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Council race could represent turning point for Menlo Park

By Pam Smith

The Menlo Park City Council majority hangs in the balance Nov. 5, as voters choose who will fill three seats on the five-member body.

For the last four years, the council has been largely perceived as having a distinct majority. Votes often come out 4-1 or 3-2, with Mayor Steve Schmidt, and Council members Mary Jo Borak and Paul Collacchi typically aligning on one side of an issue, and Councilman Nicholas Jellins on the other, sometimes joined by Councilman Chuck Kinney.

Schmidt and Borak are vacating their seats, and Jellins is running for re-election.

Three candidates -- attorney Jellins, full-time mother and volunteer Lee Duboc and retired marketing executive Mickie Winkler -- say a vote for them is a vote against the status quo of the current council majority, which Winkler called "a stop-everything council." The three candidates have coordinated some volunteer efforts, fund raising and literature, as well as running individual campaigns.

Three other contenders, whom the above opponents generally paint with the same colors as the council majority -- landscape architect Bill Halleck, real estate project manager David Speer, and environmental engineer Toni Stein -- say their qualifications and positions are distinct from the current council members', though Schmidt, Borak and Collacchi have supported their campaigns. They've coordinated some volunteer efforts, but not fund raising and literature.

Eric Kinney, a financial advisor and Councilman Chuck Kinney's son, said he turned down the opportunity to run on a slate because he wanted to be independent, and "won't fit one shoe on every project." He and his father disagree on many political issues, he said, pointing out that the elder Kinney is a registered Republican, while the younger is a former Democrat now registered as nonpartisan.

The eighth candidate on the ballot, Michael Meyer, said he no longer wishes to run for council, because he doesn't want to siphon votes from Jellins, Duboc or Winkler. He recently became treasurer of their candidate-controlled committee, the Menlo Park Neighborhood Association.

Incumbent Nicholas Jellins said people have the power and the obligation to serve their community, and that his four years of council experience make him particularly able to serve.

He's running to give the larger community and the Belle Haven neighborhood a voice they haven't had under the current council, said Jellins, a nearly 14-year resident of the city who lives near Hillview Middle School. He has three children, up to 13 years old.

"Critical issues" include fiscal accountability, the health and vitality of businesses, and giving voice to new home buyers, he said. The business community needs some "TLC," said Jellins, adding that the city's zoning laws are anything but friendly to them.

He suggested creating a city staff position in charge of attracting businesses the city might desire, for revenue, low traffic impacts, or other reasons.

Eric Kinney said his background in economics and communications makes him "fit perfectly into what the council's lacking right now."

He hopes to reach out to Menlo Park's growing Hispanic and Latino population, because he speaks Spanish fluently, he said. If a topic especially affects a certain neighborhood, council meetings should be held there, even if it means they can't be televised, he added.

Kinney also said he'd spearhead "non-traditional" ways to fund city projects, such as forming a foundation to pursue private funds and donations. He'd also look to assign the city's redevelopment agency to recruit local-serving, revenue-generating businesses, he said. "I think that we've alienated a lot of our business community."

As the youngest candidate, with a 6-year-old daughter, he also hopes to get more young families interested in city government, he added.

Planning Commissioner Bill Halleck grew up in a political family -- his grandfather was a majority and minority leader in the Congress, and his father was a superior court judge in Washington, D.C.

The Linfield Oaks resident said he has "a tremendous amount of experience" to offer, including expertise in urban planning and environmental issues, and experience with community groups, city officials, and staff in Menlo Park and San Jose, where he works as a landscape architect for the city.

The 13-year resident of Menlo Park served on the Environmental Quality Commission, as well as the predecessor to the San Francisquito Creek Joint Powers Authority, before he became a planning commissioner. The City Council unanimously reappointed him to a second term earlier this year. He has a teenager who goes to Menlo-Atherton High School.

Willows resident David Speer , a real estate property manager for the Alameda County government, said he thinks most issues Menlo Park will face in the coming years will be land-use decisions. His development experience in the public and private sectors uniquely suit him to bring economic vitality without sacrificing small-town character, he said.

Speer also cites his civic experience in his previous city, Pleasanton. In Menlo Park, he served on the council-appointed Residential Review Task Force. That citizen task force offered mixed input on how to change the city's home-design laws for single-family properties.

In Pleasanton, Speer served on a housing subcommittee to update the city's general plan, and also sat on a committee to control and limit development on the nearby ridge lands, he said.

This election is the second for Toni Stein , a seven-year resident of Menlo Park who came in fifth in a hair-raising 1998 campaign. Early counts indicated she had won a seat, but she ultimately fell 100 votes short of Jellins' total.

Her motivation, "to serve the people of Menlo Park," is the same this time around, she said, but her qualifications are not. "I feel that I'm more informed on the issues through my experience, and more connected to leaders in the region," said the west Menlo Park resident.

Since 1998, the environmental engineer has held positions on two San Mateo County bodies -- one for traffic and air quality, the other for solid waste. She also served for three years on a hearing board for the region's air quality management district

She's more vested now in making Menlo Park a family-oriented community, because she has two preschoolers, she added.

Housing Commissioner Mickie Winkler said she started the campaign interviewing people to run alongside Jellins and Duboc. "When no one else came forth, I did," she said. "One reason ... is because I was not pleased at the direction this city was going in.

"I've been active in the community as a housing commissioner, I'm pretty politically savvy, and I'm very concerned about Menlo Park," said Winkler, a nine-year resident of the city who lives in the Willows. One of her ideas is to form a commission-type body, with representatives chosen by every neighborhood, to discuss issues such as schools and traffic, she said. Another is assigning a city staff person to build and maintain relationships with the business community, she said.

Winkler recently resigned her position as vice-chair of a local political group, the Menlo Community Association (MCA), that campaigned for candidate Christina Angell-Atchison in 2000. This summer the group informally campaigned and mobilized residents to oppose many of the proposed changes to the city's rules for reviewing single-family home designs.

She describes herself as "a big-time bike rider," and has taught conversational English with her husband in Russia, China, Thailand and Turkey. Her children are grown.

Parks & Recreation Commissioner Lee Duboc , a 15-year resident of Menlo Park, said the city needs to restore common sense to City Council decisions. Menlo Park needs a council that listens to residents, spends wisely, and makes policy based on as much community input and information as possible, she said.

"I just really feel I have a pulse of what's going on in Menlo Park," and a lot of hands-on experience, said the west Menlo Park resident. In nearly 10 combined years on the parks commission, she worked on the city's master plan for recreation and cultural facilities, the early-1990s Belle Haven needs assessment, and a joint-use playing field agreement between the city and local school districts, among other things, she said.

Her three children -- the youngest is still at Menlo-Atherton High School -- went to a mix of public and private schools in the area, and she's worked diligently as a frequent volunteer for the public school system, she said.

Her efforts have been partly or wholly responsible for raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for schools, she said, including as a member of the board for the Menlo Park/Atherton Education Foundation.

Pam Smith writes for the Alamanc, the Weekly's sister paper in Menlo Park.