PERSONAL CORRESPONDENCE
 
I wanted to follow up with some thoughts from the meeting just these
evening. In general, it is good to see you making initial progress on
important issues facing our city. I did, however, want to follow up on
one subject I didn't have time to comment on at the meeting, but that I
think is very important. I was candidly also pretty disappointed with
the lack of general interest I thought I was really (not) hearing on
pursuing the subject with more vigor.
 
That subject is ethics, campaign reform and similar matters. Actually,
I haven't talked about this topic with council member Cohen in recent
days, but I strongly endorse his emphasis on the subject as a real
priority. Frankly too, I worry that the public may perceive the council
already appears to be "part of the system" and is less interested in
classic political terms in areas that may be viewed as restricting your
degrees of freedom in certain ways. Yet, the campaign this fall was
very much about a need for change and a fresh approach. People were not
satisfied with both the substance AND the approach used in the past.
And, just leaving this be won't have it just go away. Rather I predict
the scars will fester and be remembered, and without change the same
mistakes and problems are likely to be repeated. And going forward, this
council will ultimately be blameworthy if it fails to set a higher bar
for ethical expectations. As elected politicians I think issues of
ethics and integrity are all important. That is pretty clearly the
biggest issue in corporate America in the past few years. As a citizen,
I expect the same of my elected officials, appointed commissioners,
staff and others involved in city government. I want to see you embrace
it rather than effectively dismiss it.
 
The subject has a variety of facets. There are classic questions like
campaign limits and disclosure. I don't know that I have strong views
on limits actually, though I know from discussions some in the community
certainly do. It is an area I think other cities locally have been
examining and acting on, but we have not in recent times. I certainly do
have stronger views on disclosure--that is an important and obvious tool
to get information out there. I think we should be looking at more
timely and frequent disclosure if permitted by state law. Another
classic area is our candidate code of conduct (or whatever it is called
exactly). Does it need updating? What teeth does it really have? I
don't sense any frankly. Should it? Should we and can we regulate
candidate's statements in any real way? Issues about that very subject
did come up at the start of the most recent campaign as an example. I'm
not advocating a position here, just identifying there are legitimate
issues to be weighed.
 
We also saw serious issues about the use of e mail list as well as the
form of endorsements in the fall campaign. Some of those issues caused
real tension in our local sports organizations and in our school
volunteer community. They hit the public press. And, they really have
not been resolved at all. The result is the issue festers and stays
latent until the next campaign. We can do better. As a citizen, I
demand better. I'm not interested in the subject in terms of casting
blame or something similar, but rather what as a community do we find
acceptable and not acceptable, what runs serious risks of tearing our
community fabric, yet how do we preserve political freedom, First
Amendment rights and the like. I predict failing to address these will
result in continuing and future dissention in the community. Where
possible, brighter line expectations and requirements really should be
established.
 
Another facet--privacy policy and how we use our electronic information
in the city. Frankly I think Menlo Park operates at a very backward
level here. You don't have any privacy policy I can find on the city
website. This is the absolute norm in corporate America. Instead, the
city really espouses "anti-privacy" oriented statements with references
to public records acts and the like. If you poke around other cities'
web sites, you will find a fair number of them much further ahead. The
wheel has already been invented... So, why is something like this
important? Well, as I did say at the meeting, I think the city has a
communications "gap" and in various ways a credibility gap. The city
does not use modern communications tools like e mail updates,
e-newsletters and the like that are widely used in business, by our
local schools, by large homeowners associations with which I am
familiar, by some of you individually, and a variety of other entities.
Some of you noted these tools this evening in your own comments. You
need to move the city in this direction, both for good, timely
communications and for cost effectiveness. Yet, for me to participate
in that as a citizen, I don't want my name misused, my information sold
or scraped on the web, or the system to be corrupted for unbalanced and
potentially political purposes. All subjects that I think in the modern
era you should be tackling and that fall generally into ethical or
similar policy areas. And if you don't, the city really isn't ready
for modern electronic communications and you just be inviting issues and
problems to occur.
 
I also do not think in fact this in an area that needs a vast amount of
resource to tackle. A reasonable working group with some direction can
identify key focus areas, survey best practices, identify choices and
potentially make recommendations. Classic blue ribbon task force type
material. I expect the one staff member most relevant to this would be
the city attorney, and relative to the other priorities I didn't see
many competing demands for his time like there may be with the finance,
planning, management and other staff.
 
Last, to Mr. Robinson's suggestion the community was free to pursue it
and make recommendations to council. Candidly I don't think that is the
way to go. First, if the council collectively doesn't think it is
serious enough to merit their real attention (even Mr. Cohen or maybe
Mr. Robinson might), if why would people like me spend my time on
something like this? While I think I can offer some constructive ideas
on this subject, frankly I just wouldn't in this vein. It feels like it
wouldn't be taken seriously and just be a waste of time. I'm not
interested in tilting at what seem like Quixotic windmills if I don't
hear a clear collective interest in the subject in the first instance
from the political body that ultimately will need to consider
recommendations seriously, and if merited move to implement them.
 
I would urge you to think again about this subject. As now elected
politicians, I would hope you would embrace the subject rather than seem
to say you are fine with the status quo. That's the wrong message
effectively to send, and I think out of step with the expectations of
our community. Thanks in advance for your renewed consideration.
 
Regards, Elias Blawie

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Received on Wed Jan 24 09:09:56 2007