In the most recent Mayor’s Message by Rob Schroder he stated “Very soon, what many call the silly season will begin – the start of the midterm election campaign”. He also stated “We will all be relieved when the silly season is over”. According to Webster’s dictionary August is the “silly season” when journalists have little political news to report, it does not refer to the midterm elections.
I wonder who the many are that our mayor is referring to. Is our election season really silly? It seems to me that with the current state of politics in our country these elections are anything but silly.
Our local Martinez elections this fall are not silly. We, the voters, have many serious issues to consider when we vote for mayor, two city council seats and another City Council proposed Martinez ½ cent sales tax increase.
• We still do not have a School Resource Officer 14 months after the City Council made this a funded Top Tier Public Safety goal!
• Martinez still has 10’s of millions of dollars in deferred road maintenance,
• The City Council took $700,000 from the city’s reserve fund to give the Police Officers a much deserved raise,
• The City Council took out a 3.6 MILLION dollar loan to pay back taxes it owed to the IRS,
• The City Council spent $400,000 to develop a professional baseball field for a private business,
• What is the overall condition of our water delivery system? There have been two separate failures of water main lines recently, resulting in service disruptions and flooding of properties.
I urge all voters to take the November elections seriously, get involved and vote, they are not silly!
– Mike Fleming