In response to City Council’s deep cuts to the financial support of the island’s social service and arts organizations last night, Rod Stevens sent this email around:
“Last night the Council made significant funding cuts in programs serving the arts, humanities and the needy. Council members choked up and cried before they went ahead and voted for the cuts. And yet several weeks ago these same people happily passed a million dollar, time-and-materials contract with Heery International for design and management of the Winslow Tomorrow streetscape project, despite community protests that there City has been unable to manage very similar contracts such as the one with Tetra Tech on the wastewater treatment plant. If the City had put half as much time into bidding and negotiating that work as it spent cutting the arts, humanities and social services, perhaps it could have paid for those cuts with the savings in the Heery contract. This tells me that this streetscape project is a higher priority.”
You can read about last night’s cuts here: communityservices. (this is the agenda bill, which contains details about these contracts. For a description of the Council’s final action, read the Review’s article here.)
Supporters of City administration and the Council majority have pointed out many times that the current phase of the Heery contract is supposed to be paid with funds other than the City’s depleted general fund. General fund shortfalls are the reason the Council must make brutal cuts in spending.
Aside from the fact that the City has still not nailed down the financing for the Winslow Way project, those who argue that “not one dollar …[will] be drawn from the tax-supported general funds of the City,” have a very short memory. Perhaps financing for the remainder of the project will be cobbled together through grants, LID’s and utility funds. (I use the word “remainder” with hesitation, since the actual project has not yet begun, although as much as $4-5 million–a good third as much as the entire anticipated $12 million cost of construction–has already been spent on consulting and design.)
Nevertheless, less than twelve months ago, the Council approved a consulting contract with Heery for several hundred thousand dollars (over strenuous objections of three Council members, due to concerns about the City’s finances). That money came out of the general fund, as did the rest of the money the City spent on the Winslow Way project before this year.
The City’s six top managers (two of whom no longer work for the City) received a total of more than $32,000 in bonuses at the end of 2008, when the City’s red-ink problems were already well known. Just a few weeks after paying those bonuses, the City laid off six employees due to budget problems.
The City now has at least one employee, Chris Wierzbicki, whose primary responsibility is the Winslow Way project. Yet, one of the first staffers to be laid off during this year’s budget bloodletting was the excellent Brent Butler (a COBI Employee of the Year). Butler was an effective and knowledable liason with some of the very service organizations that are now being decimated.
Those actions speak very loudly indeed.
Feeding in the trough is a joke? No public official with any brains would make such a statement- Bad joke who ever thought this up.
Althea,
It’s awful to have to consider such painful expense reductions for our social safety net organizations and arts organizations.
But I see the facts differently than the way you tell the story. And entirely missing from your story is the very painful burden that city employees will face as we struggle with the need to downsize the city from 152 employees fifteen months ago to, I’m guessing, less than 120 after another expected round of layoffs next month.
First, your link to last night’s City Council Agenda Bill is not the final; it’s just the initial proposal. On Wednesday night Council approved revised motions with less severe reductions for the arts organizations than initially proposed. Arts funding will be 6/12ths prorated through June (rather than the proposed 4/12ths prorated through April), to give extra time for the arts community to hopefully find grants for arts operations later this year.
Council’s final decision Wednesday was that 2% for public art will continue to accumulate in its special fund, but there will be two years of limits on public art spending from that fund.
Second, opponents of the Winslow Way repair want your readers to believe that the project is the reason why we don’t have enough money this year to fully cover arts and human services. Untrue. Not one dollar in 2009 — not one dollar from now through the 2010 completion of the Winslow Way project — comes from the City tax dollars that pay for arts or social service contracts.
Third, the amount spent on the design and engineering of the WWay project prior to this year is not “$4-5 million”. It’s $1.4 million. Opponents like to say $4 million because they like to throw in $3 million of Winslow Tomorrow activities that are different from the street repair project.
By comparison, the $1.4m for Winslow Way engineering in ’07-’08 is less than half the amount that my colleague Debbie Vancil persuaded 3 other Council members (no longer serving) to spend in 2007 on two open-space land purchases that I wish the Council had been financially frugal enough to reject. For 20 years we’re spend about $240,000 tax dollars per year from our General Fund to pay the debt service for those two land purchases. And THAT IS one reason why we needed to reduce our General Fund expenses for arts on Wednesday night by $135,000.
How many of you have walked in the Meigs wetlands or the difficult to find Williams property? Every step you take is being paid for by General Fund debt service that reduces the money for arts and social service safety net (and road preservation, and police officers, and …) . How many of you have walked on the dangerous sidewalks of Winslow Way? The sidewalks and street will be safely rebuilt with grant and LID funds.
Fourth, your description of the supposed $1.5m decision a year ago is incorrect. In 2008, the Council only approved two segments of Heery work for $274k, and that’s included in my $1.4m amount above.
So, bottom line, not one dollar of the project budget for the Winslow Way Reconstruction project from 2009 to completion will come from the financially strapped General Fund. It will come from $6 million of grants, $1 million of property owner LID, and $5 million from our islandwide stormwater utility and Winslow water and sewer funds.
As for last year’s payment of bonuses (representing a range of 3% to 5% of base salary) based on the terms of employment those managers were working under in 2008, I won’t comment because they weren’t a Council decision. But think about this. In 2009, the City Administrator and his top departmental managers have voluntarily, with no fanfare, agreed to take three pay cuts: (1) no eligibility for any bonus for 2009, (2) no 3.5% cost of living increase for 2009, and (3) ten unpaid furlough days in solidarity with the employees they supervise. That adds up to a voluntary self-imposed cut of over 10% of pay. I stumbled across this information by asking how the bonuses would be handled in 2009.
I’d say that those facts are worth a story in this blog.
Barry,
I’m happy to correct errors in statements I’ve made. I stand corrected on the Heery contract. How could I have forgotten the $1.1 million contract that was approved last month? (I have made the change in my post).
That still leaves a whole lot of general fund dollars spent on Winslow. If you want to tell people the Winslow Tomorrow project has nothing to do with the Winslow Way reconstruction, and that one set of costs is unrelated to another, that’s your decision. I don’t see it that way, and neither do many reasonable island taxpayers.
Barry and others on the council continue to pretend that this is simply about sidewalks and sewers. If those things were so important, the mayor would have put the thumb on Larry Nakata and Tom Haggar long ago- after all, they have the most offending pieces of sidewalk on or next to their properties. But this isn’t about sidewalks and sewers, it’s about the Mayor’s attempts to remake downtown Bainbridge as a kind of Mercer Island West. Dare i say that Barry and our Mayor are trying to play a real kind of Sim City game?
One of the neat tricks in Sim City is that when your city gets large and urban enough, the “mayor” gets to put up a statue to themselves. It is a very realistic part of the game, at least as regards the ego and motivation of those who play it, on the computer and in real life.
In the video game industry, this game, and others like it, are known as “god games”, because they give the players an all-powerful feeling of control, of ruling the world, and setting the rules by which a community will grow and be ruled. Not so different than most power trips, and in video games, the result goes away as soon as you push the off button. But this is Bainbridge, the dollars are real, the place is beloved, and there are real people walking the streets, real people who have other needs and desires than to simply occupy buildings and become bit players in someone’s urban set piece.
P.S. It is interesting that Barry, “Mr. Sustainable Bainbridge”, does not seem to think that Meigs Farm was a worthwhile purchase, since it hasn’t had enough pedestrian miles per year logged on it. By this measure, the hallway leading to my bathroom is an incredibly valuable piece of real estate.
Barry=Mr. Sustainable Bainbridge–people aren’t still falling for that line of crud are they?
P.S. Barry, I believe that the community have made it clear that open space acquisition was something they support. You can’t compare money spent on open space to money spent on Winlsow Tomorrow/Winslow Streetscape/Winslow Way repair.
P.P.S. Please stop referring to the $1 million LID. It is not an LID it is money that the property owners have said they would pay to put back in some of the STREETSCAPE.
This will come as a shock to everyone, including Adam. I was standing in line for super supper when I received a revelation from the social worker in charge.
According to this prince, the apple wasn’t our downfall. It was swine flu. Adam went wonky with the flu and he coughed up a rib. What was I supposed to do?
According to the prince of helpfulness, ground zero for transmission of swine flu began at a public trough. Mea culpa. I innocently mixed in bonuses. Isn’t a bonus tastier than apples?
Of course, the local press picked up the story you’ve all read by now. Sure, I take the rap for the apples, but I never took a bite of a bonus. And I never eat at public troughs.
On the other hand, it’s public record that Adam couldn’t resist.
1040 from our former paradise.
I agree with Althea, I make no distinction between “Streetscape/Winslow Tomorrow” or the street repairs. If we were only doing repair work I would agree with Mr. Peters, but we are not. What really scares me are his comments about city managers and his thoughts on salaries. Bonuses are just that- “a bonus”. It is clear that the city management and Mr. Peters believe that these thousands of dollars are a “right” and are an expected part of the management’s salary. Otherwise he wouldn’t call the lack of a bonus a “pay cut”. The bonus money the managers got in mid-late December more than makes up for their not getting any COLA in 2009. The fact of the managers also taking furlough days does not impress me. The staff agreed to do so in an effort to save money and jobs. How many staff then got bonuses after the furlough? How many management lost their jobs? I feel very little for the management that makes $110 to $125k a year plus another 30% in benefits. I believe that all of our department directors make much more in salary in benefits than the full-time mayor of Bremerton with about 221 employees. As the benchmark study pointed out, why do we even have an IT manager that is paid at the department director level? No other comparable city does that. Why pay someone $115k + another 30% in benefits to be in charge or 5 or 6 people? What a waste of money. The department directors did not take their 2009 5% pay cut “voluntarily”. They were simply informed by the city administrator that it was going to happen. The directors only went along because they had no choice. The directors did not come forward with the 5% pay cut.
In my opinion, the city management has fed at the tax-funded trough for so long that they have come to expect it, to include that extra 5% of slop added every December. “I’d say that those facts are worth a story in this blog.”
Be kind to Mr. Peters. His rose colored glasses apparently are all steamed up, plus as some body has previously stated on the blogs some time ago, Mr. Peters and his three companions are under some voodoo spell the Mayor put on them. He is just bonkers.
We are going to hear more and more excuses and rationale from these four as the Mayors expulsion nears. The dance group, the The Four Infamous Council People, will be seen doing the EXCUSE all over town.
Based upon what I have read Althea, more and more on your blog are suggesting that they all consider resignation. Are they looking for a second to the motion or has the count reached much higher.
Althea-
Having read the various notes on the blog for a long time I keep seeing the subject of the Mayor’s incapabilities. Although I think she is totally inept, the idea of her running again prompts me to ask why a blog on just the Mayor’s capabilities isn’t sponsored by you-the lead blogster?
“Council members choked up and cried before they went ahead and voted for the cuts.” …yet they fund BITV (only 4000 homes on Bainbridge and of those 4000 how many actuallly watch?) In addition, ALL BITV staff members are being flown to Vegas in April! Vital services are being cut yet the receptionists, newscaster, station manager and program manager are attending a convention in Vegas…does this sound familiar?!…our tax dollar, surcharges and donations at work! If the City Council wants EVERYONE on Bainbridge to be able to watch city council meetings without leaving their homes, they should stream it to their website and save funds expended on BITV for vital community services!!! The “news” on Fridays is a week old and community information is much more accessible in the community newspapers and websites.
Sandi and Shining City Media:
Anyone can call BITV to learn about our role to build a stronger, more informed community. In these tough economic times, BITV has offered numerous free services to island nonprofits, schools, businesses, and residents. We will continue to work hard to grow into the valuable resource we believe this community needs. Our policies and services can be found at bitv.org, or by stopping in the station, or by attending a free orientation.
BITV provides an employee development program. It is funded with staff generated production services and not with taxes or contributions. Two BITV employees are going to the workshops for free. Most people realize the value of continuing education. Our staff does and has made sacrifices to generate funds to pay for their educational expenses.
BITV is cablecast to approximately 4,200 households on Bainbridge. Bnews is cablecast to more than 500,000 households throughout Kitsap County and Seattle from two partner stations. BITV reports Comcast subscriber numbers.
Sponsors and underwriters in the same model as public television fund Bnews.
BITV has a variety of local, regional, and national programs of community interest. All residents, except those that have had their membership revoked, can provide programming on BITV free of charge on a first-come, first-served policy. The content of member programs is entirely up to them. All BITV produced programming is solution oriented, community first, positive, and educational. Our most popular program is Bnews.
BITV has a lease with Comcast and pays rent for the space in the building it occupies.
Paul Merriman provides free financial education on BITV. We encourage other business members to provide similar educational services in their area of expertise.
As far as Mr. Olsen’s other issues or claims about BITV, state agencies and legal authorities have dismissed them. Mr. Olsen’s membership at BITV has been revoked for major policy violations.
I have serious issues with BITV’s claim to be fair and inclusive of the island’s minority voices. Sandi raises good points. BITV has anemic viewership. BITV Schmidt claims he has viewership of 700,000 of his bnews infomational program. In reality he probably has under 400 homes on BI watching.
In addition most of the programming bitv plays is not locally produced but rather imports from national sources. Local programming by producers are shunned except for their “special people.”
Furthermore, watch the sponsors of BITV news programs and you will see classic pay-to-play. The bitv website actually lays out if your become a certain level sponsor the news program will cast your company in XXX number of happy-story programs.
BITV does not serve the community. BITV has engaged in partisan political programming and continues to serve COBI Council but seldom — if ever — allows access for COBI criticism.
All in all bitv has a supreme sweetheart deal from Comcast and COBI where their 3,000 sq ft building is rent free on 10 acres of commercial property.
BITV is engaged in flim flam representing themselves as “the community television.” BITV is a banana-republic fiefdom of BITV Schmitd.
While you are at it, look into how Paul Merriman, of Paul Merriman Financial Services, is able to be the Chairman of BITV and get sweetheart deals on the non-stop airing of his financial programs touting his other services. BITV makes Chicago corruption look squeaky clean in comparison.
See one example of their arrogance on YouTube: Title: bitv crime rebuttal censorship. (Double click the following link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYqzUL3awgk)
Or Goggle search BITV illegal firing Schmidt or read about it in the Bainbridge Review.
Sandi:
You might want to check your facts. COBI does not fund BITV. As I understand it, COBI acts as an agent between Comcast, which collects fees from its customers, and BITV, which is entitled to a certain portion of those Comcast fees.
In fact, if you want to know more about BITV’s funding, I recommend you read some of the comments posted by James Olsen and Robert Dashiell on a post I did in January of 2008, when COBI was trying to keep some of that Comcast money. Here’s one from a comment by Mr. Olsen:
Finance Director Konkel thinks because he cites past contractual agreement he can spend money lock-boxed for BITV and broadcast improvement on willy-nilly “Council-chamber improvements.” In addition past hold-backs of Comcast franchise fees to questionable COBI use also is beyond the pale. The monies given to BITV by COBI are in fact monies generated by Comcast monopoly and are for the Comcast authorized BITV. These monies are not tax funds like the tax funds given to the arts (~$80,000) or to private memorials (~$130K).
If COBI want robo-cameras or the walls of the Council chamber adorned or altered, that is a decision Mr. Konkel can authorize but he must pay for this with regular budget sources and not BITV funds. The City must stop treating the Comcast funds like their own “cash cow.” As it stands the City collects over $200K in utility fees from Comcast customers.
Althea:
Thank you for the clear and accurate explanation. As BITV’s Executive Director, I have researched numerous cable provider/municipality/access station relationships throughout the country prior to our three contract negotiations. The Comcast/COBI/BITV relationship is standard practice and fulfills the intent of the FCC.
Sandi/Althea — the relationship between COBI and BITV is not as clear as Althea makes it out to be. Because COBI gave a monopoly to Comcast for cable providership here on BI, Comcast gave one station for community access tv. Then Comcast gave a second station. Bainbridge Island Broadcasting (as their tax returns call them) would not be in a position to have 2 cable stations, free rent, free use of land and other benefits without relationship to COBI. It is a parasitic relationship where BITV would not exist without COBI and COBI’s ability to grant monopoly service.
Because the station is granted, Comcast customer get taxes xxxx dollars a month which flows to BITV. Again, this money stream only exists because of COBI.
BITV is in a monopoly position to film COBI meetings and for this BITV collects large fees. There is no reason this service could not be let out for bidding allowing BITV to compete with other companies. Of course most companies don’t get free rent, free equipment to compete.
The relationship is very convoluted between BITV and COBI and in my never humble opinion something smells very fishy here. I mentioned the role of pay-to-play for sponsors and insider dealing with the Board member Merriman.
BITV is not doing a sufficient job serving the community needs beyond the bare minimum which they held COBI hostage for.
Sandi, your question was a home run and not just an attempted bunt. Keep asking the questions.
Mr. Schmidt states “Paul Merriman provides free financial education on BITV. We encourage other business members to provide similar educational services in their area of expertise.
As far as Mr. Olsen’s other issues or claims about BITV, state agencies and legal authorities have dismissed them. Mr. Olsen’s membership at BITV has been revoked for major policy violations.”
I stand by my observation about pay-to-play and cozy relationship between Paul Merriman Financial Services and access to BITV programming.
As far as issues with discrimination/retaliation/censorship being “dismissed,” that is a bit premature on the part of Paul Merriman and Schmidt. As far as membership being terminated, Merriman and Schmidt have not followed any normal due process. Appeal was submitted but BITV Schmit stonewalls with a written response. All Comcast customers await BITV’s tardy response.
Are the accommodations Sandi asked about BITV’s junket to Vegas all high-roller?
BITV’s issues with the law are far from over. Issues about pay-to-play and sponsors buying favorable “news” coverage funs in the face of FCC public-access/Comcast rules. The day of judgment is coming.
Since Scott Scmidt brought up the issue of the termination of my families’ membership to BITV “for major policy violations,” I submit for consideration my letter published locally. It is a call for BITV to honor due process and not run the community television station like a private fiefdom.
This letter was sent to Paul Merriman, Merriman Financial Services and COBI leadership.
Bainbridge Islander paper:
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My sincere thanks to the editor at the Kitsap Sun’s Bainbridge Islander for sending the below-attached letter out to 10,000 Bainbridge homes in today’s edition of the Bainbridge Islander. BITV attitude reminds me of the saying about ConEd (NYC utility) who ripped up New York; WE DON’T CARE: WE DON’T HAVE TO. This is not the attitude and behavior we should expect out of our community television station.
Call Mr. Merriman and ask him to follow due process.
JMO
Paul A. Merriman, BITV Board of Directors, illegally canceled membership for my family at BITV and has refused to follow his own procedures for appeal.
Is BITV serving all voices and interests on Bainbridge or just those that BITV Schmidt deems acceptable?. Call BITV and let them know the station is not to be run like a banana dictatorship. BITV Paul A. Merriman has been unfair and discriminatory. This must stop. Running silly denials that you believe in free speech is contradicted by your own actions. Actions speak louder than television disclaimers.
v/r
JMO
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BI Opinion
3/14/09 Volume 5, ISSUE 8
Editor:
A letter was received from BITV Schmidt and BITV attorney revoking Olsen/Dombrowski family BITV membership. BITV news release claimed this was an all-time first for BITV. While the original issue of the alleged retaliatory firing of Mary Dombrowski by BITV is under legal scrutiny, a formal appeal to BITV Chairman Paul A. Merriman has been filed over the membership revocation.
BITV recrimination campaign involving my families’ BITV membership rights and privileges is clear and disgraceful. Charges made by BITV Schmidt, through attorney Smith, are wild fabrications and distortions.
The grievous charges raised by BITV Schmidt are, in essence, 1) Olsen falsely represented himself as BITV agent or employee; 2) Dombrowksi misstated facts on a BITV form and 3) Dombrowksi’s calling out BITV’s continued membership discrimination over the last 100 days has been threatening to BITV.
Facts:
1, Jim Olsen is not now and never has been a BITV employee or representative. All my video and news productions are covered under my free-speech rights and have been clearly identified as my voice and no one else’s. BITV Schmidt’s attempts to control my actions by linking me to BITV affiliation is a falsehood. Local reporters, Adele Ferguson and Steve Gardner, covered the debate series I filmed. Both reporters clearly stated in their news articles my filming efforts were for my Shining City Media and not BITV. Schmidt has failed to provide one iota of evidence that there had been any statement on my behalf that I was an employee of BITV or their agent or representative.
2. Every one of Mary’s scores of video submissions to BITV have had full, complete, and accurate paperwork submitted including the political debate in question. Political candidates have no reasonable assumption of privacy at a public debate with other media and citizens in attendance. BITV Schmidt’s charge that the paperwork on this public-service filming of a political debate was a BITV violation is completely false. This charge of defective paperwork is ludicrous and a clear attempt by BITV Schmidt to fabricate a grievance for the purpose of canceling our family membership.
3. Mary’s challenge to 100 days of BITV membership discrimination was respectfully made and any claim the inquiry was disruptive is ridiculous at best. The clear fact is BITV has limited Mary’s access to her full rights and privileges of BITV membership. This restriction of BITV rights and access was deliberate and illegal. Mary’s statement that discrimination has consequences for those engaging in discrimination is a simple statement of fact.
Jim Olsen and Mary Dombrowski have rights and privileges as Comcast customers and BITV members that have been maliciously denied by BITV Schmidt. BITV Schmidt is not entitled to drive out BITV members that he does not like or agree with. If BITV Schmidt is unable to act as a honest broker of our Island’s community television station, a new Executive Director must be found who is an honest broker representing all members, customers and taxpayers without prejudice or malice. Our family calls on the BITV Board President Paul A. Merriman to immediately reinstate our family membership at BITV.
James M. Olsen