​City Council Candidates Make Their Case to Biz Community

“The Chamber is vibrant and active in supporting the business community,” Knauer said. “My role as a council member would be as a partner with the Chamber and City staff to promote the businesses. I will be a major proponent and advocate for business in our community.”

Brooks and Wickham emphasized the impact of the local business community on the City’s budget via sales tax revenue.

“Local business helps everything we do here in town,” Wickham said. He also lamented the loss of some resident-serving businesses over the years. “We’re not a full service community anymore – it would be nice to bring those businesses into our town.”

“I actually have a very optimistic view of the Mill Valley business landscape,” Brooks said. “Entrepreneurs are attracted to Mill Valley. I will be a strong advocate, in a sensible way, for local businesses.”

Moulton-Peters applauded local efforts to promote the arts in Mill Valley as one of the community’s greatest strengths and attractions to both residents and visitors, and suggested continuing to grow that effort.

Improving the Permitting Process
When asked about ways to improve the costs and delays that can come with commercial permit applications, the candidates said increasing efficiency and focusing on customer service is key.

“We can do more in the way in removing government impediments and streamlining commercial tenant improvements,” McEntee said. “We need to allow businesses to do their thing without being held back.”

Moulton-Peters acknowledged the impact that the controversy around the surge in residential projects along Lovell Ave. had on the planning and building process. “We had to double down and see how we were managing things,” she said. “You have all lived through a slowdown. But now we’re taking steps to open up and streamline the permitting process. We are trying to be more responsive and there is more to do.”

Those steps have included bringing the vast majority of “plan checks” in-house, depending less on contracted assistance and adding clarity and predictability to the process.

“As a Councilman, I would simply tell the City Manager: Fix it,” Wickham said.

Brooks suggested that with the City in the midst of a residential renovation boom, we “need to look at increasing the size of the City’s resources in that department.”

McEntee also suggested a Marin Master Gardener-style program for building in Mill Valley, whereby those developers and architects with a proven track record for success and compliance in town could be leveraged to pass along that knowledge to others.

Miller Avenue Streetscape Project
With the Miller Avenue Streetscape Project set to kick off in 2016, candidates honed in on a variety of ways to manage the disruption to Miller businesses.

Wickham said the City and the Chamber should continue to work closely on reaching out to businesses, as evidence by the August forum for business owners that saw City officials and the project’s consultants unveil the schedule and implementation plan to minimize the impact on parking and access to businesses.

“City staff needs to be out there talking to businesses,” he said.

Brooks suggested that the impact on different businesses in terms of size and age will be different, as older and larger businesses can more easily manage the weeks of heaviest impact. “But I would have the City bind its contractors to a timeline,” he said.

Knauer said the hard work in terms of outreach to businesses and planning should be happening right now.

“It’s critical that all parties are involved in making sure that impact on businesses that this project has is minimized,” he said. “And the time to be working on that is now.”

“The communication with businesses is going to be absolutely critical,” McEntee added.  “It would be great for the Chamber to be an extension of staff.”

Moulton-Peters noted that City officials altered an initial plan of doing construction in the “Main Street” section of Miller where most of the businesses are located in the spring or fall after receiving feedback from business owners.

“The City is really committed to making this work for business,” she said.

Chamber of Commerce
Each of the candidates said they strongly supported the City’s professional services agreement with the Chamber and the tangible set of deliverables attached to it. Several also suggested that the agreement could be expanded for the Chamber to provide additional services.

“I strongly support the activities of the Chamber and the agreement itself,” Knauer said. 

“The Chamber is a strong communications partner in a lot of things we do at the City,” McEntee said.

“There may be room to expand this agreement,” Moulton-Peters added.

Traffic
While the economy and business issues were the focus of much of the forum, candidates spent several minutes discussing the elephant in the room: traffic and, to a lesser but still significant degree, parking.

Moulton-Peters said she looks forward to the challenge.

“I’m not afraid of our traffic problem,” she said. “We have a real chance at reducing our traffic by 15-20 percent with a variety of solutions, including school buses. Mill Valley is posed to use them if we have the poltical will to fund them. That will pull a lot of traffic off our main arteries.”

All of the candidates suppoeted the idea of testing the viability and success of school buses, particularly for students at Strawberry Point and Edna Maguire elementary schools on ether side of the heavily congested Hwy. 101.

The candidates closed the forum by reminding the crowd about why they were running for Council.

“The course of the City is going to be defined in the next four years and beyond,” Knauer said.

“Mill Valley – the words themselves evoke this ethereal, fantasy unrealistic place,” Brooks said. “That was the case when I moved here 20 years ago and it still is true today. We have a vibrant art and business community, highly effect governmentt and services.”

“Mill Valley is a place worth fighting for,” McEntee added.