Coalition for a Better Sonoma County

1700 C Corby Avenue
Santa Rosa, CA 95407
707-695-6783

None listed at the moment – please contact us for the date and time of our next monthly membership meeting, or contact our member organizations for their meetings.

None listed at the moment – please contact us for the date and time of our next event, or contact our member organizations for their events.

Greenbelt Alliance Issues New Report on the Sonoma County General Plan Update

Sonoma County is expected to grow by 130,000 people by 2025. This growth is equivalent to adding a new city the size of Santa Rosa. How will the county meet the challenge of accommodating that growth while protecting the natural areas, working farms, and distinct communities that make the county a great place to live?

Sonoma County has a blueprint for the county's growth; since 1978, its General Plan has defined where new development will go and what areas will be off-limits to development. For over 25 years, the Plan has successfully maintained extensive agricultural and natural areas while guiding new growth toward existing cities and towns. However, as times change and pressure on Sonoma County's landscape increases, the General Plan must evolve to meet new challenges.

Currently, Sonoma County is updating its General Plan. The Board of Supervisors and the Planning Commission now have the opportunity to improve the Plan. They can ensure that the General Plan will be effective at maintaining the County's high quality of life, vibrant economy, and healthy environment.

This report presents five critical issues that the updated General Plan should address to provide a blueprint for sensible growth:

1. Preserving Open Space and Wildlife Habitat
2. Protecting Farmlands and Keeping Local Agriculture Viable
3. Managing Water and Wastewater
4. Providing Affordable Housing
5. Providing Transportation That Works

On each issue, the General Plan update has already made some progress in the right direction, but it still needs additional work. The following recommendations lay out specific ways to make sure Sonoma County can accommodate future growth while preserving its quality of life.

Sonoma County's leaders have a once-in-a-decade opportunity to use the General Plan update to tackle growing threats to the rural character of Sonoma County and the county's quality of life. If they incorporate these practical recommendations into the General Plan update, they will protect the county's farmland and natural areas, and make its communities better places to live. Their legacy will be one of creating a better future for Sonoma County.

For more information, contact Kelly Brown, Greenbelt North Bay Field Rep, by email.

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Sonoma City Council Approves Living Wage Law!!

On Wednesday, July 7th the City of Sonoma became the 122nd city (or county) nationwide to approve living wage legislation and the second in Sonoma County. On a 3-2 vote the council approved the first reading of the ordinance summarized below. Seventy-five supporters packed the council chamber and representatives of twelve labor, faith, environmental, and business organizations spoke in support. The final approval will occur on July 21st and the ordinance will go into effect on January 1, 2005.

Summary of the City of Sonoma Living Wage Ordinance

1) Covered employers: The City of Sonoma, for-profit businesses with contracts of more than $10,000, nonprofit businesses with contracts of more than $75,000, and firms receiving economic development assistance of more than $100,000 must comply with the following provisions:

2) Wage rate: $11.70 an hour with medical benefits or $13.20 without. The wage is indexed annually to the CPI (Consumer Price Index).

3) Compensated Time Off: Employees covered by the ordinance shall receive 22 days off per year for sick leave, vacation, or personal necessity, including 12, which are compensated at the living wage rate, and 10 which are not compensated.

4) Labor Relations Neutrality: Any city contractor subject to the ordinance must comply with state law and remain neutral if employees attempted to form a union.

5) Responsible Bidder: Bidders for city service contracts over $10,000 must certify in regards to their history as an employer, and their past record of compliance with federal and state labor, health and safety, and environmental regulations. A firm's history as an employer, along with cost and quality factors, will be considered by the city when awarding a contract.

6) Exemptions:

• Small businesses with less than six employees and/or contracts of less than $10,000 with the City are not covered.

• There is a three year three year phase-in period for covered nonprofits with contracts of more than $75,000.

• Seasonal workers, temporary workers employed less than six months, volunteers (i.e. firefighters) and part-time EMTs and paramedics are excluded.

The complete ordinance and a fiscal impact report are posted at: www.livingwagesonoma.org

The Coalition for a Better Sonoma County supports in principle the Position Statement on Sonoma County Groundwater Issues prepared by the Sonoma County Water Coalition.

Download a pdf copy of the Position Paper. Or, email for more information.

Preventing Sprawl in Sonoma County
Kelly Brown, Greenbelt Alliance Sonoma-Marin Field Representative

Greenbelt Alliance is very excited to announce the release of a new report that examines the past, present, and future of land use in Sonoma County. The report, Preventing Sprawl: Farmers and Environmentalists Working Together, is the result of a joint effort by Greenbelt Alliance and the Sonoma County Farm Bureau.

For the last two years, Greenbelt Alliance and the Sonoma County Farm Bureau led a committee of agricultural and environmental leaders in an unprecedented collaboration to survey land-use patterns in an effort to prescribe strategies for preventing sprawl and protecting agriculture.

This project arose out of a contentious campaign over Measure I, the “Rural Heritage Initiative” that appeared on the November 2000 ballot. Measure I, which was defeated at the polls, would have required voter approval for certain County General Plan amendments. In 2002, the two organizations helped to bring together the two traditional adversaries farmers and environmentalists to seek common ground for the benefit of Sonoma County’s future. A generous grant from the James Irvine Foundation funded the two-year study.

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“Farmers and environmentalists have overcome past differences to work together for Sonoma County’s future,” says Lex McCorvey, Executive Director of the Sonoma County Farm Bureau.

“Preventing Sprawl provides solid, practical recommendations to ensure that Sonoma County can accommodate future growth, protect its unique landscapes, and preserve productive farmlands,” says Kelly Brown, Sonoma-Marin Field Representative for Greenbelt Alliance.

Preventing Sprawl is the result of a collaborative process involving leaders from Sonoma County’s environmental and agricultural communities. The report provides an overview of the history of land use and agriculture in Sonoma County, plus a look ahead at population and land use projections for 2025 and 2040. The report includes four full-color maps illustrating land uses and land use trends in Sonoma County.

The report makes four key recommendations to address the challenges of future growth and development in Sonoma County:

1. Maintain a strong County General Plan.
2. Support policies that achieve higher densities within existing urban boundaries.
3. Encourage Cloverdale to adopt an Urban Growth Boundary.
4. Extend funding for the Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District.

On March 25, we kicked off a campaign to implement our policy recommendations by hosting an event for community leaders at the Kendall-Jackson Wine Center in Sonoma County. Over 100 County Supervisors, City Councilmembers, Planning Commissioners, Agency Directors and community leaders attended the event.

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In the coming year, we will be working with our partners to implement the report’s recom-mendations. We intend to conduct outreach to key decision makers and inject our recommendations into land use planning processes around the County.

To download a copy of the report, visit our website at www.greenbelt.org. For more information, contact Sonoma-Marin Field Representative, Kelly Brown at (707) 575-3661 or kbrown@greenbelt.org.

Petaluma Adopts the First Sonoma County Jobs-Housing Linkage Fee!

On December1st, the Petaluma City Council, with a 6-1 majority, adopted the first Jobs-Housing Linkage Fee ordinance in Sonoma County. This Fee was unanimously endorsed by the Petaluma Chamber of Commerce, with the conditions that the Fee be phased in over three years, beginning in January of 2005, and that the Fee be reduced to 50% in all redevelopment areas. Coalition members Steve Benjamin (Labor), Stan Gold, Stephen Harper (HAG), Margo Merck (HAG), Eileen Morris (the Living Wage Coalition), Sonia Taylor and Cindy Thomas testified in support of the Fee before the Petaluma City Council. Additionally, members of the Housing Leadership Coalition, Greenbelt Alliance, the Sierra Club, COTS, PETS and Petaluma residents also spoke. A copy of the ordinance is available upon request. Please ask!

The following column, written by Coalition member Sonia Taylor for the North Bay Progressive, is an opinion piece about the action taken by the Petaluma City Council:

Petaluma City Council Passes Jobs-Housing Linkage Development Fee
Sonia Taylor

Did the earth move for you, too?

It certainly did on December 1, for the 16 or so environmentalists, labor leaders, housing advocates and neighborhood activists who witnessed an historic event in Petaluma’s City Council Chambers. In fact, we almost couldn’t believe what we saw and heard, and in response gave the Petaluma City Council majority a standing ovation.

The cause of our rejoicing was that the current Petaluma City Council, a group that could reasonably be described as at least slightly “right of center,” took a progressive turn and voted 6-1 to enact the first Jobs-Housing Linkage fee in Sonoma County.

Petaluma took this ground-breaking step knowing full well that the Santa Rosa City Council had already all but killed such a fee, and knowing that because of their action, a new, albeit modest, fee would be imposed on future commercial development.

The Jobs-Housing Linkage Fee is a per-square-foot fee on new commercial development that will help build homes for working families who otherwise could not afford to live in Petaluma. The fees, to be implemented in 1/1/07 are: $2.08/square foot for commercial space, $2.15/ sq. ft. for industrial space, and $3.59/sq. ft. for retail space.

Petaluma already has the best record in Sonoma County for provision of low and very low income housing, and this fee assists by increasing available funds. This city council, like previous ones, has made it abundantly clear that it cares about its citizens and wants to do the right thing for them.

The Council members are willing to lead the way in Sonoma County to do so.

The Petaluma City Council first considered Jobs-Housing Linkage in August of this year. Instead of taking action at that time, the council asked the Petaluma Chamber of Commerce for input. This was perceived by many as a delaying tactic that would ultimately lead to killing this idea, since it was hard to imagine any Chamber of Commerce endorsing any new fee on any business. But skeptics were wrong! The Petaluma Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors unanimously endorsed the proposal, with the conditions that the fee be phased in over three years, and be levied at 50 percent in redevelopment areas. Chamber support was absolutely crucial, and they are to be commended for realizing that adoption of this fee is all about the health and vitality of Petaluma’s future.

Although implementation of the fee with no conditions would have been preferred, proponents of the fee can live with them. The effect of these conditions is to reduce the amount of money available for the creation of affordable housing, but without their inclusion the ordinance wouldn’t have been adopted, resulting in no additional money at all.

Now that the Petaluma City Council has taken this unprecedented step forward, advocates plan to go to all the other Sonoma County jurisdictions and ask them to do the same. I promised the Petaluma City Council that we would do our best to ensure that they were not alone in adopting the Jobs-Housing Linkage assessment, and I plan to keep my promise.

Sonia Taylor is a graphic designer, environmentalist and housing advocate.

Sebastopol Passes Living Wage Ordinance
Ellen Bicheler, originally published in the North Bay Progressive

Cliff Ostrem is one of nine Sebastopol city employees who will benefit from the November 18th approval of the Living Wage Ordinance. For Ostrem, this represents a $3.20 an hour increase in wages for his fifteen-hour week job as a crossing guard. Ostrem supplements his social security income with this job. “I’ll be able to go out to dinner once in a while now,” he exalts. “This will help equalize inflation. So many things have increased in price, for instance a haircut or the price of gasoline.” Ostrem also gets paid for filming the city council meetings and volunteers over four hundred hours a year to the city.

The City of Sebastopol became the 113th city, the first in Sonoma County to adopt the Living Wage Ordinance. The Ordinance requires a $13.20 hourly wage without medical benefits and $11.70 with medical benefits to all city employees. The ordinance also includes non-profit and for-profit city contractors, leasers of city property, recipients of city loans and city sub-contractors, all with specified requirements.

The ordinance received the final approval on Tuesday, December 2nd. City Manager, Dave Brennan says that the new wages will go into effect on January 2, 2004. Brennan advised the council to postpone their vote at the November 18th meeting until other impacts like the Public Employee Retirement rate and the vehicle fee revenues were known.

Despite Brennan’s warnings, the council voted 4-0, with one member absent to accept the ordinance. As councilmember Larry Robinson states, “It could be argued that this will create a burden for the city. In reality, we already bear this burden. It is time for us to accept the responsibility of this burden. When the federal and state governments shirk their responsibilities, it is up to local government to see to the well being of this republic. If people are not paid a living wage, they can’t participate as citizens. In the long-term, this ordinance is an investment; I believe that it is the wise and prudent thing to do.”

Martin Bennett, co-chair of the Living Wage Coalition of Sonoma county emphasizes, “Even though the ordinance covers just a small number of workers in Sebastopol, we think it is more than symbolic: it will ensure that as Sebastopol slowly grows, that there will be equitable and sustainable economic development and responsible city contracting. We hope all private employers in Sebastopol will move towards voluntary compliance with the living wage…We hope that Sebastopol will become a model for the rest of the county.” Bennett was pleased with the substantial effort in the west county. Over 1,000 signatures in favor of the ordinance from Sebastopol residents were brought to the council.

Councilmember, Linda Kelley, one of the leading proponents for the passage says, “I think it sends a clear message that cities need to pay living wages that allow their own employees to be able to afford to live in their own community.” Kelley, a Memorial Hospital nurse made sure that the ordinance included provisions for responsible bidder, contract neutrality and that the hourly rates applied to part-time workers. She relates that in the future Sebastopol will be re-doing some parts of the city and the re-development money will be subject to the ordinance.

Councilmember, Sam Spooner reports, “I think that when municipalities underpay workers, it is a tax on the least able to pay. By passing the living wage ordinance, we are rescinding an unfair tax.”

The Living Wage Coalition of Sonoma County is part of a national movement. Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) has been campaigning since 1994 to pass living-wage laws. “Living-wage laws prevent the use of public dollars for poverty-wage jobs.” The Sebastopol ordinance echoes ACORN relaying in its purpose, “The City Council seeks to demonstrate through enactment of this ordinance, that the use of city funds to provide living wage jobs will decrease poverty, increase consumer income and reduce the need for taxpayer funded social service programs.”
The approximate seventy-five-member crowd at the November 18th meeting was jubilant with the victory. Future coalition plans include introducing ordinances to Sonoma and Petaluma and re-introducing the ordinance to Santa Rosa. Coalition leader and Sebastopol resident, Rabbi Michael Robinson expressed the sentiments of the crowd stating, “It’s the right thing to do…It’s a push for economic justice and democracy. It’s symbolic for each of those people (city workers), a life-changing event.”

Living Wage Coalition of Sonoma County holds their monthly meetings on the third Tuesday of each month at 6:30 p.m. Their meetings are held at 613 Fourth St., Suite 206, Santa Rosa. For further information call (707) 545-7349, ext. 220 or go to www.livingwagesonoma.org The ACORN website is www.acorn.org.

Petaluma Sheraton Workers Defend the Right to Organize

By Eileen Morris, originally published in the North Bay Progressive

Some 80 Sheraton Hotel employees in Petaluma are looking forward to a happy and prosperous New Year, having just regained their opportunity to organize without interference from hotel owners.

The Hotel and Restaurant Workers Union has a new memorandum of understanding with hotel owners that allows the union to organize for up to nine months under a "card check neutrality agreement." Under a card check neutrality agreement, employers agree to let employees anonymously sign cards, denoting their willingness to join a union. A neutral third party counts the signatures and announces the results. The employer agrees not to try to influence or dispute the election results or process.

The card check provision was one of the conditions the city of Petaluma required when it agreed to loan the hotel developers up to $2.7 million to help cover construction and initial operating expenses. Now, the city, the hotel owners, and WG Investments, the hotel's main creditor are involved in messy financial negotiations about the terms of the loan, whether it will ever be repaid, and whether the city must continue to loan money to the hotel.

WG Investments, the hotel's main creditor, has taken control of hotel operations. A bad economy and high vacancy rates prevented the original developers from making payments to WG, according to Tom Birdsall, WG's representative.

In September, Birdsall informed the City Council that WG Investments believed it was within its rights to foreclose on the hotel. That action, Birdsall said, would obviate the hotel's requirement to abide by the card check agreement and repay a substantial loan to the city. WG's pronouncement about union organizing provoked a huge outcry in the community.

Hotel employees and other union and living wage supporters crowded the City Council chambers for that September meeting, reminding the City Council that its original rationales for making the loan to the hotel developers was to promote the creation of well-paying service sector jobs. Some 44 percent of the jobs created in Sonoma County between 1995 and 2002 paid less than $10 per hour, Living Wage Coalition chairman Marty Bennett reminded the Council. Those kind of jobs rob employees of their dignity and the public and nonprofit sectors of their resources: those who cannot afford health care and other basic necessities will need to access emergency health care services and assistance programs.

Many in the standing room only crowd wore yellow union placards around their necks, but few Sheraton employees spoke-not surprising, according to Chris Rak, the lead union organizer, who told the Council that the union had had troubles getting access to the hotel workers since the new management had come on board.

Hotel employees Lourdes Coronado and Manuel Rojo told the Council that the vast majority of their colleagues supported the union, but were afraid to speak in public, for fear of being fired.

Rak said that he was not predicting that the Sheraton would fire employees if they card check neutrality agreement did not remain in effect, but, he said, "We've seen it happen in too many other places to feel comfortable."

Rak told the Council that he believed a card check neutrality agreement was in everyone's interest. No one could prevent the workers from organizing, as is their right under Federal law, he said. "But there are two ways to get there. One is a peaceful path, brokered in productive talks. That's what we're hopeful will happen. The other is an ugly one. Often, union organizing campaigns can drag out for years, and they don't benefit anyone.

Father Abel Mena from St. Vincent's Catholic Church, who attended with a large contingent his Latino parishioners, told the Council, "What is at stake is the harmony of our community."

After that September meeting, WG and the hotel and restaurant employees union sat down and worked out a new agreement. On December 1, Birdsall informed the Council that WG would abide by the new non-interference agreement regardless of the outcome of its loan negotiations with the city.

"Ultimately, I think the owners just recognized that it was a win-win situation,"said Bennett, chair of the Sonoma County Living Wage Coalition. Two years ago, the coalition helped negotiate the public/private partnership between the Sheraton and the City of Petaluma that ensured that the Sheraton would provide well-paying service sector jobs, and stay out of employee efforts to unionize.

Eileen Morris is a member of the Living Wage Coalition of Sonoma County who lives in Petaluma. For more information about the organizing campaign at the Petaluma Sheraton call Hotel Employees, Restaurant Employees Local 2850 organizer Jamie Thompson at 510-219-6358 x119.

More Charter Cities Vote to Preserve Prevailing Wages, Including Santa Rosa!

The Cities of Santa Rosa and San Leandro joined San Jose and Santa Clara in supporting the payment of prevailing wages and rejecting the appeal by the City of Long Beach to exempt charter cities from this wage requirement. Santa Rosa had originally been included in an amicus to the appeal filed by Long Beach. The City Council voted unanimously to withdraw from the appeal. Special thanks are due to Santa Rosa City Councilwoman Noreen Evans, City Councilmen Bob Blanchard and Steve Rabinowitsh, Bill Scott, Secretary-Treasurer of the Marin County Building Trades Council, and Steve Benjamin, Business Manager of IBEW Local 551.

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