This evening the City Clerk's office sent out the final Roster of Candidates for the City of Alameda November 5, 2024 election:

Auditor and Treasurer

Beginning at the bottom, two long-serving individuals will each be running unopposed for the Auditor and Treasurer. Kennedy was "first elected City Treasurer in 2000, then re-elected in 2004, 2008, 2012, and 2016" and Kearney has "had the pleasure of serving as the City Auditor of Alameda since 1991."

What do these positions entail? one may ask. No, the Auditor does not audit the city's financial records — my understanding is that that actual work is performed by an outside firm of auditors hired by the city. No, the Treasurer does not oversee the financial controls for the city — that actual work is performed by city staff — nor does the Treasurer manage the city's investment portfolio — that actual work is performed by one or more outside asset-management firms. What these roles do, per the City Charter, is:

• My novice's read of Section 4-2 is that once a year the Auditor puts his (or maybe someday her) signature to the audit performed and submitted by the city's actual auditing firm.
• And my novice's read of Section 5-2 is that once a year the Treasurer transmits a report from the actual managers of the city's investment portfolio to City Council and gives his (or maybe someday her) recommendations as a PowerPoint and verbal presentation to City Council alongside city staff about making changes the city's overall investment policy. (This happened recently at the July 2, 2024 Council meeting.)

For these modest duties, the city and taxpayers of Alameda provide fancy titles and some compensation, as well as the perk of reserved parking spots downtown. I believe also the same health benefits that the Mayor and City Councilmembers receive (which is also pegged against the health benefits that the city's executive staff members receive — of a value somewhere between $10,000 and $30,000 for each individual annually) although I am having trouble confirming this in online documents.

To sum it up: the roles of Auditor and Treasurer look like sinecures.

Does it matter that these are ceremonial roles that are vestiges of the past and may not be necessary to responsibly operate a financially prudent public entity in the 21st century? (That's my take-away from skimming a Solano County Grand Jury reported titled "City Treasurer Functional Review.") Does it matter that there appears to be zero competition to fill two publicly elected roles?

Maybe — but also maybe not. There are more important challenges to solve through ballot measures in Alameda. (For example, the super-majority requirement for approving leases or sales of city-owned property, which is allowing Councilmember Trish Herrera Spencer to effectively be holding hostage businesses at Alameda Point. Fixing this requires bringing a measure to voters. That's probably more important to more people and more businesses in Alameda and would yield more financial gain for the city than performing the "good government" reform of removing one or both of these outdated roles.) There may also be a real use for one or both of roles that I'm misunderstanding.

Still, I wonder about these roles at times such as when my family and I recently walked through the Downtown Art and Wine Fair, continued to the library [to all turn in our summer reading report cards!], and I believe I saw the Auditor's and Teasurer's special reserved parking spots at City Hall in use. (Those are the closest spot to the curb, so it's always more visible than the rest. I didn't walk over and see which other electeds were using their reserved spots that day.) Anyway, having one's own personal and free parking spot for the busiest of days of the year in downtown Alameda sure looks handy.

Candidates for City Council

After two terms on Alameda's School Board, one term as Mayor, and this one term as a City Councilmember, Trish Herrera Spencer is runnin' again.

(Councilmember Malia Vella is finishing her second consecutive term on City Council and therefore has been termed out from running in this election.)

If Herrera Spencer had not registered to run again, everyone else would have had until August 15 to get their ducks in order and register. But because all eligible incumbents registered, the filing period ended today and potential candidates working to complete or fix their paperwork had to put their pencils down.

Stephen Slauson is a perennial candidate for local office. Ballotpedia lists him as running as a Republican for Congress in 2024 and 2022 and as Republican for state Assembly in 2021, 2020, and 2018. He's received from 5.3% to 12.4% of votes in these races. The one time he completed Ballotpedia's biographical submission form, he provided the following:

This blog will probably have nothing more to say about his candidacy for City Council in this election cycle.

I very much look forward to learning more about the remaining three candidates for City Council. To be upfront, I've gotten to know Thushan Amarasiriwardena in recent months and I was one of the signers on his nomination paperwork. I am not familiar with Michele Pryor or Greg Boller, but I also look forward to learning more about their relevant experience as well as their visions.

I'll look forward to reading more as candidates get their own words out in their own voices and express their policy positions. I'll be eager to listen to debates, as well as follow endorsements from local groups. And I'll be curious to see signs of how much effort candidates are putting in to their campaigns — not just yard signs (which don't vote) — but also in terms of signs that candidates and campaigns are successfully reaching a wide cross-section of voters.

Endorsements (?)

Will The Morning Bun issue its own endorsements as the election approaches? I dunno. This is just a blog named after a pastry, after all. (More seriously, you all are sophisticated enough readers and I'm a verbose enough writer that any preferences I develop will eventually show through. And if I eventually decide to contribute a hefty sum like $25 or $50 to a candidate or two, you can look that up.)

That said, as the election approaches, this blog may likely argue that whichever challenger to Councilmember Herrera Spencer is finding the least traction should drop out and wait for a future year to run. That will guide voters to focus on a clear and discrete choice: Do they want the chaos that is Herrera Spencer serving another term on City Council? Or do they want a change toward reasonableness, responsibility, and two new councilmembers whose names may not be as familiar but who will make a good faith effort on behalf of all Alameda residents and stakeholders?

Past elections have shown how close the spread can be when a larger number of candidates run simultaneously for City Council. That's how Herrera Spencer returned to Council in 2020; but her outsized loss for Mayor in 2022 showed the ceiling of her support.

In any case, it's still just August and we're all just learning these names. Best of luck to these three new candidates as they begin to tell us all about themselves, their policy positions, and what they could bring to Alameda City Council.