Justify my love

Even though most everyone else without a real definitive position on the whole Special meeting regarding the old Harbor Bay Club site at Packet Landing could not figure out why Trish Spencer abstained in voting to affirm the existing zoning at the site.  This was low hanging fruit in the world of politics.  It’s not really making any decision since there was no application before the City Council, in the grand scheme of things this should have been an easy gimme for all the members of the City Council to vote in favor of, particularly the City Councilmembers celebrated by the Harbor Bay Neighbors as the protectors of the Harbor Bay’s “feel.”

But instead of puzzling out why it was that Trish Spencer abstained, the Harbor Bay Neighbors took her at her word that she abstained out of “an abundance of caution” as a means to justify their past and continued support of Mayor Trish.

I wonder if other City Councilmembers that were not Trish Spencer would have been given such the benefit of the doubt had they opted to abstain.  My guess is they would not.  In Twitter postings, one of the leaders of HBN further justified her non vote by offering a “well we already had three votes so it didn’t matter anyway.”

Ah, profiles in courage!

The framing of this non vote by Trish Spencer is ironic considering that both Frank Matarrese and Trish Spencer took much more hard line stances during the campaign than the positions that resulted from this affirmation of the existing zoning.  And they used their “bravery” to have an opinion to consistently flog their opponents for being cautious about speaking about a potential project application before it had even been submitted.  Both Frank Matarrese and Trish Spencer signed the HBN petition and Trish Spencer touted it in her campaign materials:

In a report during the campaign this is how the Harbor Bay issue was framed and the supporters of both Frank Matarrese and Trish Spencer — including those applauding Trish Spencer’s “abundance of caution” — roundly criticized Marie Gilmore, Stewart Chen, and Jim Oddie for their “abundance of caution”:

Similarly, when questioned about a proposal to build new homes at the site of the current Harbor Bay Club, the three declined to answer, arguing that the issue could potentially come before the City Council in the future, and so if they voiced an opinion about it now, they might have to recuse themselves later from voting on it. “I really envy the candidates who are not in office because you are at-will to speak your mind,” said Chen. Even though the controversial plan to tear down the aging Harbor Bay Club and build new homes and a conference center on the site was withdrawn earlier this year, Gilmore and Oddie took the same position as Chen. “You cannot make up your mind before the idea comes to council,” Gilmore said. “It’s ethically wrong.”

In an interview afterward, Matarrese, a former councilmember for eight years, contended that Gilmore, Chen, and Oddie were just making up an excuse to avoid answering a tough question. “Does that mean if I’m Barbara Lee — and I’m against the war — does that mean if a war-funding bill comes up that I can’t vote on it?” Matarrese said. “I thought we were legislators, not judges.” Matarrese, however, said he would recuse himself from any Harbor Bay Club vote if elected because he owns property within 300 feet of the club, and thus could benefit financially from new development on the site. Spencer opposes the plan because it likely would bring additional traffic to Bay Farm Island.

Spencer, a school board member known for speaking her mind, opposes most development plans in Alameda. “We know there are housing developers that want to come here and build, build, build. We know that. Is that best for Alamedans? No. Many of us do not want that,” she said. “That is why I’m running. We have housing development that is occurring way faster than any real solutions to address the transportation issue.” [emphasis added]

This seems to be pretty much Trish Spencer’s leadership style though, her real super power though is not her leadership abilities, but her abilities to vote against (or in this case, not vote for) her supporters’ interests but still have them be protective and defensive of her, and consider her to be the most awesomest mayor ever.

She turned her back on her Harbor Bay Neighbors supporters, but they still support her.

She voted for the Del Monte project after bringing the appeal herself and then voting against her own appeal.

She’s voted to make way for more residential housing units than her predecessor and that is not even an updated list to include the City Venture development.

She voted to expend more money on the City’s budget, despite her being heralded by her supporters as the leader to rein in spending.

She voted for the new fire station even though her supporters claimed that a fire station was unnecessary in Central Alameda and should have been shuttered anyway.

I’m sure there are more examples, but those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head.

That is an amazing super power, but at some point she will be forced to make a decision that will solidly alienate her base, until then, it will be interesting to see how many more times she can vote against her supporters’ interests before they realize that.