Matt Beekman: Angry mayors acting on bad advice

Agricultural preservation in our county is not a preference but a fiscal necessity.

On a net basis, housing costs cities more than the tax revenue it generates while agricultural land generates more tax revenue than the dollar amount of the public services it requires.

When we preserve agriculture, we not only preserve farms, we preserve jobs, economic growth and a sustainable tax base. When we preserve agriculture, we secure the success of our cities. The Agricultural Mitigation Policy passed by Stanislaus County’s LAFCO in 2012 reflects this imperative.

The 3-2 vote on March 25 amended the county’s existing policy to suggest ways to successfully meet the mitigation requirements. There are three ways, but one allows developers to pay a mitigation fee based on the value of the ag land being developed, based on comparable sales. That fee is then turned over to a third party and eventually used to buy development rights on strategically located farm land, ensuring that it will be farmed in the future. Another method is for the builder to simply purchase development easements on comparable land.

The need for this amendment was triggered by the city of Patterson’s attempt to adopt an in-lieu fee of $2,000 per acre as requested by the Building Industry Association.

This low fee structure would have placed Patterson out of compliance with the policy’s required minimum 1-to-1 mitigation ratio. LAFCO could have let the process continue, ultimately resulting in a denial of any annexation requests. Instead, LAFCO stepped in with a more realistic method to calculate in-lieu fees. LAFCO approached Patterson to avoid wasted hours, time and money for everyone involved, but its efforts were not welcomed.

Since my vote in favor of the amendment, the mayors of Riverbank, Oakdale, Newman, Patterson, Waterford and Ceres have taken steps to remove me from LAFCO for not representing their interests.

The law governing each county’s LAFCO (Section 56325.1 of the Cortese-Knox Hertzberg Act) states that: “While serving on the commission, all commission members shall exercise their independent judgment on behalf of the interests of residents, property owners, and the public as a whole in furthering the purposes of this division. Any member appointed on behalf of local governments shall represent the interests of the public as a whole and not solely the interests of the appointing authority.”

In this case, the appointing authority is the City Selection Committee composed of all nine mayors of Stanislaus County. This committee appointed me to LAFCO as a voting member in May 2014.

In the March 25 vote, I appropriately exercised my independence and considered the total impact of the amendment. The amendment provides guidelines for transparency and predictability for city planning, private investment and public scrutiny.

Apparently, these mayors are concerned this amendment will dictate their land-use choices. This is not the case at all.

It is a one-paragraph amendment to the two-page policy, and it is not complicated. Yet all six cities misquoted and misinterpreted it in their opposition resolutions filed with LAFCO. It concerns me that the legal counsel representing these cities would advise them so poorly.

I met with most of the mayors prior to the vote. As I explained to them, as others in LAFCO explained to them, the amendment shows there are other ways to show mitigation compliance. Again, our efforts and explanations were not welcomed.

I hope the mayors of the six cities have taken the time to reread the amendment and have reconsidered their demand for a special meeting to remove me from LAFCO. We have many urgent issues threatening the stability and success of our region. Agricultural preservation should be a unifying issue in our county.

I stand by my vote and believe the amendment helps cities achieve fiscal solvency instead of subsidizing sprawl, a lesson I hope we don’t have to learn again.

Beekman is mayor of Hughson.

This story was originally published May 11, 2015 at 2:47 PM with the headline "Matt Beekman: Angry mayors acting on bad advice."