Richmond Voters to Decide Between Council Fixtures, Newcomer in 3-Way Mayor's Race

Richmond voters are mulling a three-way mayor’s race in the Nov. 4 election that includes two longtime City Council members with disparate visions for the city’s future or a newcomer in his first run for elected office. The mayor’s seat is open this November with current Mayor Gayle McLaughlin termed out and running for a spot on the City Council. Voters in the city of nearly 107,600 are being asked to choose between City Councilman Nat Bates, City Councilman Tom Butts, or local businessman Uche Uwahemu. The candidate with the most financial support by a landslide is Bates, a retired Alameda County probation officer who has served on the City Council off and on since 1967, including two stints as mayor in the 1970s.

Over the past nine months, Chevron has given $2.9 million to its “Moving Forward” campaign committee established to support Bates and three City Council candidates, as well as to campaigns to defeat their opponents, according to campaign finance reports filed at the end of September. Viewed as the most conservative member of the City Council, Bates has a long track record of supporting businesses and a close relationship with Chevron, the city’s largest employer whose hilltop tanks are visible throughout much of Richmond. But Bates rebuffs criticisms that he’s too cozy with the oil company.

“Whether it’s Chevron, Google, Microsoft or any large corporation who contributes almost 40 percent to your general fund, you must show respect to that company,” the councilman said. As mayor, Bates said, he plans to emphasize development and to embrace a growing number of interested property buyers from Asia as a way to bring more revenue to the city. During his run for mayor, Bates has touted his good relationship with the local business community and his past successes in helping to bring new business and infrastructure to Richmond, including the Hilltop Mall and the completion of the John T. Knox Freeway in the 1970s.

If elected, Bates said his first priority will be Richmond’s economic issues, starting with its $7 million budget deficit. “You cannot spend more money than the revenue that you bring in -- we’ve got to get that under control as a first priority,” he said. Another piece of Bates’s platform is to “restore civility” to the City Council, whose meetings in recent years have been marred by conflict, frequent disruptions and even name-calling, sometimes among councilmembers themselves. For more than a year, City Councilman Courtland “Corky “ Boozé -- who is up for reelection and is Bates’s staunchest ally on the council -- has hurled personal insults at Vice Mayor Jovanka Beckles, the city’s first openly lesbian elected leader. Some of Boozé’s supporters have been known to lob homophobic remarks and other insults at the councilwoman during meetings. When asked about criticisms that he has failed to stand up for Beckles, Bates instead accused the councilwoman of being disrespectful toward the public.

“Beckles needs to understand its not about her sexual orientation, it’s about her attitude and behavior and disrespect to citizens in the community,” he said. On the other side of the dais, Councilman Butt has consistently voiced his support for Beckles and denounced the anti-gay rhetoric. The 70-year-old, who has been a councilmember since 1995, is not a part of the council’s ultra-liberal Richmond Progressive Alliance but frequently votes with them. Butt, the main owner of Point Richmond architectural firm Interactive Resources, has opposed Bates on a variety of issues during their time together on the council.

“For the years I’ve been on the council, I’ve focused on quality of life issues in Richmond, trying to make Richmond safer, make it greener, make it cleaner, make it more welcoming for both residents and businesses and trying to change the image from a dirty old industrial city with a lot of crime to a new waterfront city that has lots of opportunities and a lot of diversity both in population and in businesses and residential opportunities,” Butt said.

He said Bates has focused “almost entirely on trying to make Chevron happy and trying to attract more industrial business to Richmond.” Butt, meanwhile, has been known to challenge Chevron’s influence in the city. He touted his work along with Myrick and Councilman Jim Rogers earlier this year in negotiating for $90 million in programs dedicated to greenhouse gas reduction, education and job training in exchange for the city’s approval of Chevron’s $1 billion refinery modernization project.

“I think this is an example of how I can work with a lot of different people and at the end of the day achieve something and make something happen,” he said, adding that Bates is too “obsessed with pleasing Chevron” to have brokered the deal. Butt has raised far less money than Bates - about $30,000 by the end of September, according to the most recent available campaign filings. As for the city’s $7 million budget deficit, Butt said he’s optimistic about the passage of Measure U -- a half-cent sales tax measure that would bridge the budget gap by bringing in a projected $7 million annually. He also said Richmond property values are expected to rebound after taking a hit in the wake of the massive 2012 fire at the Chevron refinery and believes the Contra Costa County Assessor has erroneously undervalued city properties. Butt has criticized Bates’s record of voting against parks projects in the city and his opposition to a recent proposal to expand bike lanes.

“I think Nat associates anything that has to do with quality of life with being anti-business for some reason. He’s just totally focused on business,” Butt said. Bates countered that he isn’t against funding parks but said he is “pro-development” and believes there is an excess of unused park space in the city that could be better utilized. He cited bicycle lanes that took the place of two regular automobile lanes along Barrett avenue that he claims are not only underused but clog traffic.

“If I’m mayor, one of the first things I’ll do is restore those four lanes for both bicycles and automobiles,” Bates said. “People will respect the bike that’s in front of you, but to have that lane blocked off 24 hours a day is not proper planning, nor is it serving the community.” Running against the two City Council fixtures is local businessman Uche Uwahemu, who after living in Richmond for the past 12 years, said he was inspired to take his chances in the mayor’s race “at a critical moment in the city’s history.” Like Bates and Butt, Uwahemu also cited the city’s economy and quality of life issues as pillars of his campaign. He said he plans to expand on the Richmond Police Department’s successful community policing strategies, but believes the city’s economic success is also an important component to crime reduction.

“The economy is number one in Richmond,” he said. “You don’t have strong public safety without a strong economy.” A former social worker in Washington, D.C., Uwahemu said he understands well how a lack of job opportunities can lead to crime, which is why he plans to focus on bringing new businesses and creating new jobs in Richmond. The city currently has a 10.6 percent unemployment rate.

As the CEO of Cal Bay Consulting Group, which provides strategic planning services to businesses and nonprofits, Uwahemu said he also knows what it takes to draw businesses to Richmond. Since a skilled workforce is key to attracting new businesses, he said he has proposed building a technical high school in Richmond where every student would learn critical computer and technological skills. Uwahemu said that if elected, he would also work to expand operations at the city’s port. While it’s his first run for elected office and he lacks the name recognition of his two opponents, the businessman said he believes his prospects in the election are good.

“What we have is a well-organized grassroots campaign, we’re reaching out to people,” he Uwahemu said. “That’s really what our strength has been.” He noted that Mayor McLaughlin was also an outsider when she ran for office in 2006 but was ultimately elected due to her “clear vision” for Richmond’s future.

“I’m not going to make a campaign here that is based on power-grabbing, but that’s based on bringing what’s most needed to Richmond, which is jobs and businesses. And if I don’t get it done in four years, I will not run again,” he said.

By Bay City News