A strong move
Bites was the only reporter inside last week's strong-mayor debate
When the AstroTurf group Sacramento Tomorrow rebooted the strong-mayor effort last year, it said it had nothing to do with Kevin Johnson.
And yet there was Boss Johnson on Wednesday night, March 26, at a town hall meeting, saying, “I hope you will support me in November” with a vote to approve the strong-mayor plan.
Johnson tag-teamed with Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg and Iron Workers Local 118 president Kevin Ferreira, facing off against former MayorHeather Fargo, Sacramento City Unified School District Board of Education candidate Anna Molander, and Oak Park activist Michael Benjamin.
The forum was put on by SEIU Local 1000, the state workers’ union. It was standing-room only and open to the public. But at the request of the mayor’s people, reporters were turned away at the door. Well, some reporters were turned away. Hell with that.
You know the basics of the strong-mayor plan by now. It would make the mayor an executive separate from the city council. He would introduce the budget and could veto any action by the city council. The council would need a super-duper majority of six out of eight votes to override—giving the mayor a much stronger veto than the California governor or the U.S. president. The mayor would hire and fire the city manager, making him the head of the city bureaucracy. The council’s power would be token at best, more likely they’d be a rubber stamp for whoever sits in the mayor’s office.
It’s never been clear what real-world problem the strong-mayor plan is supposed to fix. Johnson’s special brand of word salad doesn’t help. “What it all boils down to is this: At the end of the day, you have two different visions. And I would ask you to allow Sacramento to evolve with this vision going forward, where we can take our community to the next level.”
Got that?
Johnson’s teammate Ferreira told the union crowd that strong mayor would
Strong mayor is a weak priority for Sacramento
The mayor and his supporters have successfully diverted attention from the very real problems our city faces to instead address his signature issues.SN&R, 11.14.13.
On Strong Mayor 4.0
SN&R worries Sacramento Tomorrow’s latest executive-mayor pitch will still be unconvincing.SN&R, 08.08.13.
