Red flags, part 7

So recall that there was some drama about how closed connected the Alameda Architectural Preservation Society (AAPS) was in the maritime school nomination. SHPO/SHRC staff explicitly wrote in the last staff report that the nominating party was AAPS:

However shortly after this was released the denials from AAPS connected individuals started rolling in, the first from the president of AAPS’s board:

And then via verbal communications with Alameda City Staff:

With this information being presented the pressure was on the nominating individual to get some sort of message of solidarity from her allies on the AAPS Board and she managed to get one of the two Vice Presidents on the Board to send out this letter:

It’s pretty obvious that other SHPO/SHRC staff was asking about the inconsistencies which prompted the SHPO/SHRC staff leading this nomination sent out this to, it looks like, his bosses:

The “attached support letter” is the one signed by Conchita Perales above who made sure to explain in the email what is not expressed in the formal letter:

And that it is AAPS that is also an applicant because they “supported her as the lead applicant on the nomination with AAPS listed as the organization.”

When the lead of AAPS’s Preservation Action committee (you’ll notice that Conchita Perales referenced Carmen Reid’s membership on the Preservation Action Committee) Chris Buckley was asked by City Staff if AAPS was recommending that the 100 units allocated to the Wellness Center to meet Alameda’s RHNA be removed, Chris Buckley balked at that suggestion:

At the June 13 Planning Board meeting, using these details presented by AAPS and SHPO/SHRC, City Staff called AAPS “the applicant” in reference to this nomination. When Alameda resident Amelia Amy Rose asked AAPS via Facebook Messages about this, AAPS denied, again, that they were the applicant:

The “Appropriate responses” ended up being this letter:

So, at this point what it sounds like is that AAPS is trying to play both sides because there’s disarray in their organization. They want to be “affiliated” loosely with Carmen Reid’s application when it comes to determining whether or not AAPS is looking to remove 100 very low income units from our RHNA — honestly at this point someone should probably send a letter to HCD to say that these units are in question because of the actions of AAPS — but when SHPO/SHRC comes calling to lend an air of legitimacy to this nomination they are 100% behind the nomination.

The back and forth of this whole affiliation, attribution, who’s behind the nomination should have thrown huge red flags for SHPO/SHRC and cast a pall on the entire nomination but somehow it did not. At this point it looks like the SHPO/SHRC staff lead on this nomination is going to try to dig his heels in and get this nomination pushed through by any means necessary because it was so bungled from the start that to admit that now would be to admit failing to do basic due diligence on this nomination. But, maybe given the attention to this nomination, hopefully other folks with less invested in this nomination will provide some temperance. This was an email I received yesterday from THE SHPO saying that they’re still trying to sort out who is the nominating party: