Mad Men and the Big C-City Council that is!

Well I am back after a very long vacation, but the City of Long Beach’s wheels keep turning and I am not one to sit back and let them turn without comment.
Some interesting items coming up in the next two weeks:
Today,Tuesday November 2, 2010-ELECTION DAY
If you have already voted then you can attend the Council Meeting BUT it starts at 4:00 pm today. It is hard to keep up with the ever changing time of the meetings. Check out Item #4, “Recommendation to receive and file the Registered Lobbyist 3rd Quarter Report for the period ending September 30, 2010.”
I was not enthusiastic about the lobbyist ordinance because I felt it fell too much on the lobbyist and did not make elected officials any more or less accountable than they were before the ordinance passed. But if you have trouble sleeping it can be some good reading, and frankly it raises more questions than it actually answers. For instance, ABC Consulting, who has as one of its primary partners, the wife of a Harbor commissioner, is pitching Union bank for the job of the City's bank. The city has an RFP out for a new bank and isn’t the City’s bank also the Port’s bank? Whoever lands the city /port as a client has caught a big fish and who better than the wife of the commissioner. Good Luck!
Speaking of big fish, Alex Cherin is also a contract lobbyist and he seems to be doing well since leaving the POLB.
Lobbyist forms must be filled out to indicate which city official or employee was the point of contact for the lobbyist. Unlike his competitors, Alex lists the Mayor as his contact for ALL his clients. Other contract lobbyists don’t list anyone at all or list lowly Department heads or City line staff. Nice work Alex that should be worth a few extra bucks.
Also on Tuesday’s agenda is Item #10, “Request to Implement Ballot Rotations.”
This item suggests that the current practice of allowing a candidate to be listed first on the ballot gives some candidates an unfair advantage and that the practice should be eliminated; even though the selection is done via lottery from the California Secretary of State and is intended to determine the RANDOM order of the candidates. We are told that making the ballots rotate so everyone gets a chance to be first somehow levels the playing field.
Who are they kidding? This is a waste of the taxpayer’s money because we would have to print half of the ballots with candidate #1’s name first, then the second batch with candidate #2’s name first and so on. What if we have six candidates? How do we control the cost? If they wanted to level the playing field then they should ban late hit pieces, provide for truth in advertising and try to do more with campaign finance rules.
And to top it off, this item is coming from city council members that recently raised their office holder account to $10,000 a year. (I would have voted yes too)
But do you call that a level playing field when the incumbent has a fund of possibly $40,000 going into an election? I think not.

Interesting agenda next week too, November 9, 2010:
Changing the rules of the game-again- for Medical Marijuana (item #13, no kidding) and folks just trying to catch a fish! (Item #22)