Black, Latino leaders: No on A
Salinas: They say it will cut affordable housing for minorities

Posted May 31, 2007

By ANDRE BRISCOE
Herald Staff Writer


Black and Latino community leaders voiced opposition Wednesday to Measure A, the slow-growth general plan at the top of Tuesday's ballot for Monterey County voters.

More than three dozen Measure A opponents, calling themselves the Diversity Coalition, signed a 6-by-4-foot postcard that said "No on Measure A" to
demonstrate their position on the fiercely debated land-use measure.

Carlos Ramos, president of the League of United Latin American Citizens Monterey branch, said: "This is obviously a message from diversity to Monterey County voters. What we are doing here is saying that our
voice hasn't been clear enough. We need to make people understand that there is a strong, diverse voice."

About a dozen Measure A supporters also were at the news conference in front of Salinas City Hall, saying the issue is about land use and not about race.

Ramos said the Diversity Coalition is a new group of minority leaders put together specifically for the anti-Measure A campaign.

Coalition representatives included Seaside Mayor Ralph  Rubio, the Revs. Samuel Gaskins and Herbert Lusk of Seaside, Juan Uranga, executive director of the Salinas-based Center for Community Advocacy, Maria Buell, district director of LULAC, and Mel Mason, former president of the Monterey Peninsula branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

In an interview, Mason said Measure A mirrors past efforts by anti-growth groups like LandWatch Monterey County to restrict affordable housing for minorities. "We can ill afford having another one of these kinds of no-growth, slow-growth, restricted- and so-called smart-growth policies that are basically going to serve to inhibit, if not eliminate, housing possibilities for blacks and other minorities," he said. "These (policies) have always worked to the
detriment of minorities."

But Measure A proponent Chris Fitz, LandWatch executive director, denied that race plays a role in the debate.

"I think it's a real desperation move. Today, they are trying to play the race issue again. Clearly they are very worried," he said. "This is not about race. This is about bad planning and the people of Salinas are affected by this bad planning more than any group."

Fitz said the general plan passed by the Board of Supervisors — which is the subject of Measures B and C on Tuesday's ballot — endangers county residents and wastes tax money.

"It's twice as much growth, twice the impact," Fitz said. "The system is obviously broken. Representative government is supposed to respond to what the people want."

Mason pointed to Seaside's battle over the Embassy Suites Hotel Monterey Bay in the 1980s.

"Slow-growth organizations surface at times when projects arise that are designed to help minorities," he said.

"Some folks said the Embassy Suites was going to be an eyesore. My point was that there was no bigger eyesore than the Marriott in Monterey, but nobody ever said anything about that," Mason said. "If in fact, Measure
A was somehow beneficial to the black community, then why weren't the Measure A proponents out in the black community doing outreach education?"

But Latino activist Bill Melendez of Monterey, a former LULAC director, said the anti-Measure A campaign is "muddying the waters" and the measure
would provide for affordable housing.

"People are losing sight of that," he said. "I just want the public to understand that the people behind No on Measure A are not there for the betterment of
the worker. What they want is much more, which will destroy the quality of life for all people, particularly the workers."

Rubio said he wants to make sure that the democratic process is upheld.

"To overlay an initiative that doesn't allow for the process is wrong. There were no public meetings held to decide what went into that plan," he said. "It's a highjacking of the process. It's not right that folks in Pebble Beach should be able to vote on farmworker housing in South County, when those same folks will not be able to vote on mansions and trophy homes in Pebble Beach."

Andre Briscoe can be reached at 646-4436 or abriscoe@montereyherald.com.