The Future of FCN

The stadium issue appears to be resolved. What do you think FCN should do now?

How can FCN work toward positive change for Fremont? What do you think that would look like?

Some people feel that we need new representation on the Council, Planning Commission, even the City Manager. Is this a direction we want to move toward?

If we want to move toward new representation, would this take the form of a recall effort, or would we get involved in identifying and developing potential candidates, and would this lead FCN to become a political, rather than a grass-roots, organization?

Is there any interest in working with the City to develop a Public Participation Policy, or some other series of changes that would work on transparency, input, respect, and other areas where the City could improve their services to residents?

There are some local issues (Besaro Mobile Home Park, Patterson Ranch, others) that some people are interested in. Should we agree on one issue to address at a time; can we work on multiple issues simultaneously? If one issue, who chooses?

FCN must have a lot of e-mail addresses now; it would be a shame to let the established framework fade away. We might as well talk about what course to take.

If you have other ideas or comments on the future of FCN, please share.

▶ Reply to This

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Michael on June 9, 2009 at 12:40pm

Fremonter,

Thanks for your reply.

I've often found that the people who bollux up something are usually the ones that tell the rest of us to "move on" and to "get over it".

You are correct, we haave to move forward with what we have from here. However, it pains me to no end to see all this "what do we do now" discussion since this group was founded for only one thing, to nix the Fremont stadium and now that that is done, the people are trying to put forward that they are some sort of "force for good" in Fremont.

From my perspective, and that of many buisness people and residents I know who live here, FCN destroyed a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the city. A chance to join a handfull of US cities who host a major sports team and all the pride, revenue, and jobs that that would bring. Would it be without some sacrifice by some residents? No, but it would be in the best interest of the entire city. That's where the disconnect is: You don't seem to realize what you've done and the fact that an opportunity like this will NEVER, EVER come back. You do realize that the A's are the only reason 2 million people a year go to Oakland to spend their money? Fremont is not like San Francisco, we have no draw here except more shopping malls and a few restaurants and an auto row (with 15% of the dealerships now gone).

I welcome the opportunity to move forward, but please, please spare me the attempt at earnest: "how can we make Fremont better?" questions since the one thing you could have done was to let the stadium deal go at least to the planning stage so people could have gotten the REAL info needed to make intelligent decisions. I'm afraid that anything you do for the positive going forward will be a tiny drop in the bucket compared to what damage you have done to the city and it's workers.

It's your right to think of FCN as looking forward, unfortunatly, FCN will always be looked at in retrospect as the group that NIMBY'd the stadium deal for the city.

I think that one huge positive that can happen to Fremont to help it would be to stop small vocal groups from disseminating false and biased information. If you are in favor of that, then you can count me in. Unfortunatly, as the past has shown, FCN has a horrible record on that front.

fremonter said:

Michael, has it occurred to you that re-hashing all of this stadium stuff is so three months ago? It reminds me of my old relatives who still complain that the City closed down the drag strip. If you'll try to get over it, so will the rest of us.

I'd like to think that FCN is about looking forward, working toward a better Fremont, and hopefully bringing solid businesses into town that will contribute to a better economy, quality of life, and future for all of us who live here. We could go on forever arguing back and forth about what may or may not have happened if things had worked out differently, but we have to live in the now, in what is, not what might have been.

I refuse to believe that Fremont is runied. It is being challenged on many levels, but positive things can come from challenge. What alternative do we have? Don't reasonable people try to make the best of the circumstances they are faced with? That's what FCN was organized to do, and what I believe it is still trying to do.

Going forward, what would you like to see happen in Fremont? How about working with us to make that happen?

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Jo on June 9, 2009 at 1:11pm

I believe many of the disagreements can be resolved by having an independent audit department looking into and validating facts, so we all can have meaningful and objective discussions. This is fundamental in prudent decision making, wouldn't you all agree? This applies not only to the A's project, but other normal business function of the city.

The federal has the GAO and Inspectors Generals identifying funds to put in better use, effectiveness of the programs, in addition to fraud, waste, abuse, mismagement. This has returned billions to taxpayers.

Many of the cities have one, even hotline for its citizens, except for Fremont. There is no reasons not to have an independent audit department, unless there are reasons the city doesn't want to be scrutinized.

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by fremonter on June 9, 2009 at 4:30pm

Michael, I can tell that the recent stadium situation has caused you a good deal of pain. I am sorry for that. My advice was offered in an attempt to help you.

One thing to consider; a democratic society is largely based upon small vocal groups, often local groups. I am willing to accept that the people who were in favor of the stadium proposal were just as sincere in their hopes for Fremont as those of us who were opposed to the stadium proposal. I hope you will eventually join me in this belief. I do not want all of the people who believed differently from me on the stadium issue to go away; I want to work with them to come to a common understanding about what will benefit this town and take whatever steps we can together to make that a reality. If we're going to go the rest of our lives dismissing any ideas that might be put forward by someone that we disagreed with on one issue, we will be doing a disservice to ourselves and to the town that we both care about.

Finally, if the stadium proposal had gone the other way, I know that I would have been more than a bit ticked off, too. I've lost before, I'm sure I'll lose again, and it stinks. In this life, none of us gets our way 100% of the time. It is much easier to be conciliatory when you've prevailed, but it is losing that builds character. So, if it helps you to post here and anywhere else about your disappointment over the outcome of the stadium proposal, and how mad you are at all of us because of it, by all means do so. But, in the end, please come back to the table and work with us. It's what we would have had to do if they were going to build the stadium.

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by fremonter on June 9, 2009 at 4:37pm

Jo, I think that's a great idea. I'm wondering if this should be done by an independent department within the City or by an outside contractor; which would be more truly "independent"? The hotline is a good idea too; perhaps an online report as well. Thanks for sharing!

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Michael on June 10, 2009 at 8:46am

Fremonter,

Thank you for the reply.

I think you will find that democratic societies are most often based on the ability of the people to do what is right when it might not coincide with their personal views or personal needs. Anyopne can be against something they don't like. It takes a lot of guts however to fight for and support something for the greater good even when you may not like it.

You'll also find that Anarchistic societies are based on small, vocal groups. If history serves me right, so were the Communists and Fascists so I'm not sure that argument is what you want to put forth.

I think you are missing the point here. It's not that I have personal pain because of what FCN did. If I want to see a baseball game, I can drive to Oakland or San Jose. The pain I feel is for the citizens of Fremont who had only one opportunity to have a say in this by electing a pro-stadium mayor and defeating anti-stadium condidates for mayor and city council. Then, before the reports were even in, the FCN made it too difficult for the A's to continue and they pulled out. I have a job and a business in Fremont so for me, life goes on as it would have. The pain I feel is for those without jobs, those people who needed jobs in the short, and long term.

I doubt I will ever beleive your premise that those opposed to the stadium were opposed to it out of a justified sense of well-being for the city. On the contrary, from what I have read here, most of this opposition was from three groups:

1. NIMBYS. These are people who believe that their needs outweigh the needs of their neighbors and fellow citizens. This relates to the stadium location being "too close" to their house/neighborhood/community. Since they have a job, they dismiss the fact that the stadium would employ many people in the trades and would bring much needed economic growth in areas such as restaurants and stores, etc.

2. People who do not like or care about baseball or are ignorant to the role baseball has played in American culture through history including World Wars, and Depressions. These people won't generally look at the true benefits of something to the community as a whole because they are disinterested in the subject and have little, if any experience with it. They may not even understand how the the iconic American sport is played. For instance, a person might vote against a car manufacturing plant if they don't like American cars. Or work against a dog park because they don't have or like dogs.

3. People who got whipped into an emotional frenzy by reading the misleading information put forth by FCN members and didn't check the facts on their own or didn't even give the information put forth a simple logic test. This is the most dangerous group as they are initially led by false arguments that no one would ever go against like "someone could get hurt by a baseball flying out of the stadium" (actual response on this website) or "traffic will be gridlocked for hours" (another actual response). No one would want these things. But this last group does not have the desire, or ability to verify these claims, they just go along. This is where the mob mentality gets its power historically. It's easy to control a person's opinion when you get them emotional abut something early on. Even if the facts prove otherwise, these people will not change their minds.

Again, I think you misread my point. You are assuming that I am mad because "I" lost. Untrue. I am mad because Fremont lost. And because it lost by the efforts of a small group of unelected people (less than one-tenth of one percent) with motives founded in often incorrect and sometimes intentionally misleading information making the decision for the other 220,000 people in Fremont.

I am more than willing to work on anything that may benefit the city. Unfortunately however, in this case, that is like asking someone to "get over" someone totalling your car because they want to work with you in the future to get a new air freshener for it.

Especially in these terrible economic times, we should have been doing all we could to bring jobs and revenue in, not shut them out. Not to mention bringing Fremont to the forefront in the Bay Area with something for people to come here for, to spend some money here on. All Fremont has is tiny Niles as any attraction to the outside world at all.

fremonter said:

Michael, I can tell that the recent stadium situation has caused you a good deal of pain. I am sorry for that. My advice was offered in an attempt to help you.

One thing to consider; a democratic society is largely based upon small vocal groups, often local groups. I am willing to accept that the people who were in favor of the stadium proposal were just as sincere in their hopes for Fremont as those of us who were opposed to the stadium proposal. I hope you will eventually join me in this belief. I do not want all of the people who believed differently from me on the stadium issue to go away; I want to work with them to come to a common understanding about what will benefit this town and take whatever steps we can together to make that a reality. If we're going to go the rest of our lives dismissing any ideas that might be put forward by someone that we disagreed with on one issue, we will be doing a disservice to ourselves and to the town that we both care about.

Finally, if the stadium proposal had gone the other way, I know that I would have been more than a bit ticked off, too. I've lost before, I'm sure I'll lose again, and it stinks. In this life, none of us gets our way 100% of the time. It is much easier to be conciliatory when you've prevailed, but it is losing that builds character. So, if it helps you to post here and anywhere else about your disappointment over the outcome of the stadium proposal, and how mad you are at all of us because of it, by all means do so. But, in the end, please come back to the table and work with us. It's what we would have had to do if they were going to build the stadium.

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Michael on June 10, 2009 at 10:46am

Kathy,

Just some REAL evidence that my data on Nummi is right, and yours is... well, not right.

http://www.autoobserver.com/2009/06/future-of-gm-toyota-nummi-plant...

Kathy said:

Michael,

Perhaps you should go back to some of the research data (now filed on this website) to review the economics research and crime data. I don't have the time to review the materials with you, but if you read the data, you will see that a stadium would have done nothing to help our situation. In short, the original proposal had the stadium not paying any property tax, and only giving the city up to $1 million (this to cover all costs of maintenance, security, etc.). Given that construction was projected to use mostly non-union labor (avg. $22/hr) and only projected to last two years, and that there were no new full time positions created by the stadium (positions transferred from Oakland), I'm not sure where you were going to get the "billions of dollars in wages for construction and millions of dollars in wages for operation"...Last I heard, hotdog vending was not a multi-million dollar occupation. I think even Lew would be surprised, since he only estimated the project to cost $450 million--land, materials, & labor.

Furthermore, with the downturn in our economy, we have already witnessed a sharp increase in crime, for which our police force is understaffed. Even if we only minimally outfitted the new recruits, the additional million from Lew would only have paid for a half dozen new cops, while the data from Crime Reports clearly indicates that we could have put 7000+ new "incidents", just within .5 miles of the staduim, just around the baseball season. That was our city's total for all of 2007.

You have also misinterpreted the NUMMI information. Today, the plant is actually picking up new orders because of other plant closings around the country. These Fremont jobs, which should be treasured because, by your own admission, they are rare, relatively high paying, and ACTUALLY CONTRIBUTE MORE TO THE CITY GENERAL FUND THAN ANYTHING ELSE IN FREMONT. These jobs may not have been saved, had we planted a ballpark next door.

You assumed that I am regretting the loss of Lew's new elementary school. You have unfortunately missed three important points:

First, Lew was not building the school until he built the neighborhood, which would not have been until the economy turned around and housing prices started to rise, again. Who knows when the school would actually have been built...perhaps not within the next ten years, either.

Secondly, you neglected to read the fine print where they (developers) were projecting nearly 2100 new students from their project, but only willing to build one elementary school to accommodate less than a third of them. Well, thank you, but where were they planning to put the rest of these children???? They couldn't possibly have meant for the kids to be bussed (with money the district doesn't have), over HWY 880, to other overcrowded schools???

Finally, building the school would be great. If it were in a neighborhood where we already have overcrowding, it would even be better. However, where were we going to get the money to outfit that school? FUSD is struggling to find the funds to buy lightbulbs and toilet paper...how are they to pay for the additional books, desks, technology, staff, management?

My hindsight is perfectly fine...perhaps you need to get some reading glasses? Sorry, have a rotten streak that breaks loose sometimes...I really would like to move on to more important issues. I think the discussion on overcrowded, old, delapidated schools is something all Fremont residents can ralley around. If you have traveled to any city outside of Fremont, you cannot miss the difference in facilities. If you venture to visit out of state public schools, it would make you scream.

The likelihood of FUSD having the funds to buy the land to build one new school is not high. (I would like to see several.) However, if the city worked with the district to allocate some city property for much needed schoolsites, it might happen. Why don't we try to get the city to work on some joint solutions to issues essentially created by their approval of additional residential development in overcrowded school attendence areas. I fully believe that a city with high performing schools and 21st century facilities attract home buyers and thereby improve property values, which in turn increases the property tax base of the city. As we have already determined that post Prop 13, residentilal developments do not pay for themselves, shouldn't we look for ways to improve the return instead of building in more costs?

Can we work together on this?
Kathy

Kathy