Wow! This is getting serious-- and fun--at the same time!
The Dream Inn/Coast Hotel proposal referendum group has had their paid signature gatherers out around town for a couple of weeks�and now the other side (the pro-new hotel, pro-blow up the old hotel team) seems to have people passing out flyers trying to fight against the referendumb. This is quite a breakthrough in Santa Cruz politics. Usually the �don�t build anything new no matter how good it is� gang can claim the sky is falling on Santa Cruz and everyone just moves out of their way. This time a bunch of people are actually showing that the sky is not falling. What is falling is city government�s services and the city�s budget and jobs for lower to middle class people. This is so amazing� Go team go!!
And now we have all these former mayors slugging it out. The anti-hotel people trotted out five former mayors (including perennial village jester Christopher Krohn) last week. It was really fun to see the other side pull out like thirteen or fourteen former mayors a few days ago and kick the referendumb people�s collective asses. Yeah, I know some of them are ancient mayors that most of us don�t remember or have never heard of. But still, fourteen!! Bruce Bratton almost died a second death�
Speaking of the resurrected Brat-on-line, he really does have a stick up his butt about Scott Kennedy. Brat-on-line (I know the brat nickname doesn�t quite work for an old dude �but he really is kind of childish and probably deserves to be spanked), in his recently rediscovered column, decided to blame Kennedy for �denying us the right to vote.� Huh? Bratton sort of missed the minor detail that the demand for a citywide vote came up after Kennedy was already off the Council by the end of last year perhaps for rubbing a few too many people the wrong way (my kind of guy!). Brat-on-line blames Kennedy while sort of avoiding the fact that two of his own favorites from the last election also voted against the idea of a referendum. Even more mystifying, he skipped a mention of the fact that his friend (apparently everybody�s friend) Emily Reilly voted against the proposal to put the hotel on the ballot.
Anyway, this whole idea of the referendumb being about democracy is another one of those Ralph Lie-berg deals. As one of my regular sources wrote to me, this referendumb is all about killing the project and has very little to do with democracy. We had this long process of public input and none of the Lie-berg gang ever said a peep about taking this thing to a vote of the people�until saw they were losing at the City Council. When they thought they could win at the City Council, they were happy to have the Council deciding. Ask one of the �pro-democracy� referendum leaders if they will try to get the totally not democratic Coastal Commission to stop the hotel if their �democracy� effort fails. (Have you ever been given a chance to vote to elect a Coastal Commissioner?) Don�t get me wrong�I love that California has a Coastal Commission. But let�s not pretend it�s even close to as democratic as our just-elected city council.
Anyway, here�s the fun part� Several people working to stop the hotel referendum have started sending me news� since I have lined up on their side. They tell me that there may be a big surprise for the referendum people when they count the signatures. Apparently lots of people that support the hotel are signing the referendum petitions�and then sending some kind of official letter to the City to take their signatures off the petition. One of my gleeful sources told me that this was a double shot: it tricks the referendum people into thinking they have more good signatures than they really do AND it costs the anti-hotel people money because they pay their signature gatherers for each signature collected. Anyway, it is way too clever. Apparently there was some controversy in the group about this business so the anti-referendum group as a whole is not encouraging it. But some activists around town are spreading the word�and I am glad to be helping them. Whether you want to get involved in that game or not, you should spread the word that anyone that has changed their mind about the petition after signing can write a letter to the City Clerk before the March 9 deadline and simply ask for your name to be removed.
Some smart-ass people I know have started creating slogans for the campaign against the hotel�just in case they do get enough signatures.
�Save the Dream Inn�stop the oppression of Westside Millionaires.�
�Save the Dream Inn parking lot�it�s part of the city�s blackbelt.�
"Save our City�for the wealthy homeowners on the Westside.�
�Let the lower Westside get their way�they always do!�
OR �Vote our way �and we�ll stop spreading so much bullshit.�
If you have any more ideas along this line, send �em in and I�ll share them with my readers.