The city has been trying to develop Pearce Field for decades. It’s a complex project that requires several different areas of expertise. The vision, infrastructure, environmental concerns, and economic viability of the area all need to be address for this level of development to have a chance. I believe we have the right people in place now to make this happen. In the last few years, the city has seen a new Starbucks open, and a new retail/gas station under construction across the way. We’ve also signed agreements for hospitality and a $50m Adventist clinic on the site. The challenge is no less complex than it has been in the past, but the desire for this area to become a retail and services magnet for Lake County is a priority for me.
Konocti Unified School District is seeing ~8% growth every year. Our community is growing in a wonderful way, but that growth also brings issues. Over the last four years, I have been an ardent supporter of our schools. This city council has approved a school resource officer, the conversion of our Youth Center into a daycare facility for teachers and administrators, realigning our roads for safer pickup and dropoffs, and a Tobacco Retail Licensing program to cut down on underage access to vapes and cigarettes. There is still more to be done. The city has been active in considering new school and recreation facilities and I intend to continue of that work and nurture the great relationship we have formed.
Inflation has risen at a staggering rate over the last four years, and the impact to local agencies have been significant. It is natural for non-percentage fees to rise as costs rise. But these fees should not rise without severe scrutiny by your elected officials. I have been vocal in ensuring our Measure V Oversight Committee is empowered, have opposed the raising of city impact fees on new housing and commercial development, fought historic increases to water rates, put pressure on our fire districts to validate their fee increases, and pushed for clear performance goals before our Tourism Improvement District raised their fees. None of these fights have earned me political points with those organizations, but I believe that it is my job to make sure government doesn’t ask the public for another dime unless it is truly needed.
Lake County as a whole is struggling to build new, quality housing for our residents. Clearlake has done a better job, but we’re still woefully behind where we need to be to make up for the homes lost in fires or general dilapidation. I am committed to developing policy and creating the conditions to encourage more housing development, such as supporting ideas like the Homestead Program, partnering with developers to build multi-family complexes, or acquiring paper lots and tax defaulted parcels to combine into attractive tracts of land. While the city can’t build homes, we can do a lot to combat the staggering construction costs and state regulations that make building in a lower-cost community so difficult.
When Clearlake was founded in 1980, it was a patchwork of disconnected systems, services, and neighborhoods that combined for a common goal. We are a young city, grappling with a lack of development, dirt roads, and fragmented water systems. If we are to move forward as a city, we need to start thinking 5, 10 even 50 years ahead. We started with our roads. In 2016, we passed Measure V to the gather resources to fix our streets. By the end of this year, we will have resurfaced more than 50 miles of roads in the city. That is more than the entire road system in Lakeport. Our water systems are in the same situation. For a city of our size, having three separate systems is not scalable. Even worse, two of those systems are “at risk” and one has some of the highest rates in California. Having a key piece of infrastructure, an essential municipal service, so fractured needs to be solved. This council has never been afraid to make tough decisions if we feel it’s in the best interest of the city, and this is a problem that must be address.
