We opposed the Board of Supervisors wasting public funds on preparation of the one-sided Section 9-111 Report on the Fair Payment for Public Benefit Act, but now that we have the report, we think we should all read it and understand it.
One fact that literally jumps out of this report is that the Board of Supervisors seventeen (17) times in 2004 passed ordinances and resolutions that could adversely impact property values without ever giving a thought to the damage they might be doing to property values or the harm they might be doing to property owners. The 9-111 Report says that each of these seventeen actions by the BOS had the potential to damage property values, but that it is simply not known if any of them actually did damage property values. But tellingly, it goes on to say that if the BOS acts similarly in future years, it could damage property values by many tens of millions of dollars and it actually analyzes three hypothetical actions by the BOS that could damage property values by up to $117 million.
If the Fair Payment Initiative does not pass, and if the past is any guide, the BOS will continue regulating carelessly and irresponsibly. They will make no attempt to estimate the potential damage, nor will they perform any cost-benefit analysis of their proposed regulations. They have given no consideration to property owners’ rights in the past, and there is no reason to believe they will change unless the Fair Payment for Public Benefit Act is enacted by a vote of the people. Preventing such callous disregard for collateral damage to property owners and property rights is the primary reason we must pass the Fair Payment for Public Benefit Act.
Of course, this was not the point of the 9-111 Report. The 9-111 report was commissioned as a hatchet job on the Fair Pay Initiative, so its focus was on what it might cost the County if the County is finally held accountable for its actions. The report took 2004 as a typical year and extrapolated it into the future, saying that, based on 2004, if “Fair Pay” passes, it will cost the County many tens of millions of dollars to make restitution to property owners for the harm caused by new County land use restrictions. The report conspicuously omitted saying that these same costs would be unfairly imposed on property owners if the Fair Payment Initiative does not pass.
The 9-111 Report was not intended to give any consideration either to property owners or to fairness. The report’s sole objective was to provide one-sided campaign arguments against the initiative. It made no mention of any of the positive effects the initiative will have. It made no attempt to analyze how the measure might help us find ways to regulate while minimizing collateral damage, or how it might spur us to treat people fairly. The authors dreamed up all those tabulated costs not with an eye toward evaluating and minimizing the harm done to real people, but rather to try to demonstrate that it is simply too expensive for the County to act responsibly.
In the process, however, the 9-111 Report inadvertently makes it clear that it would also be too expensive to continue regulating irresponsibly. The regulatory financial burden it describes is huge and it would be unfair to continue blindly imposing that financial burden on property owners. Common sense dictates that a new regulation’s collateral damage should be analyzed in advance, evaluated in terms of cost, necessity and value; minimized to the extent possible, and then fairly apportioned. This, of course, is exactly what the Fair Payment for Public Benefit Act will accomplish, and the reason it is so badly needed.
However, the 9-111 Report even treats this benefit as a negative. One of the arguments it proposes against the Initiative is that it would create a situation where valuable staff time might have to be devoted to analyzing the collateral damage that might be done by a new regulation before the Board of Supervisors enacts it. The underlying assumption seems to be that it’s okay to have loose cannons on our Board of Supervisors unleashing a barrage of new regulations each year without even considering the damage they might do. The amazing truth revealed by the 9-111 Report is that staff time is not already being devoted to evaluating collateral damage, apparently because our County Supervisors simply don't care.
Voting YES on the Fair Payment for Public Benefit Act will make them care.