Groucho Marx once said: “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.”
It may not apply here, but any excuse to quote Groucho. Apt or not, the quote came to mind when watching the San Mateo City Council blunder its way through an appointment to its Planning Commission.
The council is now drifting into its third or fourth week fussing with what should have been a routine decision. An inexperienced council seems to be suffering from an Amo hangover.
Amo is Amourence Lee, the councilmember whose determination to be mayor four years ago touched off a monthslong fight that brought San Mateo tons of unwelcome attention. The dispute laid bare two warring factions: People aligned with the county’s progressive activists and those aligned with the city’s old, if less overtly contentious, guard.
Battle lines have been drawn, to paraphrase the 1960s anthem, and continue to dominate the public discourse.
To be clear, I am not weighing in on the reappointment of incumbent Commissioner Seema Patel, whose tenure on that august body has generated an astonishing level of controversy. No, my interest, almost always, is in amateurish politics.
Patel is running for the City Council seat currently held by Rob Newsom, who is seeking reelection. A minimal understanding of politics would seem to suggest that Newsom should have stayed out of the decision to oust his opponent from a high-profile position that gives her candidacy a meaningful credential.
If Newsom abstained, the decision, with one councilmember absent, might have been postponed for a week. Which is what happened anyway. Because, incredibly, someone failed to ensure the person they appointed over Patel actually had time to attend the meetings.
Lee is said to be advising Patel in her candidacy. This fuels widespread speculation that Lee will run again in 2028. She opted not to run for reelection two years ago and was replaced by Nicole Fernandez.
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Both Fernandez and Newsom said Patel should be reappointed, after rejecting that very option several days ago. They joined Adam Loraine, also facing a reelection challenge; it looks like Patel is back in the saddle again. Unless some of the more influential old guard types kick up an even bigger fuss.
Some interesting things were said at the most recent council meeting to address this self-inflicted controversy. Fernandez said she and her colleagues are “a council of good governance.” The translation of that is still pending. The prospect of more Patel seemed profoundly upsetting to Councilmember Danielle Cwirko-Godycki, who offered much innuendo without specific facts.
Meanwhile, you have a council with all five members in their first term in office. It shows.
DISTRICT 5: The election of Supervisor David Canepa as assessor-clerk-recorder-elections chief means there will be a special election to fill the remaining two-plus years of his board term.
Daly City Councilmember Juslyn Manalo, a Canepa protégé, already declared her candidacy in 2028, when Canepa would have been term-limited out; it is assumed she will run now. Other names in circulation: South San Francisco councilmembers Eddie Flores and Mark Nagales.
And there is another big name out there: Former Jefferson Union High School Trustee Kalimah Salahuddin, who said by phone yesterday, “I am not opposed to running. I will run if I don’t feel like anyone who is qualified has stepped up.”
Well regarded in North County, Salahuddin has countywide alliances and often has been mentioned as a formidable would-be candidate for the board. She said she is concerned about protecting the kind of social services that she relied on to lift up herself and her family. “We need real people who are serious,” Salahuddin said. She has no timeline for a decision, but she said she hopes county leaders hold off on the customary practice in which “someone announces and everybody jumps behind them, rather than waiting to see what the whole landscape looks like.”
ELECTION LEFTOVERS: Supervisor Ray Mueller, it turns out, got the highest vote percentage of any candidate with an opponent on the June 2 ballot — 86% in his mostly coastside district. … In District 3, Supervisor Noelia Corzo, got more than 93%, but her only opposition was write-in candidate Taso Zografos, who got almost 7% of the vote. Fun fact: Zografos got 1,908 votes, a 1,000 more than former Rep. Eric Swalwell got countywide.
ANOTHER COMEBACK? There are rumors — just rumors — that Christina Corpus will run again for sheriff in 2028 against Kenneth Binder, who was appointed to the post after the Board of Supervisors fired Corpus.
(16) comments
Mark I disagree with your assessment. Rob is a stand up guy and most certainly would have inquired from the City Attorney (who would have also been required to bring up a conflict had it existed). Had he recused himself and waited you would have ended up with a 2-2 deadlock and a very long meeting. I am more concerned the appointment planning commission was bullied into giving up his seat. At least Mr. T was left out of this week's column hopefully that streak continues.
Rob colluded with Amo Lee and Nicole Fernandez (and Taso Z.) about stealing bike lanes from school children in a low-income "Equity Priority Area" (their name for it, not mine).
These bike lanes are part of some 10-20 different city and county plans ... and this is quite a funny looking coalition fighting children. Especially when you consider, Amo was up for Mayor and it was Rob who opposed city standards and prevented it.
Rob does not sound like someone who should be described as a "stand-up guy", that is "standup-comedian" material. And luckily, schools organized and fought back against this kind of clown show.
Easy Gerd -- you are responding to the wrong post on the wrong day with incorrect information. Take a read of Annie's post a few days back for some good advice.
"Stupid is as stupid does" [Forrest Gump]
Never look at what they say, only at what they do.
"Accountability" is never in the wrong post, on the wrong day and what exactly is the incorrect information here?
Who was opposing Humboldt Street Bike Lanes for low-income children in an Equity Focus Area?
- Democrats Amo Lee and Diane Papan voted against it, and then they were miffed three men were the ones doing the right thing.
- Let's repeat that. Middle-aged, "fairly white" men did what female leadership did not want to do. Now that is a black eye for female leadership.
- Democrat Papan even supported the 101 highway expansion knowing fully well that cars and pollution from 101 are the main reason that neighborhood is an Equity Focus Area in the first place
- Democrat Rob Newsom did oppose Democrat Amo Lee becoming Mayor until they reached a deal about the fifth council member (Democrat Hedges I believe)
- Then Democrat Amo and Democrat Rob did collude with new city manager Democrat Alex K. to get rid of the bike lanes.
- Democrat Amo was replaced by Democrat Nicole who promised to be much better than Amo ... and then doubled down on the bike lane stealing nonsense.
- Now, Democrat Alex K. failed with his "slow streets" and "bicycle boulevards" badly in Redwood City, why he thought they would be a great idea in San Mateo .... beats me.
(Meanwhile, Papan, Newsom, Fernandez are at it again and pushing for the I-92 interchange project to bring even more pollution to the area. )
Anyways, there are a ton of city plans promising and promoting these bike lanes and Democrat Rob, Democrat Amo, and Democrat Nicole need to be called out for not knowing these plans or violating these plans on purpose.
Ergo, San Mateo Democrats are anti-equity, anti-children, anti-education, anti-sustainability, anti-climate-action, and pro-pollution.
And that seems to be true for any article we read in SMDJ.
Quod Erat Demonstrandum
FUN FACT: EasyGerd appears to be equally committed to hiding behind anonymity and serving up imaginary narratives guaranteed to cause indigestion. Neither the name nor the content should be taken too seriously.
I'm not exactly making it "hard"; "gerd" seems to be making this fairly "easy".
Don't fret, once I need your vote as a write-in candidate, I will give you the exact spelling.
Easy Gerd , surely you made an error in concluding with Q.E.D. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.
Given what you wrote, I believe the more accurate ending is Q.E.C. Quod Erat Confingendum.
"Which was to be fabricated."
Hi Mark,
This is council member Cwirko-Godycki. I find your column very misleading to the public. If you watch the entire video of Monday’s city council meeting, you will see that twenty-five plus residents spoke up to express concerns with Mrs. Patel and/or ask for the commissioner selection process to be reopened, with many of those people citing specific instances where they felt insulted by Mrs. Patel. I was simply responding to this direct, in-person community feedback. To call this “innuendo” is to suggest that all of these residents are lying. Is that is your intent? Are you saying our community is full of liars? And are you also saying my job is to ignore community concerns?
Best,
Danielle
Thank you for your comments, but it’s quite a leap to say I’m saying your community is full of liars. What I’m staying, and I still believe it to be accurate, is that you claimed certain misconduct by Seema Patel without providing any meaningful details.
FUN FACT: Groucho Marx had another quote: "WHO ARE YOU GOING TO BELIEVE, ME OR YOUR OWN EYES?"
Mark, I submitted documentation of Seema Patel’s attack on me. It was included in my letter to the interview committee and I resubmitted it for Monday night’s June 15th special meeting. You don’t even have to make a PRA request, It’s in the packet for the May 27th meeting, page 122.
I was one of five residents to speak Monday night that testified to a specific event occurring between me and Patel.
Currently, on social media, Patel’s posse is trying to once again rewrite the story to blame the victim.
From my letter: “Seema Patel invented a story that I am homophobic because I made a comment saying she was ‘…doing a good job of grooming him to spew hate at good people…’ Suddenly, according to Seema Patel, the word grooming is only used by anti-LBGTQ+ folks, but googling the definition doesn’t confirm that. But this is a signature Seema Patel move - twist the truth so tightly that it screams. She also got a buddy on Stonewall Democrats to diss me without even trying to contact me. I reached out to them via Facebook telling the true story, but truth wasn’t what they were after. They blocked me after calling me a Karen. And ironically, that is not the definition of a Karen either…”
Note that I am a private citizen, and I have never had a conversation with Patel, except for when I make comments in the San Mateo Daily Journal or on social media or in front of the Planning Commission. She knows nothing about me personally except for what I have shared in public forums.
What’s important about this is that when you and others at the SMDJ and even those on City Council don’t acknowledge the voices speaking out by saying it’s innuendo or hearsay, you help Patel rewrite history. Like Amourence Lee, Patel’s behavior will only get worse as these two BFF’s will be even more emboldened, and San Mateo will suffer greatly because of that.
Hi Connie, I hope you're well. I wrote a column the other week encouraging people to connect in person for many reasons. I hope you don't think I'm stepping out of turn here, but you noted in your comment above that you've never actually spoken to this person - I think our community is small enough where it's fair to encourage each other to take these things offline and simply have an in person conversation or two. This can very easily clear up a lot of unnecessary frustration and rumors. It sounds like there has been a lot of online back and forth but no actual conversation from what you are saying.
Annie, with respect, I believe you are missing the point altogether…
Annie, I appreciate the sentiment, and in many cases I would agree that face-to-face conversations can resolve misunderstandings and lower the temperature.
But I think you’ve really missed the point and overlooking an important distinction.
The issue raised here is not that two neighbors had a disagreement over a fence line or a Facebook post.
The concern is that a public official publicly labeled and attacked residents, and multiple residents have now come forward with specific examples.
When someone in a civic position of authority publicly mischaracterizes private citizens in damaging ways, the burden should not fall on those citizens to seek out a private meeting to make peace. Accountability by those in civic positions matter.
Certainly, civil conversations are valuable. But asking residents to "just talk it out" risks minimizing conduct that has already occurred in public view.
Some misunderstanding can be resolved with a cup of coffee.
But a pattern of behavior needs to be acknowledged first.
Those are two very different things.
FUN FACT: Mark Simon's editorial reminded me of another Groucho Marx observation: "WHO ARE YOU GOING TO BELIEVE, ME OR YOUR OWN EYES?"
Mark correctly noted that there was controversy surrounding Commissioner Seema Patel and the lingering "Amo hangover." So far, so good.
Residents remain concerned about the damage this unsavory duo has caused, and many have no desire to see the return of those same political shenanigans.
Not sure why Mark chose to skim over the years of divisive politics, personal attacks, and lack of remorse that created the hangover in the first place. His column — his choice.
But more curiously, he characterized Councilmember Danielle Cwirko-Godycki's remarks as "innuendo."
Sadly, that narrow interpretation overlooks the fact that Danielle had the courage to publicly acknowledge what many residents have witnessed for years.
In my view, Danielle was the real hero that evening. She was willing to call out conduct by the Amo Lee-Patel duo that has damaged trust in City Hall and contributed to the dysfunction many residents have grown tired of.
THE most important part of the story was that Danielle spoke up.
For many residents, we are glad she did.
Conveying half the story half right can be viewed as progress.
As Groucho might say, "Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, DIAGNOSING IT INCORRECTLY AND APPLYING THE WRONG REMEDIES."
Apparently, selective amnesia is one of those remedies.
Eddie Flores does not live in County District 5. I'm uncertain about Nagales because the PDF district map on the San Mateo County website does not list cross streets and the one in the County's GIS portal still shows the 2013 boundaries.
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