A week after San Diego City Attorney Jan Goldsmith opened the door to the privatization of city services without competition from city employees, Mayor Jerry Sanders' office is leaving it open.
"We just got this (opinion)," City COO Jay Goldstone said. "I just think it's too early for us to take a hard-line position one way or the other."
The city attorney's opinion said San Diego voters approved an outsourcing initiative three years ago, not a competition initiative. The city, the opinion said, could outsource services without soliciting a bid from city departments for those services.
Until last week, discussion on the initiative has focused on "managed competition," or the ability for private industry to compete for services with city departments. The initiative was carefully labeled "managed competition" -- not "privatization" -- during and after the 2006 campaign Sanders waged to have voters give him the ability to outsource. Since being approved by voters, the effort has stalled for variousreasons and the city and affected labor unions are now at impasse.
Goldstone said the city attorney opinion gives the city a tool it didn't know it had in addressing cost and efficiency issues. There's nothing inconsistent between the opinion and the proposition's original intent, he added.
"The intent was to allow the city to contract out for services through whatever means," Goldstone said. "Whether it was through just pure outsourcing or through managed comp, it was to contract out for services."
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Reaction from organized labor to Goldsmith's opinion and the mayor's response was fierce. The San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council issued a press release yesterday morning calling Goldsmith's interpretation "farfetched" and called on Sanders to denounce it. The release linked to an advertisement from the 2006 campaign on the ballot measure. In the ad, Sanders refers to competition between city departments and private companies, not outsourcing.
In an interview, Lorena Gonzalez, the secretary-treasurer and CEO of the Labor Council, called Goldsmith's opinion "political bullshit" and part of "political power plays."
Clearly the City Attorney is doing nothing more than playing politics before the impasse hearing on the managed competition guide. This was never presented as an outsourcing initiative. This was always presented as a way to have the city workers bid on their work. I want to know if any of the elected officials who campaigned for this who voted to put it on the ballot who presented this to the San Diego voters ever believed or promoted that idea that this was an outsourcing initiative. What San Diegan thinks they voted for a Halliburton-style outsourcing initiative?
Told of Sanders' intentions, Gonzalez's chief deputy Evan McLaughlin called it "a complete flip-flop."
"We just want him to reaffirm his position that there's going to be competition," McLaughlin said.
Regardless, Gonzalez didn't expect City Council to outsource any services without city workers having an opportunity to bid. On Tuesday, a spokesman for Councilman Kevin Faulconer, a managed competition proponent, declined to support outsourcing without a city bid.
Goldsmith denied his interpretation was political.
"It's nice to call it political, but it's not," Goldsmith said. "If [Gonzalez] wants to discuss it, you discuss it on my level which is the legal analysis of the section rather than getting it into the political arena. It's up to the policymakers to decide whether they want to go beyond private-public competition and bids. It's up to us to interpret whether they have that opportunity or not."
Goldsmith added he realized discussion on the issue has centered on competition, but it wasn't his job to interpret anything other than the charter's language and accompanying ballot measure.
In an interview, Mike Aguirre, who was city attorney when it passed and supported the initiative, called the key section in Goldsmith’s opinion "ambiguous." That section refers to charter language that Goldsmith said does not require city departments to bid.
Because of the ambiguity, Aguirre said the City Attorney’s Office could look to evidence outside the charter to determine the section’s meaning.
"This would be an incomplete opinion," Aguirre said.
-- LIAM DILLON
7 Comments so far on this story...
Lorena: Naughty, Naughty! It's one thing to voice your opinion; another to be trashy. It would be refreshing to have folks disagree, but do so in a civil manner in issues at The Hall. We're disappointed in your efforts to protect the union members, who are sucking the lifeblood out of the system with their pension benefits, and tossing the City Attorney and the citizens, who are paying for those benefits, under the bus. It's time for you to take a realistic look at what the city is facing and be part of the solution, not continuing your efforts to exacerbate the problem.
Goldstone is totally wrong on this and should Sanders stay with the City Atttorney's opinion it will most likely lead to another valid unfair labor practice - the City has negotiated this over the last two years with proposals allowing City employees to bid. Now they want to switch tracks. The intent of the voters WILL be trumped AGAIN because of the City's failure to bargain this in good faith. Check out the facts - the City was found to be in violation of state labor law on the negotiations tactics they deployed. Now, they could be charged with regressive bargaining? Once again, the state labor board will find the City in violation - but hastily acting politicians who get appropriately corrected will turn around and blame it on City employees and their unions. Pathetic.
Revisionist historians ....they're everywhere, especially when politics takes focus. I thought our learned former Judge, now City Attorney, Jan Goldsmith campaigned with a promise to keep politics out of the office of City Attorney. After four years of Michael Aguirre, the Citizens of San Diego were hoping to get that office back to the business of offering SOUND legal advice, not politically motivated diatribes. Watch the video of political ad by Mayor Sanders for yourself, then decide. If, and this is a really a big IF, if Sanders has any ethics left he knows what Prop C meant when the voters approved it. He knew the intent, heck he even said it in the ad, ..."Competition between City Departments and outside providers will make City government more efficient and accountable." Those are his words, words understood by voters who approved the measure.
When are we all going to acknowledge that Goldsmith is and always has been a political hack--nothing more, nothing less. He is a rollover for Charley Brown Sanders and the worst mistake the voters have made since . . . well, since they didn't quite do enough to elect Mayor Frye.
Has anyone connected the dynastic dots between pottymouth Lorena Gonzales and the efforts of her brother Marco to make us drink our own recycled crap, thereby insuring perpetual job security for all those great MEA union members at the Metropolitan Wastewater Dept.? You know, the same city department that is unwilling/unable to comply with the Clean Water Act, yet demands and gets compensation as if they were actually treating the wastewater (which is their job)? If Goldsmith sticks to his guns he will succeed in gutting the public employee-union vampire that is draining this city white. Crucifixes, garlic, stakes are all appropriate when dealing with these shape shifters. Long time City employees, like the lab group at MWWD, better start buffing their resumes for a long exile into reality.
Hey Hayduke. I am all for conspiracy, but I think you have some facts wrong. I don't think that Lorena represents MEA, I think Mike Zucchet does. Also, I don't think MWD has MEA employees, nor will MWD or MEA benefit from toilet to tap. Also, I think Voice ran an article that said Marco and Lorena, while siblings, don't get along. But, don't let the facts get in your way of spinning a good story.
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