For the last few months, Nat Bates has been writing voluminous and detailed accounts of the proceedings, according to Nat, of each City Council meeting, liberally sprinkled with opinions and commentary – typically with a couple of swipes at me. I am, of course, flattered by the attention. I get Nat’s reviews as a member of the North and East News Yahoo Group, and so far I have resisted the urge to pass them on, but this one focusing on the meeting of July 29 has to be shared.

Nat resides in an alternate universe where he is always right, Chevron and “business” are the only things saving Richmond, the RPA is beyond deluded and I am hopelessly corrupt. In this commentary, I particularly liked Nat’s characterization of me as the “master extortionist.”

In Nat’s world, nothing is done without a prospective payoff, so he projects that motivation on everyone else, including me, this time by saying, “You can bet down the road, Butt as the city representative with MCE, will financially benefit for his actions. If you know Butt as most of us do, you know he never do anything without a financial payoff somewhere down the road to line his or his friends pockets.”

I hope you enjoy reading this.

Now that the dust has settled and the deal with Chevron has been approved, there were several points of view as to what really occurred that consummated the deal from my perception.  To Chevron's credit they knew how to count and realized they needed four solid votes to receive approval for their project. Knowing this, they went about negotiating with those council members who they felt were at least receptive to listening to their proposal while asking what it took to garner their votes of support. Each councilman had a wish list as well as the city staff who were sort of invisible.  Chevron listened to everyone who was reasonable and receptive except perhaps the mayor and vice mayor who reflected the RPA and planning commission outrageous demands of no compromise. As a result, the mayor, vice mayor and RPA were never at the table. There is a commercial regarding the lottery and it states "If you do not purchase a ticket, you can not win". Unfortunately, the same occurred in this case whereas the mayor, vice mayor and RPA never purchased a ticket and have consistently been so hostile toward Chevron and businesses in general that it is difficult to trust them even if a deal is struck with them. They simply could not have been trusted to follow through because mayoral candidate Michael Parker was calling the shots instead of CBE.

Politics has always been associated with the art of compromise where one negotiate  in good faith to arrive at a mutual decision both parties can agree upon.  We collectively do this as we purchase an automobile, home, and other large and small ticket orders. The problem with the radical RPA is it has to be their way or the highway and there is no room for compromise. It is interesting in that all of a sudden, they wish to take credit for the final agreement when they contributions zero to the end results. Their demands had nothing to do with the final outcome no matter what they say.

Jim Rogers, Tom Butt and Jael Myrick hit Chevron up big time for their pet projects because they were the key votes in consummating the deal. It appeared going into the final day of the public  hearing, Chevron had perhaps four votes in Bates, Booze, Rogers and Myrick. Obviously it would have been more comforting to increasing those votes and thus became the negotiating with Rogers, Butt and Myrick. It was Rogers  idea to bring master extortionist Butt to the table. Be mindful of the fact, there is a Fair Political Practices Commission ruling that mandates a conflict of interest should a majority, in this case 4 members of the council,  meet and confer in private on any item and such a violation may cause a heavy fine or forfeiture of ones office. Therefore the negotiations went forward with Rogers wanting funding for the Easy Go electric vehicle program, Myrick wanting scholarship money for Kennedy High and other low income students in Richmond and Butt, who has been associated with Marin Clean Energy (MCE), wanted funding for his program. You can bet down the road, Butt as the city representative with MCE, will financially benefit for his actions. If you know Butt as most of us do, you know he never do anything without a financial payoff somewhere down the road to line his or his friends pockets.  Councilman Booze and I were supportative of youth programs and especially the 501 c non profit organizations like PAL, Salesian and Richmond Boys and Girls Clubs,  Girls  Inc. GRIP,  Richmond Steelers, Richmond Half-steppers, various soccer club leagues and senior citizen programs. We felt theses were valuable programs that benefitted the total community. That in summary is why the two of us voted for the project and mitigating funds. However, the largest reason for our votes was the opportunity to return so many trade workers back to work and the financial revenues it will bring to the city of Richmond in general. We requested funding for a large segment of the community that do a  great  job serving the community with limited funding while not asking for one dime for ourselves.

With respect to Doctor's Hospital and the some 17 million dollars request by RPA. While many of us supported the hospital and wish it to remain open, our legal staff clearly informed us there was no nexus between the approval of the project and Chevron contributing funds to the hospital. The only way this could have occurred had Chevron volunteered to make the donation on their own  without it being in the contract as a condition for approval.

Chevron's willingness to comply with the Attorney General's request and strong expert testimonies from highly professionals in the field who possessed PhD’s, Master Degrees, Specialist with years and years of training and experiences together with federal, state and regional governmental agencies providing a green light to the project was impressive. What was unimpressive was the amateurish RPA 's mayoral candidate Parker and sidekick Marilyn Langlois with little more than a high school education attempting to compete with a highly respectable team of experts while displaying complete ignorance of the complexities of how a refinery operates. Is this the best they could offer, my grief what a mismatch

Finally, these mitigating benefits will not occur until Chevron has the rights from the courts without appeals to move forward with the project. When all appeals have been exhausted and the green light  for groundbreaking occur, action will take place.  I understand Chevron will be filing a writ ASAP to the court,  but how soon this request will be heard is unknown. This obviously could take weeks, months or a year or more as it depend upon CBE, RPA and other environmental groups in pursuing or not challenging the court should they rule in support of the city council decision to approve the project.   

Please note: The above comments are my personal observations and analysis as one council member with views of what is occurring inside and outside of city hall. Please feel free to share these comments with others should you desire. If you wish to be added to my email list, kindly forward your request to the above email address.

Respectfully,