BILL'S OUTGOING MAYOR'S MESSAGE

To all members of our great community, I want to take this opportunity to thank you again for the support you gave me back in 2010 during my campaign. It has been and continues to be my honor to serve you.  To my fellow Council members, thank you for the honor of serving as Mayor over this last year.  I am sorry that I cannot be here tonight to personally address you and help with the transition to a new Council.  Nonetheless, I would like to take afew minutes to reflect back on what we have achieved over the past 12 months and to take a look to our upcoming challenges.

Despite what you may have heard or read in the media, the blogs or even in the Athertonian, we have done a lot of great things over the past year.  Not the least of these is that we are putting more emphasis on recognizing those who help make Atherton a better place.  Some of our recognition came in the form of proclamations. While just paper certificates, they are a way of saying thank you, and that is something that we need to do more often.  In addition, we hosted an employee appreciation luncheon in the spring and initiated the idea for a volunteer party. I hope such a party will be budgeted for in the coming year because as I mentioned, saying thank you to those who willingly give their time and effort is important.

Many of you recall, one of my campaign platforms was accountability.  I feel strongly about accountability.  People should say what they’ll do and do what they say.  I have done my best to be accountable over these last two years.  While my objectives are well chronicled on my website, they were supplemented with some short term goals which I announced during my brief incoming comments. 

You may recall, I suggested just afew simple goals for the Council to focus on.  The key ones were to:

·         Fill our Interim positions and set objectives and measure performance

·         Gain further efficiencies from our outsourcing contracts

·         Begin to better use technology to improve our processes leading to greater efficiencies while improving our openness to our residents

So how did we do?  I think, pretty well.

At the beginning of the year, almost all City Management positions were being filled by contractors.  The only exception to this was the City Attorney and the City Clerk’s office.  Today there is only one management role still being performed as an interim position; that being the Public Works Director which is being filled by Mike Kashiwagi. Over the last 12 months, the Town filled 3 key roles.  The first of these important roles was filled by the hiring of Ed Flint as our Chief of Police.  Ed initially assisted the Town serving as the Interim Chief. In June, he agreed to stay on, coming out of retirement. The Town also needed a permanent Finance Director and Robert Barron agreed to come aboard in early October, joining us from the City of Millbrae.  And finally, after considering almost 100 candidates, the Town hired George Rodericks, an experienced City Manager at the October Council meeting.  The town also hired additional police officers to retain the force at its existing level, we hired a new office specialist and helped to grow our current City Clerk, Theresa DellaSanta as the Council entrusted her with serving as Interim City Manager for nine months.

During the year, the Town renewed the outsourcing contracts it initiated the year before.  While not extraordinary in itself, it is important to note that the Town did gain some additional concessions and commitments from these contractors, who, based upon resident inputs, are all doing an excellent job.  While more work should be done to improve the cost efficiencies in these agreements as well as in our other major subcontractor arrangements, one thing is clear, they have become more than just arms-length contract relationships, they are becoming partnerships. 

The last major objective was to improve the use of standard technology to boost our efficiencies and openness to the public.  While this objective will never be fully reached, and understanding that we still have a long way to go, some key first steps were made.  First, a search capability was implemented on the Town’s website which allows anyone to find information easily and efficiently.  Secondly, reliable wireless internet connections were installed in the Council chambers which allow attendees to download packets for review during the meeting.  Lastly, the town procured iPad II’s and several laptop PC’s to help enable our push for paperless meetings and initiate the Town’s movement into a paperless environment.  I understand that the Council will receive their devices tonight.

We also took a lot of other important steps forward.

One advancement was the recent ballot measures.  For the first time since I have lived here, for an item other than a tax measure, the Town was asked to weigh in on three items which would change our community.  The town was energized and the town spoke.  And yes, while there were complaints about presentation of facts, one thing was certain. The residents got involved and to me that was a great thing as this is what any local government wants.  

We also brought the safety issues on El Camino to the attention of the State.  While this issue is far from complete, the serious problems are now on the radar screen of CalTrans and I do not intend to let this die.  While there have been some meetings between the State and the Town there is a lot more work to do and the processes used by the State will certainly not be a friend. We will need to solicit the help of our Sacramento elected officials to assist and so this is a watch space.

The town also got involved in Menlo Park’s deal to bring Facebook to the area.  To this end Facebook was made to understand that Atherton would realize a traffic impact due to their relocation to the old Sun campus.  As such I negotiated a contract with them which provided the Town with an unrestricted grant of $350K, and additional $15k in traffic and bike lane consulting plus some Facebook IT consulting and access to surplus equipment over the next two years. 

The budget was also a big focus for the Council this year.  The process, which was a three month activity, resulted in a fully funded Police budget at funding levels higher than any other year and an overall Town budget, which considering all revenues, was over $550K in the black before any Facebook funding is added to the revenue totals.  Additionally the Town developed a 5 year Capital plan which identified key projects such as cap sealing of roads, street improvements including funding for pedestrian and bicycle safety, addressing the Marsh Road channel and funding a Parks Master Plan.

Additionally this year, the Council began to address some long term financial issues.  Recognizing some of our off balance sheet issues, those being our pension liabilities and costs associated with our long term employee healthcare obligations, the Council took some bold steps to address not just our periodic expenses but to address some future ones as well.  These included establishing and placing approximately $1.5M in pre-allocated funds into an irrevocable trust which locks away these funds and which will help fund  our anticipated long term financial obligations for retiree health.  This fund will now grow as we place our annual contribution into it. The fund is now an off-balance sheet liability of approximately $7.5M.

The Council also authorized the commitment from the General Fund reserves of almost $2M of payments to the CalPers system to payoff the side fund obligations which were established in 2003 and were to be payable by 2022.  This payment saves about $321K in costs which would have been paid during this fiscal year and saves up to $489K over the remaining obligation. 

Finally, the Council took steps to address the high employee overhead costs which many of our neighboring towns have begun addressing.  Specifically, the Town established a second tier benefit level for new employees which, through its elimination of lifetime health care for the employee and spouse, and changes to the pension formulas    will help to bring down, over time, the off-balance sheet liabilities which are in the tens of millions of dollars, as well as help manage our year-on-year budget.

While these items are not pleasant nor popular, they were and are necessary steps and ones which have been well overdue. They are advances which the Council needs to have the courage to continue and do what is in the best interest of the community for the long run, and not focus on the short term while showing compassion for our own employees as well.

So all in all, I believe this has been a very productive year.  We have accomplished a lot, despite a lot of unwarranted criticism. This Council and the last have had to make difficult decisions to fix problems which were passed forward by earlier Mayors and Councils.  We need to stay the course and not be distracted as there are still formidable challenges and follow on activities ahead.

I thank you all for your help and support over these past twelve months.  I thank my family for their support even in the face of unwarranted criticism and harassment by anonymous individuals.  Leadership takes courage and foresight.  I believe we have shown that we have that.  I am proud to have had the opportunity and honor to have had your support to serve as Mayor during this period when, as a team, we have accomplished so much.

Thank you again.  I look forward to continuing serving with you for the next few years.