parking garage.

“I would say that Lytton Gateway project was one of the few projects that will make parking better downtown and didn’t add a single car to off-street parking,” Scharff said in a telephone interview.

Holman did not return a phone call or email seeking comment for this story.

Shepherd, meanwhile, said the council has made relatively few decisions on land-use issues and speculated that several of the votes on the scorecard reflected matters in which the council had little wiggle room. Neither she nor Scharff had seen the scorecard as of Thursday.
For instance, appeals of projects that are otherwise compliant with zoning can only be rejected for design reasons, Shepherd said. Three of the 20 votes involved appeals of projects approved by planning officials.

“I hope that it is illustrated in a way that shows the narrow decisions that we have to make on council which are much more complicated than just a little snippet of a description of a project,” Shepherd said about the scorecard. “That’s where I do get really troubled with the concept that they (PASZ) are necessarily independent. I don’t consider them independent.”

Shepherd said she is running again with the intention of revamping the Comprehensive Plan, a document that guides development in the city.

“Change in Palo Alto only comes through changing the Comprehensive Plan. That’s how we change what the experience is,” Shepherd said.

“I think it’s a sad story to say that you can change it just by showing these people as being bad when in fact we’ve been custodians of the ordinances that the city put together with the rigor of a Comprehensive Plan, and that is by state law what we’re supposed to look to,” she continued. “And until somebody changes the Comprehensive Plan … we don’t get to explain to our community that this is how we want our vision to be and this is what we want to do with zoning.”

Email Jason Green at jgreen@dailynewsgroup.com; follow him at twitter.com/jgreendailynews.