To appreciate the term limit power play now being pursued by county Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer, a little background is helpful. The June 2010 campaign to impose a two-term limit on supervisors wasn’t just fueled by SEIU Local 221, whose members didn’t care for what they considered the stinginess of the all-Republican board when it came to pay and benefits. There was another big reason the measure quickly gathered enough valid signatures to qualify for the ballot and then won with 68% support: the widely held view that having the same five GOP supervisors since 1995 had produced unhealthy arrogance and insularity at the county’s highest levels.
This hauteur was exemplified by county CEO Walt Ekard, who regularly claimed to lead “the finest local government in America.” Whether it was the U-T Editorial Board or local residents offering pointed, specific criticism, Ekard and Supervisors Greg Cox, Bill Horn, Diane Jacob, Ron Roberts and Pam Slater-Price would barely acknowledge it.
Now a campaign has begun with the opposite intention — weakening term limits — that nonetheless has parallels to what happened in 2010. It’s again driven by the county’s public employee unions, which exult in their chummy relationship with termed-out board Chair Lawson-Remer and want to extend her time on the county payroll through 2032. This chumminess was on stark display in December, when Lawson-Remer and fellow Democrats Monica Montgomery Steppe and Paloma Aguirre used bureaucratic maneuvering to get around the rule that the county board could only dip into reserve funds with the support of at least four supervisors. Why? So they could provide millions of dollars in bonuses to county workers. That Lawson-Remer orchestrated this even as she was calling for heavy new tax hikes led to pointed, specific criticism. But like Cox, Horn, Jacob, Roberts and Slater-Price, she didn’t bother to respond.
The arrogance seen in 2010 is now also on display in how Lawson-Remer is making the case for weakening term limits as part of broader changes that would give the board’s Democratic majority (and its union allies) even more clout. Before we examine her argument, we remind readers that Lawson-Remer is one of the best-educated local officials in county history. The Yale graduate went on to get a law degree and a Ph.D. from New York University, then worked for the World Bank and the Treasury Department.
Yale and NYU may want their degrees returned. To justify county changes, Lawson-Remer trumpets the results of a $40,000 taxpayer-funded survey of about 700 residents. The twist: It’s not legit. It’s a “push poll” designed to mislead participants. It asks about their support for a “limit” on supervisors of “three four-year terms” — without mentioning the existing limit of two four-year terms.
In other words, it implies that if the changes Lawson-Remer wants are enacted, the county would have a more restrictive rule on term limits than now exists — not a less restrictive rule.
The contempt for county residents that this reflects is hard to exaggerate. That the source of this rank dishonesty is the county’s most powerful elected official is stomach-turning. Lawson-Remer has joined the steadily growing list of local politicians who have proven beyond a doubt that they can’t be trusted.