The Walmartization of Government in the US: When Among Others The Cost of Elections becomes a Reason to get rid of them

As I wrote last week (http://patch.com/california/redwoodcity-woodside/elected-officials-conflicts-interest-california), the Redwood City City Council under pressure by State Bill 415 from Sacramento that requires municipalities that have faced dropping participation in odd year elections must now change the dates of their elections back to even years. This has given a lot of local government elected officials the ability to in a clear conflict of interest extend their own terms. As a number of speakers noted at last week’s Redwood City City Council meeting government processes in the United States are beginning to look and act like a tyranny. Like Walmart, Sacramento when crafting State Bill 415 focused on quantity not quality. To function effectively, a real democracy costs money and requires an educated and informed electorate.

Personally I am not convinced that SB 415 is even the right solution.

Years ago Redwood City and some other cities decided to change their elections from even years to odd years so as not to conflict with national and state elections. The voting participation data however shows that participation dropped which is simply a measurement of quantity. But what about quality? What the data doesn’t necessarily shows us is whether or not the voters were more informed, knowledgeable voters and whether or not this helped new candidates and non-incumbents get elected more easily. The cost to run in a national and state election year is substantially more expensive due primarily to the increased cost of media buys and mailings. In addition, given the noise and volume of national and state elections the ability for new candidates and local issues to be heard and make a case probably drops creating even more of an incumbent advantage and less of a true discussion of local issues.

Data does show that the older you are the more likely you are to vote. So instead of forcing a switch back to even year national and state voting years, a likely more effective mechanism could have been to add voting education to the educational system by allowing 16-18 year olds to vote only in local elections. High schools could then include real civics courses that discuss and research the issues and the candidates as a prerequisite for graduation thus helping educate and setting proper voting habits for the adult citizens of the future. In addition of course to boosting the actual participation rates in local elections! I sure wouldn’t want to be the parent or a neighbor of a 16-18 year old that is voting and not vote myself. And even if you don’t necessarily think that this is the best solution there are other options for increasing informed participation.

Regardless of what you think about SB 415, some of the arguments Redwood City city council members gave for approving extensions to their own terms were frankly jarring.

Cost of elections:

Mayor Seybert brought up the cost of elections. Much to the dismay of a number of speakers and of Thomas Jefferson (see quote above), we must be headed towards a system of tyrants in government. When the cost of elections is given as a reason for eliminating them and finding cheaper alternatives let’s just be honest to ourselves and realize that if we just appoint a tyrant and let him or her stay in power for as long as they please we will effectively save a lot of money. Not to mention all the things the city is willing to pay for like 1.5 million dollar legal settlements, expensive consultants and staff, etc, etc. If we are to follow the logic of council members, Redwood City could instead of spending the money on elections try to balance the city budget. For somehow a city that has been on a development and construction boom that should have produced budget surpluses and ongoing community benefit fees somehow is concerned that sales taxes are dropping and there haven’t been any provisions for development impact fees.

Terms of Service: Three year terms vs. Four Year terms vs. Five year terms

Councilmember Diane Howard stated that she would be against a three year term option because she felt that it took longer than that to learn the job on the job. However in Redwood City most elected council members go on to serve for at least twelve to sixteen years so the length of any one term is really immaterial, Alicia Aguirre could in fact serve more as she was first appointed to the Council and can run for four terms one of which could end up being five years what with the coming changes. Not to mention, Diane Howard herself that served until she was termed out, sat out one election as she was required to, after which she ran again and is now eligible to run and serve for four terms again.

Government cronyism: Local school district elected officials have already voted to extend their own terms

Of all the reasons given this was probably the worst! To state the obvious two wrongs don’t make a right. As I mentioned in my post last week (http://patch.com/california/redwoodcity-woodside/elected-officials-conflicts-interest-california), it is clearly a conflict of interest for a sitting elected official to have the right to extend the length of his or her own term.

However like Walmart, government entities in this country are now only focused on quantity vs. quality and the cheaper it is the better it is. To function effectively, a real democracy costs money and requires an educated and informed electorate. If we don’t start thinking that way we are on a sure path to tyranny.