We cannot escape responsibility for choosing the future of our metropolitan areas and the human relations which develop within them. It is a responsibility so critical that even an unconscious choice to continue presents policies has the gravest implications. I have been interested in journalism for so long and have found so many new things. However, never were my eyes opened so widely as during the time that Kevin Johnson has been mayor of Sacramento, California. It has been a strange experience to hear of a politician be accused of serial sexual harassment of women and minors so many times, accused of embezzlement, and forced to pay money back, and then increase his staff, by using $700,000.00 of taxpayer money, then threaten to sue the Sacramento Bee (newspaper), and actually sue the Sacramento News and Review for requesting public documents. Just a few years ago, President Bill Clinton was impeached for far less. And in 2003, Governor of California, Gray Davis was recalled and removed from office because he had lost touch with voters. However, why has there been no public hamburger throwing about the misrepresentation of the good people of Sacramento?

 That we have delayed in choosing or, by delaying, may be making the wrong choice, does not sentence us either to separatism or despair. However, we must choose. We will choose. Indeed, we are now choosing. The future of our cities is neither something which will just happen nor something which will be imposed upon us by inevitable destiny. That future will be shaped to an important degree by choices we make now. We have attempted to set forth the major choices because we believe it is vital for Americans to understand the consequences of our present drift. There is a widening gap between human needs and public resources and a growing cynicism regarding the commitment of community institutions and leaderships to meet these needs. As a resolution, the Sacramento City Council wants to consider an ethics package with commissioners five, who would serve four-year terms, and make sure that there is transparency in Sacramento’s local government. However, the committee would be appointed by the mayor, who is the reason this committee has been established.

 The problems Sacramento is facing have many dimensions, financial, political, and institutional. Mayor Kevin Johnson and the City Council are simply unable to meet the growing need for public services and facilities with traditional sources of municipal revenue. Many feel like the city is structured politically so that great numbers of citizens have little or no representation in process of local government. It is as if the Mayor Kevin Johnson has seduced the city council with his sexual aggressiveness and limitless taxpayer money, and as the decay of the central city continues, its revenue base has been eroded by the retreat of industry and white middle class families to the suburbs. In the past few years, central city has lost 38,000 residents. And to make matter worse, it seems the public is indulging in the Kool aid of Mayor Johnson and so deep in a sugar coma they do not see how serious the syrup of corruption surrounding the mayor is. The tax rates are inflated by rising costs and increasing numbers of dependent citizens and its public plant—county workers, correctional institutions, and long-deferred maintenance.

 Yet to most citizens, the decay remains largely invisible. Only their tax bills and the headlines about crime suggest that something may be seriously wrong in the city. In the long run, continuation and expansion of the mayor’s power threatens a permanent division. The first is the danger of sustained violence in our cities. The timing, scale, nature, and repercussions of such violence cannot be foreseen. However, under the Mayor Johnson administration and the current city council, it would further destroy our ability to achieve the basic American promises of liberty, justice, and equality. Not only that but the corruption surrounding Mayor Kevin Johnson makes all of Sacramento, California, and every single politician look bad because they are sitting back watching, as if they have no idea what is going on. As Mayor Johnson continues to rape public savings, and put a strait jacket on community meetings, shutting out journalist and the public, Sacramento cannot espouse the American ideals of individual dignity, freedom, and equality of opportunity meaningfully to the rest of the World, to ourselves, to our children. Some may still recite the Pledge of Allegiance and say, “one nation, under God, indivisible.” However, they will be learning cynicism, not patriotism.

 Voice your Opinion about Mayor Johnson:

Mayor Kevin Johnson
915 I Street, 5th Floor Sacramento, California 95814
916-808-5300 – FAX 916-264-7680
mayor@cityofsacramento.org

Chief of Staff, Daniel Conway
916-808-5300 – FAX 916-264-7680
dconway@cityofsacramento.org

Senior Advisor, Patti Bisharat
916-808-5300 – FAX 916-264-7680
pbisharat@cityofsacramento.org

Senior Advisor, Cassandra Jennings
916-808-5300 – FAX 916-264-7680
cjennings@cityofsacramento.org

Director of Constituent Affairs, Helen Hewitt
916-808-5300 – FAX 916-264-7680
Hhewitt@cityofsacramento.org

Executive Assistant, Adrianne Hall
916-808-5300 – FAX 916-264-7680
aehall@cityofsacramento.org

Press Secretary, Ben Sosenko
916-808-5300 – FAX 916-264-7680
bsosenko@cityofsacramento.org