Delayed for months, the Truth or Consequences City Commission appointed four new members to the Planning and Zoning Commission at the July 13 meeting.
Susan Buhler and Esther Luchini were given two-year terms and Eduardo Alicia and Robert Carey were given one-year terms. Chris Sisney remains seated, bringing the board’s five-member complement to full measure for the first time in at least two years. None of the members have any related governmental, planning and zoning law experience.
All but Carey were interviewed by the city commission, whose questions probed for pro-development and pro-business agreement and a willingness to “work with” the city commission.
So much for the P&Z acting as a check and balance on the city commission and city staff. When such a board existed, it was such a pain.
It was a contentious time, a democratic time, with findings of fact, references to code and verbatim minutes of properly conducted quasi-judicial hearings. The city chambers were often filled with concerned citizens (I attended as a reporter for the Herald). It was hard for the city commission to disregard the professional and unassailable P&Z recommendations. In fact, it became pointedly clear the city commission’s over-rulings violated city code.
After just such a ruling (the city commission favored a local businessperson, letting his billboard remain, in violation of the sign code) the P&Z resigned en masse. Why waste hundreds more volunteer hours?
What followed was seven years of no P&Z, from 2013 to 2020. The city commission took complete control of land-use decisions.
In 2020, then-City Manager Morris Madrid reactivated the board, but made sure he controlled the agenda, along with Assistant City Manager Traci Alvarez, the city’s designated planning and zoning administrator.
When the new board wanted to make land-use recommendations and possibly draft new laws related to the Downtown Master Plan, the Housing Plan and the Historic Downtown district, Madrid quashed it pronto.
Three members had planning, design, development, construction, historical architecture and governmental land-use compliance experience. All three resigned after Madrid defamed and threatened them, city commissioners making it clear they stood with Madrid during city meetings.
Rick Dumiak was among the qualified P&Z members and was the most public. Madrid vilified him as a liar and trouble maker because he regularly came before the city commission to request it clean up T or C Rotary Park and enforce dangerous-building, weed and trash codes for named addresses. Although Dumiak supplied documentation, the city commission sided with Madrid.
It’s a different board and city manager, but the same tune is playing for Dumiak. He again applied for a P&Z position last March. For months he was the sole applicant, which should have made him a shoe-in. But delay followed delay and then an accusation was lobbed against him.
Dumiak withdrew his P&Z application about a week before the July 13 meeting, submitting a letter that was not alluded to or acknowledged by the city commission or part of the city commission packet available online.
The letter states: “With all due respect to this commission, after presenting my qualifications at three different city commission meetings and having a vote on my appointment or rejection tabled three times, it is my opinion that this commission does not want me to serve on the P&Z Commission despite my qualifications.”
“After all, having made three different presentations to this commission, which were followed by questions regarding not only my qualifications to serve on the P&Z board, but I was questioned about a petition I signed supporting a neighbor’s art work installation located on his property.
“If you support the First Amendment, then my signing of any petition is irrelevant in voting to either appoint or reject me to the P&Z board.
“This commission tabled a vote based on our city attorney’s recommendation and assumption that my signature on a petition was, in his opinion, proof that I was not in support of the city or this commission and might be used in a court matter.
“The decision to table a vote solely based on my signing of a petition came very close to violating my civil rights.
“The First Amendment guarantees our right to present requests to the government without punishment or reprisal. A signed petition is just that, a request to the government, nothing more.
“My application to serve on the P&Z was submitted to the city clerk on March 31 and on April 7 the P&Z board voted to accept my nomination pending a vote by this commission.
“However, here we are three and a half months and seven city commission meetings later, and no decision, one way or the other has been made.
“This is not only frustrating it is disrespectful. Have any other advisory board applicants ever had to have made three separate presentations to a city commission? Not to my knowledge, so why am I being subjected to such scrutiny? If you were in my shoes what would you do or think?
“I would like to point out that serving on any civic or governmental entity requires you to only look at the pertinent facts and the letter of the law. Personal opinions, assumptions or popularity should not influence a decision one way or the other.”
For past coverage on the P&Z interviews, please read: Rule of law and fact-finding not a concern in P&Z commissioner selection
While I commiserate with Rick’s frustration and seeming irrational abuse, it falls clearly within the scope and culture of this community. Appointing a “qualified” individual to a post like the P&Z would be paradoxical in a city run for the most part by unqualified managers, employees and elected officials. Let’s not allow Reason and Logic to interfere with the downward trajectory of this community’s future. Well Rick you hold a special place in the annals of P&Z history, as do I for likely being the only unanimously appointed member to be similarly un-appointed before taking office…by the same commissioners.
You can’t make this up!
This reporting is all well and good. It’s hot. It’s been hot since May. It’s been hot much earlier. Out of the many concerns we have about this community, what is being addressed to help people in this heat. Cooling centers, help with cooler expenses. food. 9.1% inflation… Yes we are not alone in this, but yes we are. P & Z Board, Commission, and a long list of squabbles, a lightweight word, are permanent fixtures. This is the third iteration of the “Sun”. Now what? Same old?
I have to agree that, in particular, the over 1/5 of Sierra County that is at or under the Federal Poverty Level could perhaps be more directly and strongly addressed here. And with the rise in real estate prices here and across the country even our little county is pricing the poor and underserved out of the housing market.