Thursday, December 10, 2009

Door Hangars Hang on Mistruths

Door hangars were distributed around Alameda over the weekend urging a no vote on Measure B.

Unfortunately, the anti-Measure B campaign, run by San Francisco political consultant Jim Ross, gives new meaning to the idiom “red herring.” Below are some of the claims made on the ads – and the actual facts.

• Measure B could cost Alameda taxpayers $500 million - This is a herring as red as it gets. The figure refers to the redevelopment money the City is going to generate at Alameda Point that has to be spent on redeveloping Alameda Point regardless of who develops it.

• Waives $51 million in fees – The project is required to pay for public benefits directly rather than paying for them via fees.

• Transfers $11 million in yearly revenue from the City to the Developer. The City collects about $11 million in rent revenues but spends close to $14 million per year on maintenance and security, a net loss of over $2 million per year. Redevelopment is needed so that the City stops losing money at the Point and, instead, a project is created that benefit the City financially.

• Underfunds public improvements and benefits by at least $175 million - SunCal initially developed a peer-reviewed budget of $200 million for public benefits, such as the sports park. The Alameda public works department came up with a new budget of $375 million. SunCal has unequivocally assured the City that it will remove the cap. The initiative specifically states that specific fiscal terms will be addressed in the Disposition and Development Agreement, as is industry practice.

Then, the Ross campaign throws in the same-old bankruptcy charge. The City knows good and well that this project has no connection to the other projects. Each SunCal project is a separate entity. When Lehman went bankrupt, so did the projects financed by Lehman. Alameda Point has DE Shaw as its financial backer with $28 billion in assets behind it.

All we ask is that we try to be truthful here so that voters can make a decision on facts, not fiction.