 Good evening. This is what's going on. I'm John Lee our guest this evening is Brett Lee the newly elected mayor pro tem of the city of Davis Brad, I want to thank you for being on our show. Thanks for having me John. Absolutely So we're in experimental mode here. I'm I've recruited Zoe Vickstrom to be the co-editor and so I'm gonna make an initial statement that I've been wanting to stay Say for a long time then Zoe's gonna introduce Brett and interview Brett and then We're Brett and I are gonna have a little conversation about the future of Davis at the end. So I've been wanting to say this for a long time seven years ago Lois Wolk and I Had lunch and she asked me about her son being on the Davis City Council And I said I don't think he's got the fire in his belly and I don't think he does I don't think he should have been in an elected office So I'm going to tell a very brief story and try and make my point if you take two Seeds and germinate them and put one in a pot that's outside and one in a pot That's the inside and then let them grow and then after a while put the inside pot outside As soon as there's a wind the outside pot Will not fall over but the inside plant will and So that's basically what happened to Dan Wolk was when he was on the city council He really didn't learn how to do what it takes to be on the city council And so one of the things that he advocated and I'm making this really brief I'm not filling in all my details One of the things that he advocated very strongly was the sugar tax on soda and Then he got three two other members of the city council to agree with him and Then he brought it to the city council and then the next week all the merchants were in the audience And he had never faced opposition before and he completely caved in and a week after that The special interests in Sacramento spent two million dollars To make sure that he did not get elected to the assembly So the Davis learning experience in the last five years has been incredible The person who has benefited from that the most is Brett Lee Brett Lee five years ago was an unknown person that Dick Livingston was coaching to run for the Davis City Council Five people ran for three seats Dan Wolk for sure was number one Lucas Freerichs for sure was number two Incumbent Sue Greenwald and Steven Souza That made Brett Lee number five Brett Lee had to earn every single vote. He got four years ago and he did Brett Lee came in third To his credit he's worked full-time. He's raising his son He's active in the civic affairs that are his responsibility as a candidate for reelection He ran the second best campaign I have ever seen in the city of Davis in the 30 years that we've done this show in 1982 and Evans and her campaign with John Miles Smith as his her campaign manager Walked the entire city of Davis one and a half times That is the only campaign and they had a fundraiser once a week That is the only campaign that was better than Brett's campaign Brett met with people on a regular basis when out of his way to do everything he could to be a viable member of the city Council I Am really impressed with the campaign that Brett ran and I'm gonna be really interested to hear what he has to say So he's gonna do the interview. Thanks for being on our show Hi, my name is Zoe Vickstrom and we are here today with Brett Lee He is a city of Davis council member and an engineer. Thanks for being here today, Brett. Oh, thanks Zoe. Thanks for having me So let's start off with You telling me a little bit about yourself and your position Okay, so I'm currently on the city council. I Was recently reelected in June. So I have another almost four years to go I Lived in Davis off and on my entire life my grandparents moved here originally in the 40s and On my campaign website, I listed that I was a third generation Davis site So grandparents my mom went to school here went to Davis high Davis high grad Ultimately graduated from UC Davis and then of course me and then so I have a son who's the fourth generation But it's actually kind of funny a A few weeks ago. I was talking to my grandfather who's still alive. He's 98 and I was thinking wait I remember that on 8th Street my uncle and I helped paint my great-grandmother's house He said, yeah, you know, she had a house there and I thought well wait So if she lived in Davis does that mean instead of a third generation? I'm actually the fourth generation into Jaspers the fifth and so it is So I've been in Davis for a while. My family has been here for a while Nobody in my family has been involved with local politics Just sort of just kind of going about our daily lives and you know volunteer here and there But but not really involved in political life I think For me how I ended up on the city council is I was pretty Volunteered on the no on measure X the no on coville village Activities back in guess that was 2004 ish And then I got to meet a lot of the people involved in local politics and then sort of one thing led to another and then Eight or so years later. I decided to run for city council. Wow Lots of experience in Davis. Yeah, fair amount. Yeah Um, so you work for farm fresh to you. Yes, can you describe what you do there? So I'm a process improvement engineer. Okay, so prior to farm fresh to you I worked at FedEx. I worked as an engineer for FedEx Express And there I was really focused on productivity and efficiency at farm fresh to you I Look a little bit at productivity and efficiency, but I would say my main role is gathering data and Analyzing it in a way so that people can make decisions from it as we have a lot of data available to us You know who our customers are or what types of produce they like and then things is Related to like how does that produce do so for instance, you know We're getting a lot of complaints about apples like apples Not tasting as nice as they should and so you investigate and you know try to figure out what's going on in terms of the product we offer so really I would say that my goal is to Improve the product that we deliver to people's homes. So it's a organic produce box It's kind of like a CSA community-supported agriculture type of system But rather than people having to go and get their box We actually deliver it and one of the things that we do which is a little bit unique But adds a whole level of complexity is you're able to customize so the typical CSA box would be okay The farm packs up this box and all the boxes are the same and you just kind of go and you grab your box We allow people to say well, I don't really want kale this week I think I'd rather have a double order of celery or something like that. I don't want celery I just want extra oranges Because of that each box potentially is sort of customized to that individual and so rather than making you know 100 boxes all the same we have to be able to Individually package the box based upon what the customer's preferences. Okay, and about how many customers you have is this a local company? Or is it yeah, it's local So the farm the main farm is in the K-Pay Valley, okay, and it was started by the current owners parents in the 80s They were UCD students and they went there and they bought a piece of land and they were Kind of like the hippie back to earth and Kind of movement and they created this organic farm and then we also have some land in Southern, California In the Imperial Valley and the reason we have that is so that there's a greater selection So in the winter you're not limited to just what could be grown in close proximity But it's all the food is organic and all the food is local at some to some extent mainly Sort of local to Northern California or Southern California Because some people want a little more variety, you know, we'll sometimes have like Washington apples or Oregon apples or things like that So we do do that, but there's nothing imported. It's all sort of Kind of West Coast product and what made you decide to go into engineering in this specific job Like what about engineering? Are you interested in? Yeah So they're sort of separated by a large time frame. Yeah being a little bit older When I was in high school, I think Like many kids if you were good at math and science, they said, oh, you should be an engineer and I didn't really know what that meant, but I felt like I was good at math and science and so That kind of gave me a little push towards that career field. I Think it's a little bit interesting because I was also good at all the other subjects I had pretty good grades For whatever reason so if somebody had said well, you're good in history or you're good in English or you're good in To be a history major intentionally, but it Kind of the way it worked maybe back then and maybe the way it still works is if you're kind of good at math and science They say, oh, well, you should be an engineer. Okay. I originally started as a civil engineer at Berkeley and I thought I had this vision of myself working overseas building like large airports or dams or big road projects and that was a fairly typical That was a real possible career path in the 80s early 80s That sort of went away because a lot of the countries overseas started to have their own engineers and own construction companies So in the early 80s Bechtel was the sort of this civil engineering company That would go and if you lived in Peru and you needed a dam built well, you'd pick up the phone call Bechtel And they'd come and built this, you know Very large project so my freshman year I sort of looked around and realized those jobs were disappearing and then I changed to industrial engineering and operations research which is Applied math applied statistics. It's sort of a problem-solving productivity and efficiency and I think John and I talked about this maybe Four years ago when I first I was on the show It kind of grew out of World War two and what it is it's When you have a scarcity of resources And you have some objective. How do you best use those resources? And so one of the examples early on in terms of operations research is from World War two Where in England they had very limited resources in terms of you know Manpower in terms of you know people to fight in the army in terms of the actual metals and various other things And so do you build airplanes or you build a ship? Ship takes way more resources, but you know if it takes 20 times more resources to build the ship compared to the airplane What's the the better thing to do with your resources? And so it tried to come up with a way of systematically analyzing those types of questions and so That's a little bit of the background of the operations research side of things So in answer to your question in high school didn't really have a concept of what engineering would be like But when I got to college, I thought I had an idea and I watched as that sort of career path I had envisioned sort of Narrowed so I switched to something else which seemed like it'd be fairly interesting and it was and so in relation to farm fresh to you 20 or 30 years later after graduating It just sort of continues with that Kind of line of work which is looking at systems and figuring out how we can best improve them And sometimes it's trying to reduce costs. Sometimes it's trying to improve quality. Sometimes it's a mix of both Okay, and I brought you back to Davis, right? It did So what's your favorite thing about Davis? What do you like about living here? I Like the fact that I don't have to get in a car to go run an errand and this this may seem like Well for some people they they get that right you see said I'm like, okay. Yeah, I got it Other people they're kind of like, yeah, what's the big deal? You just get in your car You go drive somewhere. What's the big deal about that? Having lived in Los Angeles for a while There is something nice about just hopping on your bike and being able to go downtown and just Get something to eat or run a quick errand There's something when you're on your bike at least for me and in Davis with bike paths and things like that It's a fairly relaxed experience. I've ridden my bike in other cities like in London. It's high adrenaline adventure sport Just you know going from point A to B because of the traffic and just you're sort of at 100% attention so you don't get squished But in Davis. Yeah, I think that's really one of the nice things about it and I also appreciate the weather. I Know it's very hot in the summer, but it's Dependably sunny and warm. I've lived places where if you say hey Zoe, you know, let's go play tennis next Wednesday You have no idea whether it's going to be rainy or what the weather is going to be like and Davis once you hit May You can pretty much, you know Guaranteed guaranteed until the end of September that if you make a plan to do something outdoors It's probably going to be suitable for doing something outdoors. So I appreciate those two things Have you ever ridden your bike through UC Davis campus one in session? Yes, I found that riding My bike through there is a little bit like going riding through a zoo Have you noticed that the start of the term start of the fall term? There's always Fair number of people who are newish to bikes or discovering bikes But in general, I think the infrastructure is laid out well enough and if you sort of pay attention It's it's still pretty relaxed. It's nowhere near The level of attention required say of driving. That's my experience. Okay, and what has been your experience raising your son in Davis? Positive so when I was a kid I really enjoyed going to the parks and playing soccer on the fields and going to the rec pool It's nice. You know all these years later to be able to do some of the same things with my son. So And So I spent part of my life so I growing up in San Francisco in San Francisco my schoolyard literally had no plant life Right and so it was fun you played four square and tell their ball and kick ball I mean there's all sorts of things, but there really wasn't any plant life Golden Gate Park was nearby so I'd go play there But in Davis, you know, we're really fortunate Kids can go and they can run and play on the fields. They can play tag. They can do whatever my my son went to Redbud Montessori and they have this great tree that all the kids climb and So yeah raising a kid in Davis is actually pretty nice And I'm very appreciative of the fact that we have a nice school system And that we also have the community that does a lot of volunteer work to Make things nice for kids and families Yeah, yeah, I've really enjoyed my experience growing up in Davis. Yeah, you must have experienced a lot of those same types of things Yeah, yeah There's a lot of a lot of parent involvement in schools, which I appreciate Not as a kid but I appreciate it now looking looking back on it And what you said about being in nature and just being able to run around. Yeah, and it's a safe place in Davis So you're it's safe to run around so that's been nice. Yeah What projects are you currently involved with in the city council? so one of the the big things that we're working on which is Kind of a it's complex it's and ultimately How it moves forward will probably be slightly controversial which is dealing with the homelessness issue And the homelessness issue I think a lot of times people like to sort of do this quick black-and-white type of thing and the homelessness issue is So complex because there's so many reasons why we have people sort of living Out on the streets or you know behind buildings or in you know behind trees and things Some of it is self, you know, some people like a nomadic lifestyle Some have lost their job and it's an economic thing. Some have addiction issues some have mental health issues and I think the key thing to think about is that you know, these are people and They ended up in this situation for a variety of reasons and So there isn't going to be one simple solution right so if people end up in a situation for a variety of reasons There's probably not the one simple answer and so that's going to take some hard work and And unfortunately for some of these issues like you know, imagine addiction issues or mental health issues It requires resources for counseling and things like that and that can be very expensive So I think a lot of the communities in California and also across the nation are dealing with this issue And so I'm not sure how we're going to address it. I know that we have some city staff people working on it And it's definitely on the minds of the council people One thing that's actually coming up that I've been working on for close to three years is our renters ordinance So we're hoping to actually have the final vote on a renters ordinance probably in mid to mid-November to early December and We have a situation in Davis where there's a vacancy rate of under half a percent and We have a situation where a third of the single-family homes are actually rental properties so right now, we don't really have a comprehensive approach to Dealing with the rental issues. And so what we're planning on is having something which has an education component So landlords tenants and neighbors kind of know what the rules are what the laws are Mediation components or if there are any Issues right so currently There's not too much you can do other than sort of jump to small claims court And so the idea is with mediation services, which would be provided by a local nonprofit for essentially almost nothing There are volunteers who staff this mediation group yellow conflict resolution center We can work out these disagreements between roommates right so roommate issue can be oh well I was just here for two months I don't think I should pay a share of the rent even though I kind of said I would and then you have this weird Dynamic and one is a friend of the other roommates and just like you just need somebody just kind of step in just Hear people and then kind of work something out and then you have disputes between the landlord and the tenant And those are probably more typical but having somebody who can come in who's well trained on what the real estate in terms of what the rental regulations are and Sort of mediate the situation Then sort of a third component would be an inspection piece especially really just for single-family residential units that are rental properties sometimes people Do a very good job at keeping their place in good repair and are very prompt with making repairs if something breaks And sometimes not so much And so this component would be an important piece so people would understand of what is sort of the basic level of repair For something to be suitable for renting out and so Yeah, we've been doing a lot of outreach with Landlords property owners and also some of the student groups trying to come up with a workable solution which Tries to avoid a lot of unintended consequences But that'll be coming up pretty soon and then those are sort of two big ones and I would say Number one focus for me is sort of if not number one. It's definitely in the top three Is trying to figure out a way to repair our roads and bike paths, right? Which is what the Nishi project was in part or right partly that would have helped with some of our infrastructure needs Okay, in terms of around traffic congestions and Traffic congestion and things like that. Okay, and since that didn't pass. Are there new plans being drawn up to sort of Redesign what that project was meant for? I've met with the project proponents and as far as I know, there's nothing planned and then your future Okay, so I think they I Think understandably I think it's always you know when you put a lot of time and energy into an election and you are Unsuccessful, it's kind of understandable that they're probably just taking a breather just yeah out what their next steps will be But as of now, I don't know of any plans for that project. Okay Can you tell me about your experience with the Gandhi statue and the protests? Yeah, I can actually so Last February At a city council meeting where that was the last council meeting Where we could place something on the June ballot We were planning to talk about revenue measures. So each of the council people most of the council people had their own sort of pet ideas for a Possible revenue measure. So one of mine was Maybe a parcel tax for $20 to fund three additional police officers somebody else wanted to talk about some infrastructure for recreational facilities and parks and Those sorts of things so this this was the this was the as we approach the meeting This is what we were gearing up for this was kind of like the last meeting to discuss our competing ideas for this and so that was on The main part of our agenda and the agenda has essentially two parts We have the main part which are the items that we take Individually where there's individual public comment around that issue and then there's something called the consent calendar And on the consent calendar These are items which are described as non-controversial Not likely to need any additional information and likely to pass five zero So this there could be five to twenty five different items on the consent calendar so for instance if we need to renew a contract to We subcontract out some tree trimming so if it's just a renewal. Hey new contract with you know company XYZ who does this tree trimming or Pay consultant $5,000 to update the software of the wastewater treatment plan This these things would typically end up on the consent calendar. So With the Gandhi statue, I typically read the main items on Thursday Before the Tuesday meeting and I read more in-depth on Friday and Saturday Saturday I'll look at the consent items and On Sunday, I'll take a closer look and so I saw this thing for the Gandhi statue I haven't really heard anything about this and Then I look and it basically says a local group of people want to fund raise to Place the statue in Central Park and they will pay for the cost of the statue and they will pay for the installation cost So the city won't cost the city any money I'm really It's funny. I haven't heard anything about this. Normally you hear about things like that And then I thought well, you know, it's Gandhi, right? Guess that's fine sure So as a council we passed the consent calendar with multiple items including the Gandhi statue proposal as a block Typically, that's how we do it. So the consent item are moved as a block and that's not individually It's as the whole yes, and so we voted 5-0 and then Didn't really think much of it and then about a month and a half later I got this email from the organizations of minorities Organization of minorities in India saying we can't believe you're placing this Gandhi statue Gandhi was this bad man And you know, this is a really terrible thing so I looked at it and it was Probably actually worded a little more extreme than that and I thought hmm. Oh well We get being on the city council. We get a variety of emails. Some are just Super kind of out there hostile and then there are others like, you know, the Paint The roadstriping in front of my house is really worn out. I wish you would really fix something like that So those types of things are like, okay here. I'm gonna respond to you or I'll forward it on to somebody in public works Through all right emails and so the one from the the people who opposed to Gandhi would just seem kind of out there And I'm like, come on. It's gone to you like And then they emailed again, and I realized like oh, this is a legitimate group of people So I emailed back and I said well, you know, I'm happy to talk to you about your concerns And so I mentioned to Rob Rob Davis. He's the current mayor. I said hey Rob You know, you know that email that we got a complaint about the Gandhi statue I'm gonna go meet with those folks who want to go with me. He's like, okay, sure. So we went and Everybody just into their house in South Davis and we sat and you know the person so as a background My knowledge of Gandhi is fairly limited I'm not a Gandhi scholar and My knowledge is based upon probably a Couple lines and like a junior high school textbook or something so they were you know They started out saying well when Gandhi was in South Africa and listed all these things and then I'm thinking wait, South Africa No, India, right? Gandhi India and at that point I realized that there was this whole there were several chapters in his life I didn't really know anything about and some of their Comments and claims I thought were rather extreme But the takeaway from it for me was that this actually was this group of people really had heartfelt sincere concerns about this idea of the Gandhi statue being placed in Central Park and You know, I I'm still a believer in Gandhi has done a lot of really wonderful things So that has not changed but I but I sort of got a sense that there was a greater depth to this person and Right, he's a human. So, you know, you know human is perfect But yeah, I felt like they they really had some sincere concerns And I thought well and I had Rob shared those that view with me We thought well, we should actually bring it back to the city council and let's have a fuller discussion Let people come and let's revisit this issue and let them, you know Say what why they want the statue why they don't want the statue and let people be heard because I think that's an important thing About Davis we have this public comment period and I think it's very important for people to feel like they can express their concerns and They will be listened to we don't necessarily have to agree with them and vote their way But at least they feel like they were heard and it's not we just don't do it Just for the sake of doing it But I really try to listen to people and and try to take that into consideration Before I vote and so I thought it was important So the likelihood that this group would have been able to speak and would have changed everyone's minds probably fairly small but just the ability to speak in public and feel like They had their their their forum to acknowledge their concerns. Yeah, so we so We approach city manager talked about how we would like to bring this back The people in favor of the statue had done all this work had done this fundraising and really excited about it We're kind of like well wait a minute. Yeah, you approve this in February here. It is let's call it August I don't know Yeah, sometime, you know, hey, wait a minute. We've done all these plans the statue has actually arrived in Davis We know what are you guys doing and So understandably they were upset we met with them and yeah, they were upset and we tried to explain like look This isn't that we are opposed to Gandhi. This is really about this idea that this Appears to be a controversial thing and it'd be nice to let people have the venue for them to express their concerns They weren't completely satisfied with that answer And then we got word that the Indian Consul General wanted to come to Davis and talk to us. So from San Francisco Okay, sure. So the Indian Consul General comes to Davis and Rob and I meet with him at City Hall and It turns out that the statue was coming directly from the Indian government. It wasn't sort of this Homespun like oh gee, you know, we're just gonna say raise and have the statue not to take anything away from that group I mean, they did fundraise and they made active efforts to help place the statue but the statue itself was funded from by the Indian government and the current Indian government is a Indian Nationalist Party That's who's in charge now and so it's they've had this effort of placing Gandhi statues all over the world and For whatever reason Davis happened to be one of the places that Was was going to have one of these statues anyway, so Rob and I were We brought the item back to City Council in the sense that we The item came up on the agenda where we asked our colleagues whether they would reconsider the item whether we would be able to Revisit the item And so during that we heard commentary From the pro statue people and the anti statue people Ultimately our colleagues voted three to two Rob and I were the two vote to Not relook at the statue. So just sort of Status quo, we're not going to go backwards. It's we already voted on it. It's just going to move forward as planned What was interesting at the public comment on that issue was it was almost like They were talking about Gandhi the sort of this two different Gandhi's one Gandhi Which is the one we're most familiar with was the person who? led nonviolent protests helped gaining independence At some level led this exemplary life and was very inspirational to people in the West like Martin Luther King and you know various others about this the power of non-violence and Okay, so there was that and you're like I don't disagree with that. I mean Gandhi is symbolic and Has really inspired people in a very good way and then there was sort of this other group of people who? We're looking at the failings of Gandhi as a person, right? so Gandhi was a real person and Had Some weaknesses So they were sort of talking about two different Gandhi's Gandhi the person versus Gandhi the symbol and I think the majority of people in Davis and throughout the US View Gandhi as the symbol and that's understandable One of the things that struck me with the people who were opposed to the statue is There were people who were Minorities in India based upon religion and they were also lower caste members in the Hindu religion and Several lower caste people who we used to call untouchables You know really expressed their frustration that somebody who To them represents high caste Hindu the high caste Hindu sort of system That this person would be placed in the park because they talked about how They as a lower as an untouchable or a Dalit in India were they were severely Constrained in terms of what they could make of themselves what their life would look like in India But in America they felt like all sorts of possibilities existed for them And they felt very strongly like this is a really good thing especially for their children and what was really I think touching was the fact that they Reference their kids they reference the fact that here in the US they weren't bound by this sort of this caste system and that having this this this Symbol of this person that to them represented kind of this caste system was sort of hurtful to them And then the statue was installed on October 2nd I think it would have been nice to let people Express their concerns, but ultimately even at that council meeting where we were discussing whether we should Look at it whether we should place the statue or not. It did serve as a form for people to express their Their thoughts both positive and negative the statue currently exists in Central Park and At the placement there were some protests, but thankfully they were nonviolent. I won't say they were exactly civil but Yeah, that's that's the the Gandhi story and kind of a nutshell Wow, that has a really interesting background that I would have never known about if not for those protests Right. So thank you very much. That's all of the questions I have for today, but okay for being here Oh, sure, and thanks to the audience for watching John will come on again, and then Ask you a few more questions. Okay. Well, thank you Zoe. Thank you. Okay. Good so Zoe you look so different. Yeah, thank you. So What surprises you about being on the city council? how little I Knew about my community right, so you live somewhere for You know decades or something and you feel like you know, you're a community But when you get on the city council, there's so many different things, right? You're sort of like go lighting of the dog park. So Waste water rates for El Massaro You know the current water project we you know had this sort of water rate battle in terms of you know What would be the most appropriate way to set water rates? We have sort of how the parks are funded What's going on with the pools? What's going on with the cool Davis and our sustainability efforts? I mean, there's sort of all these different dimensions and whether we realize it or not in our normal lives We sort of deal with some subset and being on the council You know the council is sort of the governing the policy board Governing body of the city. It's actually the city manager who kind of carries out the policy but all those things sort of come to us and It's you know the interplay between the school district and the city we have this thing going on right now about tennis courts There's just lots of things so really that kind of surprised me I thought well, you know them Davis I kind of know this stuff and I kind of focused on development issues and peripheral development and you get in there like oh one of the first things some of my first meetings was Somebody from the US Department of Agriculture went and shot coyote in north Davis, right? So shot the coyote the neighbors came forward and you know They love the coyote and the coyote that we think might have had little pups and Square the pups and You know like huh when I was running for office. I wasn't thinking like I'm gonna deal with the USDA Person who goes and like shoots a coyote. Yeah, just running out on the green belt We actually canceled the contract with the USDA over that But yeah, it's something along those lines, which was really Realizing how much more to the city there was Yeah, that's kind of so there's the the evolution of the city of Davis since World War two has been Growth and then less growth and then limited growth and then at this point virtually no growth. Yeah Between measure J and measure are the Likelihood that another project is going to be approved on the periphery of Davis is pretty slim the Nishi campaign was an attempt the fact that all five members of the city council and most of the establishment supported the Nishi project and To a certain extent reflects that it was vetted by the city political process It was as close as the citizens could come to having something that everybody in the establishment said We support this project and it lost by a very narrow margin I think that the traffic conflict and it's I live on olive drive and it's Richard and all of So I deal with it every day, but I have a bicycle. I don't have a car So I don't have to worry about most of the congestion The the there are enormous problems facing the city of Davis that I think we're not dealing with But I think that they're I'm segueing to what I really want to talk about so the American economy is based on false premise. We're six hundred billion dollars in trade deficit every year Going back to 93 That's a long time we we owe the Chinese government over two trillion dollars as people of the United States If we were actually being responsible We wouldn't be spending all the money worse we're spending because we don't have it We exported in California twelve trillion dollars in exports to China We imported a hundred and twenty eight billion dollars in imports from China That's how irresponsible the American economy is We have the pension problems that the city is facing every municipal government is facing every state government is facing And the federal government is in deficit so From my standpoint the answer is we need to go to daily reporting That that we're so out of touch with the future that we're out of touch with the present So from my standpoint the most exciting thing that bread talked to Zoe about was operations research because that's what I think We need to do with the city of Davis. I think there's a complete incongruence Between what the city staff doesn't what the city council thinks I think we need to get that in adjustment But it's also a problem at the national level Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump are proof that the establishment does not have a majority behind it The the social contract is in real trouble. We're having a lot of problems with our government and how the economy works, so From the standpoint of making sure that the lights get turned on at night that the roads get paved We're losing sight of the future. We just The the people that supported Julie part Kansky 25 years ago are people that want Davis to be smaller And I think that we're gonna have to change so if I mean at that point I have a whole bunch of ideas about changing but they're from the standpoint of a bicyclist and I think that we can go in different directions that are more sustainable. So with that tirade What do you think Davis should do to become more sustainable? So Sustainability, I mean we can talk about sort of greenhouse gas sustainability, you know environmental sustainability things like that I think you touched upon one area which to me is I might get in trouble for saying this but I think is as pressing Well, let's call them there. They're tied for tied for tied with each other one is sort of the environmental sustainability You know Davis is a small town. I think we can play a role in Making environmental sustainability Woven into what we do and sort of lead by example So this is important thing so our role and this is not only for our own community But also in the region and just in other areas, right? So people take inspiration just like we take inspiration from people what's people doing Boulder and Berkeley and Santa Monica or you know, wherever like Portland So I think I think that's a very very important piece I think we have this great organization cool Davis We have a lot of people volunteering and really helping us push forward and the council has an important role there too So we passed a residential solar requirement. So any new residential construction has to have photovoltaic solar Incorporated on each unit. I think we're pretty close to having something similar for commercial So these are important things that we can do But what I was going to say is I think the the financial situation is also Really important and it's not something that can really to a lesser extent Volunteers will play probably a smaller role. I mean, this is something that the council really needs to wrestle with Obviously volunteers are helpful and whatever things we do and what activities were involved with But I think in terms of getting our financial situation in order that kind of falls on the laps of the city council so I Think you know, there have been several large factors that have played into that. I think over generous assumptions about what CalPERS was able to deliver in terms of pension Investments and you know, maybe 10 years ago 15 years ago 10 years ago. Let's see what year we in You know CalPERS would say, oh, you know, we are doing so well in the investment area 2008 was the year that matters. So eight years ago and anything before that CalPERS look pretty good Yeah, I mean they sort of said well, you know, we're doing so well that you won't even have to fund your pension cost You know, don't worry about it. Even if you let people retire early and give them a little bit better pension Hey, we're doing so awesome. You know our projections show that you might not even have to contribute at all Well those assumptions kind of crashed and burned so now we're sort of left with this situation which Depending on how you look at it either it's well, let's call it unsustainable at some level So there's that there's just kind of the global situation or the national situation with low interest rates and things like that we You know in California, we have a prop 13. We also have a state that decides to sort of Take away funding from local municipalities and maybe put a little back So we have this situation where road repairs. Hey, that's that's up to you in the city You know, good luck Whereas the state was more of an active partner in helping us fund road repair costs But as the economy went bad and the state finances went bad a lot of the things they would do Prior to that for many many decades where they would help fund local municipalities and counties that funding disappeared So on the one hand the state budget looks like it's balanced Oh, but we don't fund these things like we used to and we see that also with the school district, right? Right now we have measure H and you know, there's this active campaign and I'm supportive of measure H Because you look and you see how the state has retreated in terms of the funding for school districts like our own and You know schools are important, right? so anyway, the the city is kind of caught in this situation where the funding has sort of disappeared at some level from the state where the assumptions that help create over promises to Current and former employees You know, we're in kind of a pickle and so I think what we're not going to be able to do is really kind of write the ship or You know make a change One to two or three year change that fixes things. This is sort of a 20 to 30 year process It didn't take us that long to get into this trouble But it's going to take us that long to dig out of it and the way I kind of think of it is Maybe rightly or wrongly is it's almost as if we've purchased a home or we have this 30 year mortgage And so we need to make sure It's called a 30 year mortgage with an adjustable interest rate We need to make sure that we're able to make those payments and stay current because if we aren't then the balloon The disaster strikes and so we have to make sure that we're able to do that That doesn't mean you pay off your 30 year mortgage in four years But it means that you have to be adaptable enough so that you're able to make that Those payments and those payments are sort of towards our pension obligations towards our retiree benefits that have already been promised and legally we're obligated to pay and Also road repairs so as we let our roads deteriorate the bill will come to ultimately and the longer We wait on those repairs the more expensive it is And so we have to be able to do that and keeping in mind that Let's call that 20 to 30 year horizon. So we have to be sensible. We can't overspend We can't panic because this is you know, we have a way forward, but it's a 20 to 30 year solution So part of the thing about your daily report is I'm sort of a believer in something similar to that Which is greater transparency right now if you were to go on the city's website And you want to learn about the budget and unfunded liabilities. It's kind of It's kind of hard to get that information Aggregated in a way that sort of makes sense I think we need to be better about sharing the true financial picture of the city with the citizens and Being able to update it. So the past couple years. We've had better than expected sales tax receipts Better than expected property tax receipts How does that relate to kind of that big 30-year sort of You know problem that we're trying to work on and so I think if people kind of the community knew what the problem is The scale of the problem and what we're doing to work on it That would be helpful because what it would create is this whole extra set of eyes on the city to help make sure we do something responsible and responsible is not only how we Determine that we spend the money but in terms of what projects we approve and what projects we don't approve and You talked about measure J and measure R People rightfully are skeptical about some of these development proposals because in the past I don't think we've asked the developers to pay their fair share of The externalities of the problems that they necessarily bring the consequence and so people are a little bit skeptical, you know, I You know when Zoe's first question was told Was asking a little bit about myself. I talked about I was in a measure X no one coval village You know, so I I get that skepticism on development and The Nishi project, you know people can agree with my views or disagree. That's fine But I think when people talk to me about it It wasn't oh well Umpals with the developers so we're just gonna give them a blank check It was for some very specific reasons why I thought the net positive Outweighed the negatives To the community it was it was a mixed blessing the project, you know, so it wasn't all good. It wasn't all bad I think the community needs to see that We are Looking at things more objectively from the big picture not oh well It's good for the developer so therefore it's good for Davis, but no how does this affect our community and there are some trade-offs You know any good example is? Do we really want to be sort of this sort of Monterey type of thing where everything is super expensive and Sort of regular people can't afford to live here. I don't know right I mean, there's some trade-offs there if this becomes sort of just expensive bedroom community and the students are you know It's kind of squished, you know eight students per one bedroom apartment or squished, you know, 10 to 12 people in a single family residence You know, we need to think about that I mean we have this sort of creative class of people the 20 somethings and 30 somethings who bring a lot of energy to the community and Bring a lot of interesting things There's nothing wrong with being kind of a sleepy expensive retirement zone Maybe that's kind of an overstatement, but but I mean there's that sort of path and then there's sort of the crazy Apologies to Elk Grove, but you know, we don't want to just go like hey Just build it go for it and then just like becomes this, you know double triple your population over a 10-year period and What where's the soul of Davis? What are we trying to do? So I think we kind of need to come up with a thoughtful approach where people feel like We're headed more or less in the right direction and then they'll be a little bit more willing to be open to some possibilities so the AARP the retired people did a list of the top 10 places for retired people to go to and Every one of them was a college town Eugene and Arbor Davis was number eight on the list The support system that students need is the same support system that retired people need. It's you know and part of it is your Your logistics your community is Compacted because with older people you're not quite as active and with younger people You're so distracted by what you're doing that you don't really care about most of the in-between things Um Davis is unique and special. I'm gonna wrap up the show now. Sure. Um, I I'm organizing something called the Davis community building process. There's a website. It's called Davis community building net The idea is that the city is so big that it's hard to manage for citizens I talk about the difference between a bird's-eye view and a worm's-eye view The people from the city have a great bird's-eye view of the whole city But they don't have a worm's-eye view of what it means to be alive in Davis because they're looking at the whole thing I think that the idea of a community and I think Davis has like 12 communities but the the place where you shop for groceries defines your community and each of us has our Own physical community based on where we live where we work and where we shop Where we recreate where we go to school? Nobody lives in all of Davis everybody lives in part of Davis and I think that the politics can better reflect that I'm advocating that Davis become a charter city in the next year and a half So if you're interested in that go to the website Davis community building process net I Want to thank you for being on our show for sure Are you having me our guests on November the second will be the ASU CD student buddy president Alex Lee He's interested in cities, so we're going to talk some about urbanology I'm really interested to find out what he asked to say and then on the 9th of November We're going to have interim UCD Chancellor Ralph Hector and he's going to make a pitch to become the permanent Chancellor at UC Davis So we're not going to ask him any hardball questions, but you'll get a chance to see if you think he's good enough So thanks for being on our show This has been what's going on. Thanks for watching. Good evening