Stanislaus County gets pushback on proposal to appoint MAC members

Stanislaus County leaders have backpedaled on a proposal to change municipal advisory council seats from elected to appointed positions.

After getting some pushback on the recent proposal, the county will let each of the eight MACs decide if their councils are elected or appointed.

The county stirred the waters with a Nov. 27 letter to advisory panels such as the South Modesto MAC and Wood Colony council, saying future vacancies will be filled by appointment. The letter said a resolution for switching to appointments would be on the Board of Supervisors agenda Dec. 18.

But county leaders have since reconsidered. “We were having trouble with some MACs to get someone on the board,” Board Chairman Terry Withrow said Tuesday. “We thought maybe we should start appointing because we can’t get people to run.”

County leaders say few candidates run for seats on the municipal advisory councils and some panels struggle with quorums at scheduled meetings.

County supervisors end up appointing many MAC members, so why not make appointment the standard practice, as is done with other advisory boards and commissions?

Some community members feel strongly, however, that MACs would lose their independent voice.

“It needs to stay all elected,” said Katherine Borges, a former president of the five-member Salida MAC. The council for the unincorporated town of Salida is known for its David-versus-Goliath battles resisting annexation by Modesto.

Borges said appointed members would be beholden to the supervisors who appoint them. She claimed one council over an unincorporated area in the Bay Area consists of campaign contributors for elected officials.

Municipal advisory councils serve as a voice for residents in unincorporated communities. The panels hold monthly meetings and communicate with county supervisors about community needs such as law enforcement, parks maintenance, sidewalks, libraries and transportation. The councils don’t have decision-making authority but may comment on land use projects.

Under the county’s cannabis ordinance, a proposed permit for a retail outlet within a MAC’s boundaries must be reviewed by the council, and the council’s recommendation on the permit is supposed to carry weight with county supervisors.

Matt Harrington, president of the South Modesto MAC, agreed that each council should decide on whether to have elected or appointed members. He said a South Modesto MAC decision on that question was held over until a meeting in February.

“In my personal view, elected is better,” Harrington said.

Wood Colony and Salida voted for elected council members. Keyes didn’t have a quorum for a recent meeting and reset the matter for Thursday. Information was not available for the Denair, Hickman, Empire and Knights Ferry councils.

A current Salida MAC member said the panel voted unanimously this month to stay with election.

“It is a matter of democracy,” Brad Johnson said. “You run into a lot of problems if you allow a county supervisor to appoint people who are going to approve whatever he does. ... It makes a big difference for Salida. We would be knee-deep in development projects by now if we did not have our own voice.”

County Supervisor Vito Chiesa agreed the county should let the MACs decide.

He said the county listens when the Denair MAC recommends a new stoplight or crosswalks in town. “There is really a good use for them,” Chiesa said of the councils. “If they choose to stay an elective body, I am all for it.”

In his November letter, county Community Manager Patrick Cavanah said only one contested election had been held for MAC seats in the past 15 years. Five people ran for three available seats on the Keyes council in 2007.

When expired seats are vacant following an election, county supervisors in each district seek applications and appoint to fill the vacancies.

Cavanah wrote that switching to appointments would “provide a more flexible timeline to appoint members to vacant seats.” In addition, MACs could enforce attendance requirements for appointees. In a survey of 12 other counties in the state that use municipal advisory councils, 11 of those counties appoint the members, Cavanah wrote.

Borges said at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting that efforts to publicize MACs would generate stronger interest from candidates. She noted that county letters to Wood Colony residents had informed them about items of discussion before their MAC, which was formed in 2017, but those kind of letters are not sent for other MACs.

“That’s a failure of outreach,” Johnson said, suggesting that more posted notices, highlighting meeting times and discussion items, would encourage participation.

The county has promised more online exposure by giving municipal advisory councils a page on the county website. County staff held a meeting with MAC leaders Tuesday evening to talk about membership, training and switching from odd- to even-year elections.

This story was originally published January 30, 2019 at 10:19 AM.