vanishing walnut creek?

SO YOU THINK THE MAYOR'S OFFICE IS PARTY NEUTRAL?

First Myth: Local offices, like city council and mayor, are Party neutral.
Second Myth: Local officials are interested in local solutions to local problems.
Third Myth: These officials are mainly interested in the local citizens.

Every year and some times two or three times a year, Mayors attend national meetings with titles such as the US Conference of Mayors or The League of Cities. Do they share information on how to conduct local business? Hardly, if one reads the information contained on the US Conference web site or might have followed the 2006 meeting which just concluded, in Washington, D.C.

Walnut Creek's Mayor, Kathy Hicks, was there as were most of the mayors in the cities south of Walnut Creek. Apparently the Mayor of Concord, Ms Bonilla, did not attend this year, but Concord Mayors in past years have attended.

Kathy Hicks was also in attendance on June 25, 2001, when the Conference passed a Resolution endorsing the Earth Charter and committing the organization to realization of its aim.

Some of the goals of the Earth Charter are to:
1. Promote the equitable distribution of wealth within nations and among nations.
2. Promote the Equal Rights Amendment by affirming gender equality and equity as prerequisites to sustainable development. That's equity not equal opportunity.
3. Adopt patterns of reproduction that safeguard earths regenerative capacities, and, ensure universal access to health care that fosters reproductive health and responsible reproduction.
4. Integrate into formal education and life-long learning the knowledge, values, and skills needed for a sustainable way of life.
5. Recognize the importance of moral and spiritual education for sustainable living.

If your Mayor is a Democrat he or she might also be attending the National Conference of Democratic Mayors whose goals are: To serve as the structure through which Democratic mayors can communicate and promote the goals of the Democratic Party.

For a full understanding of the Conference of Mayors go to U.S. Mayors

At the recently held meeting Chicago Mayor Daley suggested that it was good to promote food stamps for everybody. He stated that: Not enough people were taking advantage of the food stamp program. Food stamps can bring more money into the community so sign up more people.

George Cloutier, Director of American Management Services for small businesses was promoting his program called Partner America This program provided $15-20 million annually to cities promoting their (national) projects.

California's former Assembly Speaker, Antonio Villaraigosa, now Mayor of Los Angeles gave a lengthy address promoting his Poverty and Opportunity Task force which he referred to as Cities for Strong America.

He threw out a lot of statistics on poverty in America and proclaimed that a growing number of working Americans were Living on subsistence spending more than they earned. They deserved, he declared, to be given a reasonable expectation of the good life He didn't provide a definition of either reasonable or good life.

He called on every mayor to participate in his task force to help create an Ownership society. The goals of his task force included:
1. Housing vouchers.
2. National charitable giving (unclear what he meant by that).
3. Challenge the private sector to a greater claim on cities through charitable giving.
4. A higher minimum wage.
5. Health Insurance for all.
6. Rescue failing schools.
7. Free and compulsory public education. (This could be a subtle push for Rob Reiner's tax funded preschool initiative on the June, 2006 ballot.

Mayor Daley returned to the podium to endorse Villaraigosa's program and he called for the promotion of a national education program partnering with state and local entities. He also called for federal government expansion of head start with an emphasis on promoting federal oversight on education from preschool to high school.

All of this should cause one to ponder just how much local elected officials work for the local citizens and how much they really work for national special interests.

posted by Diane Lily @ 7:26 PM