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Issue date: November 17, 2000

The Pico era begins

Jeb Bing

Newly elected mayor and veteran City Councilman Tom Pico won the coveted Mayor's Award Monday night at the 30th annual community dinner for civic leaders and volunteers. The award is given in recognition of meritorious service to the Pleasanton community.

Outgoing Mayor Ben Tarver, who hosted the event at the Pleasanton Senior Center, told the crowd of more than 300 business, nonprofit and community leaders that Pico has been an outstanding partner and councilman and "is the right choice" to lead the city in the years ahead. Pico takes the oath of office as Pleasanton's 26th mayor on Dec. 5.

Pico, born 56 years ago in Hawaii, counts the Mayor's Award as "another first" in his list of achievements for a family that had humble beginnings. At the time, before jet travel and oceanfront hotels, Hawaii's economy was struggling, resulting in the Pico family moving to the mainland and Antioch. Excelling in school, Tom Pico went on to college, a family first, earning a degree in accounting. He was the first in his family to serve in the military, completing his tour as a first lieutenant in the Army's finance division. He was the first to start his own business as a certified public accountant, with offices in a Victorian he is restoring on Railroad Avenue.

Both Tom Pico and his wife Karen have two grown children each by previous marriages: a daughter Jennifer and son Tom III for Tom Pico, and sons Adam and Matthew for Karen.

The Picos married 20 years ago and moved to Pleasanton from Antioch in 1983. Tom Pico first became involved in the political arena five years later when he heard about efforts to create a redevelopment agency here. He had seen what he perceived to be fiscal waste and ultimate lack of city control with the redevelopment agency in Antioch and successfully campaigned to defeat the agency plan here.

In 1990, he ran for mayor against incumbent Mayor Ken Mercer, losing in a tough-fought campaign that saw Pico earn 47 percent of the vote. He successfully ran for the City Council seat in 1992, leading the ticket, which he has continued to do in elections ever since.

A controversial city councilman who has occasionally tangled with land developers and pro-growth advocates, Pico nevertheless has had strong and consistent popular support for his slow growth and open space preservation positions. He fought to block housing and commercial development on what is now the Pleasanton Ridgelands and, this fall, vigorously campaigned for Measure D, a Sierra Club initiative that, unless overturned in court action, will block the planned construction of 12,500 homes in north Livermore.

Pico also supported a CAPP initiative last year that would have required voter approval of projects larger than 10 homes. Although that measure failed, he was successful in his support of referendums that stopped housing plans on the Merritt property off Foothill Road and the Busch property on the east side of the city where Ponderosa Homes had proposed 300 houses.

Both projects are expected to come back to the new City Council next year. Pico said he could support a scaled down Merritt development plan that also included affordable housing, but plans to call for a major study of both the Busch site and Staples Ranch before endorsing any plans for future development there. Those two properties, both outside the city in unincorporated Alameda County, are the last remaining sizeable parcels suitable for commercial and residential development in Pleasanton.

Although Pico has seen remarkable public support and success for his slow growth positions, he considers the telecasts of council meetings as his major achievement in the last eight years.

"Before I was on the council, Pleasanton residents were very much on the outside looking in and had a hard time following local government actions," Pico said. "My major thrust after winning a seat on the council in 1992 was to open up the political process and create a more open government system."

He talked Community Television (Channels 28, 29 and 30) into broadcasting the council meetings and the rest is history. Within a few months, they were among the most watched C-Span-type shows in the Tri-Valley, with feedback often coming from Castro Valley and other cities outside Pleasanton that received the CTV signal. Participation in council meetings also increased as more residents took note of pending issues and attended the meetings in person.

Pico considers himself a good communicator and listener. He meets regularly with city staff, neighborhood representatives and those considering city projects. As mayor, he plans to expand his public communications, especially with the business community where there have been occasional strains. Next month, he will make a presentation to the Pleasanton Chamber of Commerce Economic Development Committee, a group he has largely ignored in recent years.

Pico insists that his slow growth views do not translate into "no growth," as his opponents charged in the recent election.

"It's simply not correct at all that I am against all growth," he said. "True, I find myself favoring slow growth. But note that I have voted for a number of development projects and plans after they were carefully reviewed."

"I was the pivotal vote on the whole Vineyard Corridor plan that is just now moving forward," he explained. "I favored the Greenbriar development on Sycamore Road. In fact, there was even a letter to the editor in the Pleasanton Weekly from one of Becky Dennis' supporters implying that over the last seven or eight years I might have approved more houses than she did!"

Pico sees the major issues facing the new council as: ¥ Development of the Staples Ranch and Busch properties; ¥ Annexation and construction of a championship golf course in Happy Valley; and, ¥ Completion of a comprehensive plan for public uses of the 320 acre, city-owned Bernal property.

Beyond those issues, however, Pico believes Pleasanton now faces a growing list of challenges that will have to be handled on a regional basis.

"As bad as the traffic is in Pleasanton," Pico said, "the solutions are generally beyond our city limits. I have worked to get an additional lane on the Sunol Grade. We have to consider the impact of extending Stoneridge Drive to El Charro Road, as presently planned. Will this invite more cut-through traffic to I-580 and Livermore?"

Although motorists see the southbound I-680 flyover nearing completion to eastbound I-580, Pico pointed out that the project is only a fourth of what's needed.

"The reality is that the 580/680 interchange is the only major interstate left that hasn't been completed," he said. "That's because the federal government stopped building the interstate system before it was finished. There's no money allocated for feasibility studies or construction for the next 20 years, and that's totally unacceptable. That interchange is destined to become gridlocked and will create a major crisis for Pleasanton and Alameda County as traffic tries to travel between the Bay Area and the Central Valley."

In September, Pico was re-elected vice-chairman of the Alameda County Congestion Management Agency, a group of representatives from BART, transit agencies, the county and cities. Now as Pleasanton's mayor, Pico believes he will have greater influence in Sacramento and Washington in pushing for highway and other transportation funds.

With the election Nov. 7 of two new Dublin San Ramon Services District board members, Pico also looks for a more conciliatory regional approach to resolving differences with the agency over reverse osmosis (RO) proposals. Two of those defeated - James B. Kohnen and Georgean Vonheeder-Leopold - advocated injecting treated wastewater into underground aquifers that could affect Pleasanton's drinking water. An opponent of RO, Pico led the campaign last spring for Measure J, an advisory initiative that was approved by a large majority of voters.

"With the change on the board, we're going to have some friends who may be more responsive to the concerns of the residents of Pleasanton," Pico said. "I'm optimistic that we're going to have much better relationships with the DSRSD."

Pico also expects to strengthen relations among City Council members and end any divisiveness that was there earlier. Without Tarver, the "Dream Team," as it once was known, has come to an end. Pico will have to deal with his mayoral opponent, Becky Dennis, who has two years remaining in her second term as councilwoman. Others on the council include Sharrell Michelotti and Kay Ayala, who was just re-elected to a second four-year term on the council. A political novice, Amador Valley High School teacher Matt Campbell, led the balloting for council and will take the seat being vacated by Pico.

"I know all of these people and have great respect for them," Pico said. "We'll have no trouble getting along and doing what's right for Pleasanton."

Pico, Ayala and Campbell will be sworn in to their new posts at the Dec. 5 City Council meeting, which will start at 7 p.m. Thanks to Pico, the meeting, as usual, will be shown on CTV Channel 29. <@$p>