Another example of Watsonville city mismanagement

• Found this column also written by  Steve Bankhead while doing some research. I wonder if our great city fathers charged Mr. Romo (who has received more money from ReDev. funds than anyone) with drug charges after being shot? 
  

Steve Bankhead: Watsonville's 'sweetheart' loan puzzling

Steve Bankhead

A recent Sentinel story covered the decision by Watsonville to lend $400,000 in Redevelopment Agency RDA funds to the Romo family for improvements to their commercial building across Second Street from the Civic Plaza building. This makes sense if you figure the city needs something to compensate for the county whisking away most of the promised economic draw from its downtown courthouse facilities, but all else is puzzling. One question is how might the city respond to the possible flood of applications from other businesses seeking the same sweetheart loan at 3 percent interest?

SwingTime Cafe co-owner Peggy Triplett questioned the loan, since she's requested unsuccessfully for the city to help with a $5,000 repair of the sidewalk outside her business. Peggy can be forgiven for being unable to afford the cost, since she's possibly exhausted the needed funds by providing free Thanksgiving dinners to needy community residents in past years. However, pleas of poverty from the city ring hollow since it had $400,000 for the Romos, a family who owns Jalisco Restaurant and car lots.

This reminds one of the 1990s, when the owners of Watsonville's Miramar Grill applied for a $50,000 RDA loan to upgrade their business. Their application was rejected, but the city provided the Romos an RDA loan of a half-million dollars or more to construct the downtown Burger King. The Miramar faded away, but visitors to our city can now feast on the sight of a hamburger stand at our southern entrance. And the deal was later sweetened when the city created a moratorium on new drive-through businesses in the southern half of town, thereby providing the Romos a virtual monopoly on such fast-food enterprises.

Their luck continued with the new Romo building on Second Street. It seemed unlikely to approve construction of such a large structure over existing pubic parking, but it was made feasible by the prior construction of the city's multimillion-dollar parking garage across the street.

Another possible example of supportive efforts by the city on the Romo's behalf came in 2008, when a request by Jalisco owners to expand dining service into a rear outdoor area was pushed by city staff for planning commission approval. What struck me was that as a nearby neighbor of Jalisco, I'd earlier received a notice from the California Department of Toxic Substances Control that Jalisco's rear lot was scheduled for core samplings to measure levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, volatile organic compounds, petroleum hydrocarbons and metals dating from 1879-1905, when that location housed a gas plant.

I asked a planning commissioner why the application was quickly approved without even discussing the proposed toxic testing. Their reply was the commission wasn't provided that information. I began suspecting city staff might be running the planning commission with what's commonly described as mushroom management -- keeping them in the dark and feeding them dung.

The timing for this loan is unfortunate, coming on the heels of June's layoff of seven city employees, thereby saving the city what would approximate the $400,000 loaned to the Romos. Of course, RDA funds couldn't be used to save city worker jobs since their dedicated purpose is to rehabilitate blighted neighborhoods and stimulate local economies. That, however, leads to the question of how blighted a new building like the Romo's could be.

Though the timing of the loan might be unfortunate in regard to the layoffs, it isn't in regard to its approval and any controversy resulting from it not coming until a week after City Manager Carlos Palacios had his employment contract extended another four years. Now that timing was absolutely brilliant.