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I Blame the San Luis Obispo City Council

June 16, 2011

OPINION By PETE EVANS

You can see I sent the following letter almost two months ago. Near the end of my missive I asked my representatives on the San Luis Obispo City Council to address these issues without condescending arrogance. Well, they certainly complied-by not responding at all! If that is not OK with you then contact them and let them know. Is SLO government any better than that in Atascadero? An insulting question, but alarmingly appropriate.

Since I wrote that note events in SLO, Atascadero, Cambria and Oceano only emphasize my accusations of sleaze and the need for reforms (in management of governmental affairs and police response) in our county, of which the city of SLO is the county seat.

April 18, 2011

Dear SLO City Council,

Three of you were on the council when we had a change of city managers, and I believe you three (with Dave Romero and Allen Settle as well) approved the contract and hiring of Katie Lichtig five to zero.

In tight times (very evident in 2009) why did you offer a contract that was even pricier than before? In tight times we cut back, not spend more.

Here is a brief outline floating around:

“Katie Lichtig is authorized…to take time off with pay while ensuring appropriate coverage of her duties.” $221,500 plus cost-of-living adjustments. One month vacation per year. (Paid?) All relocation expenses, including up to two house-hunting trips. $2,500 per month housing rental to assist her while relocating. $125,000 home loan tied to city’s local agency investment fund rate (taxpayer expense) Indemnification against any claims, actions, losses…arising from Katie Lichtig’s duties… “Council shall not…reduce the salary/compensation/benefits of Katie Lichtig.” Severance: “Council agrees to pay nine months compensation/benefits.” Moved: Settle/Ashbaugh voted 5-0: Settle, Ashbaugh, Romero, Marx, Carter on 12/15/2009’s/Dave Romero.

Very interesting. A single woman (I assume her husband lives in their Malibu house) needs a $2500/mo housing allowance? One can rent a 5 bedroom house for that much money. What is the 125k loan for? And immunity from any future mistakes while performing her duties? $222k and rising salary and relocation expenses. Fat severance and the council is hog tied if we can’t afford this expensive contract. What a sweet deal you handed her, out of our tax money. Our local, state and federal economies are now in shambles (another question for you, what have you been doing while our city budget has fallen through the floor?) and you hand out what looks like a sweetheart deal to someone who might not even work full time (and one wonders what the CM even does of any value). So you see this seems like a bum deal for us, sweet for the new CM. While making a fortune (by local standards) she also gets oodles of perks and protections and slack- and just what do we get? We pay more than top money for a professional and then give immunity because that ‘professional’ may not perform well sometimes!

Those are just some thoughts about these issues. I am not privy to all the ins and outs but this thing (along with a zillion others in our county) stinks like Bell. The bloated salaries, the waste, the strange allocation of dwindling resources (I hear a parking structure is slated for painting for around $250k). Giving sweetheart deals to developers (handing out MY land at low prices) and then getting geared up to tax us more to build another parking building to make up for the lost parking due to the give away! Boggles the mind. I was at the meeting where Andrew was maybe the sole dissenter about this scam, and where a citizen offered you MORE to buy the Chinatown lot-he was ignored. I guess you just won’t be able to sleep at night until you have wrecked the town; it is almost gone now to boring large new stucco structures with plenty more in the pipeline the city is intent on approving no matter what we say; making us ugly, wrecking skyline views and creating wind tunnels. After the Chinatown and Garden Street deals even more of our old, funky- and charming, spots will be gone. Pretty soon we’ll look just like any other small city full of modern strip malls and boutiques.

By the way, though our CM probably advocated strongly for good terms in her contract it is YOU who should have advocated for good terms for us- your employers. At this point I urge you to confront this issue head on and give an explanation to us. The public, though largely only grumbling quietly, is not happy. While we struggle to survive you spend our money in ways that don’t make sense to the riff raff ‘out here’.

We live in a pretty good area, you and everyone else always says how great it is to be here. I’m sure many of our citizens have taken healthy pay cuts just to live here and raise their children in this environment. So you see we have a built in incentive- you probably should have asked applicants ‘how much you will pay’ to take this job, instead of ‘how much can we give you?’ And of course everyone is wondering, did this go to open bid, weren’t there any ‘locals’ to take this job? Did you use a ‘headhunter’, was it the Santa Maria firm that the Oceano CSD used to create their fiasco?

So no matter what happens with this case I am hoping to start a conversation that will prevent this from ever happening again. The double dipping, the seemingly outrageous example of the ex fire chief, after passing on, collecting a fortune ‘because he is a nice guy’. The two cops busted smuggling drugs (and we had to carry them for a year!) until some resolution happened (didn’t that cost us around $300 grand?). I suppose these issues were ‘contractual’- no more. This is not Watts or Fresno; we don’t have to pay more than top dollar to get some talent here. We don’t have to guarantee this and that. I never got that, no one I know ever got that. This is just a fractional example of the Wall Street bonuses- quite infuriating. I know you can’t wait to lecture me about government and the realities of the situation. I am hoping for a public response from you that will address these issues without condescending arrogance.

Based on the antics of your police dept I think you should consider a new chief. The cops mentioned above, the road rage SLO cop who flipped out in Atascadero over a year ago (timely justice!!!) and on and on. There is unequal justice (worthless word in this community) for cops vs. citizens. If timely and proper discipline and management of the cops is hampered by contractual details, then????? Duh, don’t ever again allow those items in the contract and start now discussing this with all dept heads and employees. If not by contract, this poor behavior and incredibly slow response to it must be due to lousy leadership, so you know what to do. Of course, this is all under the purview of the CM, isn’t it? Well???? Are there any grounds by which the present CM contract could be modified? Can the CM never come to work and still collect the salary? Can the CM not do anything and still collect?

This seems so lame, like a kid could have gotten us a better deal.

You are the managers of the city, manage.

Pete Evans is a long time San Luis Obispo resident and activist.


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Your points are all very good ones and I agree with you on most of them. However, since you asked for feedback, I’ll give you some. First of all, your letter is WAY too long. People are busy and like it or not, you need to get your points out by being brief. Add to that the fact that you requested that they “address these issues without condescending arrogance”, however, you wrote your letter almost entirely WITH “condescending arrogance”, so why would you expect to be treated any differently? Again, I agree with everything you said and am totally on your side, but I’m sad to see such great points and comments go unnoticed simply because of the tone of your letter. I would suggest you re-write it, and start off with an apology for the “tone” of your previous letter. Mention that you have not yet received a response, and then bullet point your questions, forcing them to respond. Just my two cents….


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Sure glad I live in Atascadero. We don’t have enough money anymore since pay went up for our CM and helpers. SLO council scares me even more than ours does. And we have a better sports program. And our students are smarter. Plus our students don’t need so much money to be smart. We are very blessed to be here. Please SLO folks don’t move north to our town, I hate crowds. Anyway, I really don’t want another traffic light. God Bless.


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Too bad! Just because most Angelinos and Bay Area snobs land in SLO, doesn’t mean they won’t ooze their way to your beloved A-town!


I think Oceano might be safe, as there are a lot of “undesirables” there, apparently. At least that’s what they tell me anytime I take in a show at the fabulous Great American Melodrama & Vaudeville! Man, I love that place! That Oceano CDS better not screw that up for me!


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smelling more and more like Bell city in this town.


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Great letter. There is a time for politically correct mealy-mouthing, and a time for standing up and calling a spade a spade.


We are well past the time for curtsying while we politely entreat the city officials do the jobs for which they are paid, and which their failure to do has put the public in danger.


What I find incredible is that SLO City raised the water rates 20% recently. Either the city management is completely tone-deaf to the concerns of the people, and their dissatisfaction with the lack of performance by the management, or the city management believes it is above the wrath of the people.


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Great letter, in most parts, while I would be more courteous, I can completely understand the frustration.


You didn’t even bring up Marx and her shenanigans with Dalidio, et. AL. There is so much crap to pile on these people; and Romero goes out like a hero…


And now we’ll have more water rate hikes this year and next… maybe another Measure Y or extension thereof. More fleecing, no beneficial results.


Sure, it’s easy to gripe and complain, I am sure all cities and jurisdictions have their share of “complainers” – however, at some point we’ll need pitchforks and torches due to the lackadaisical response (if any) from those elected and bureaucratically appointed/hired. My guess is the non-elected “staff” is what is truly rancid and needs changing. That’s not a popular option, as the city/county employ so many voters… and the managers really only take advice from either staff or their pay masters.


Just ask Marx.


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I’m not seeing that 220k is that outrageous. You have to know more in order to say that. What’s her education level? How much experience does she have? What are other city managers getting paid (aside from the 900k a year Bell employees who are now in jail)? What would she make in private industry? How qualified is she? If anything, the thing that stands out is a month of vacation every year. How important can she be if she can leave for an entire month every year?


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Why all the thumbs down? Agree or not, abigchocoholic raises some good issues.

But for me the article says it all, these times are tight and what are we getting for what seems to many as big money? How well are we managed, how open and transparent is our local government? Why didn’t the council respond before, are the concerned citizens just gnats to be ignored?

How many have attended council meetings to speak on an issue of some importance and controversy? For those who have you know the council almost always has their mind made up before we even get there. They HAVE to appear to listen to our testimony but a hundred of us loses to ONE developer or chamber of commerce hack-its all pre decided for the big money, the big development, the big players. Too much is done behind closed doors. The open meeting Brown act requirement is often skirted, one way or the other, to keep our annoying eyes out of ‘their’ business.

How do you like that? You elect them, you pay for them (and all their decisions and mistakes), for that you are held in contempt and kept out of the process as much as they can arrange. When you do ask a question they lower themselves to answer you get a lecture and blown off. Cute. I’m sure the folks in Los Osos would echo some of this because of their long lasting and frustrating sewer struggle at the county level.


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I don’t think that $220K is too much either. It’s just too much for what we got and seems to show they were bargaining from a position of weakness. The perks are just added insult. I do think its much harder for those in the finance and management fields to find work in this economic environment. That means when you have an opening you don’t roll out the red carpet for somebody. At least not until they show results. How many MBAs are pouring at Starbucks? I’ve seen it. Its not right but it’s what’s going on in America in 2009 – present. Everybody needs to adjust their “expectations” including Katie.


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In total salary AND compensation, Litchtig actually makes about $311k per year, which puts her among the 14 highest paid city managers in the state. Not “outrageous” enough yet? She is the highest paid of all city or county employees in SLO County. Still not “outrageous?” Her total salary and compensation is higher than that of Governor Jerry Brown, and Vice President Joe Biden. Still not “outrageous?” How about the simple fact that this is a civil service job in a small town. If she had a Phd, and an I.Q. of 150, I still wouldn’t think her job is worth $311k per year. And if you’re not outraged yet, then I want some of what you are smoking.


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Hey, I’m not saying the pay is justified, I’m just saying I want to know more before I pitch a fit. If this is the top job in the county and she’s highly qualified–maybe even eliminating one or two other positions and she has great skills and good connections and will get us farther down the road than she cots, and the going rate for this type of person is 300k and we got her for 250k–you people are going to feel really stupid when the truth comes out.


But of course, that’s a big “if”. I will say this. There is a disconnect between what’s going on in government and what’s going in the private sector. The private sector has taken a huge hit. Huge. So many salary reductions, so many lay offs, so many business have gone under etc. Construction has all but left the county and the state. And yet, government seems not to notice. Government hasn’t cut property taxes 15-25% to reflect the reality of the real estate market. Government hasn’t cut its budgets 10-20% across the board as private industry has done. Government has yet to acknowledge the monster recession we’re in. Sooner or later government is going to have to join the recession.


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Great that he wrote this before the latest SLOPD / SLOFD hinky back-scratching. I also love that the cops who have to kick S#!$ in LA are compensated less than the “turn the music” down cops we have here. Why do we pay them so much?

As for Katie. I think the Coucil are a bunch of star-f####rs and were swooning over her Beverly Hills pedigree. Well done SLO govt.


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I totally agree. Even if Litchtig had all the education that she has now, plus 20 or 30 years of experience as a city manager – our elitist city council wouldn’t have offered her nearly as much money if she had come from Oakland or Stockton.


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I Blame the San Luis Obispo City Council


Me too.


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Right On!


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