On October 8, 6-8 pm, the the League of Women Voters Solano County, AAUW, and Carquinez Village sponsored a 2020 Benicia Candidates’ Forum. The forum was recorded and is viewable ONLY on Youtube. [Playback on other websites has been disabled by the video owner.]
The Benicia Good Neighbor Steering Committee wants to thank all the participating Mayoral and City Council candidates and those who attended the Educational Forum on Air Quality and Refinery issues on October 5, 2020.
The Zoom webinar was recorded, and is now available on Youtube (and viewable below). There are several viewing options, including the full video from start to finish, as well as individual candidate videos highlighting each candidate and their responses to the Good Neighbor Steering Committee questions.
While watching, you may want to view or download a copy of the 9 questions asked each candidate, including excellent background material.
[BenIndy editor: Note that each video begins after a 20-second “title screen” followed by an 8 minute introduction by Marilyn Bardet. After watching those sections once, you may want to jump ahead to the first question at 8:00 or the candidate response, beginning around 8:45. – R.S.]
By Roger Straw, October 2, 2020
After reviewing campaign finance documents on the City of Benicia website today, it is apparent that Valero is going to do everything it can once again to buy its way onto Benicia’s City Council.
This time around, they are smarter than they were in 2018, when the NAME of their political action committee was a mile long, naming two candidates they favored and coming right out and naming a single candidate they opposed. This year, they claim only that they FAVOR one candidate for Mayor. They kept the ludicrous “Working Families” moniker – as if we’re not ALL working families. But this time around, they’ve avoided reference to their real objective: to disparage and malign Steve Young so that he doesn’t become Mayor and hold Valero’s feet to the fire as he has in the past.
The details of Valero’s spending as of September 29 are combined in a single Excel spreadsheet here. The spreadsheet contains 2 tabs:
Direct links to Valero’s documents as they appear on the City of Benicia website follow at the end of this article.
I recall that when Valero reported in 2018, they were required to included photocopies of the dirty and misleading ads they distributed (right). I believe Benicia’s campaign finance ordinances required this. Those ordinances have been strengthened since 2018, but no such photo samples have been included in Valero’s reporting as yet. Residents have been seeing Valero’s negative ads on social media this week. (Out of respect, I will not reprint them here.)
Again – our spreadsheet is viewable on Google Docs at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IYHmTbaw8IIyIPbB97FdjyiFmvU-3vvY/view?usp=sharing
We, the members of the Benicia Good Neighbor Steering Committee, cordially invite you to join us for an educational Benicia City Council and Mayoral Candidates’ forum on issues relating to Air Quality and Refinery concerns.
Candidates have been given 9 questions prior to this forum. The candidates will have 3 minutes to respond to each question. The Zoom forum will be recorded and links will be provided to the community for viewing later.
Marilyn Bardet, Mary Frances Kelly Poh, Nancy Lund,
Kathy Kerridge and Constance Beutel
Good Neighbor Steering Committee
(A refinery and community watch dog on community environmental health and safety issues)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88625849949 ?pwd=Uk5EU09wRll0NlpGTFlRSEUrL2ZzQT09
Meeting ID: 886 2584 9949
Passcode: Local
One tap mobile
+16699006833,,88625849949#,,,,,,0#,,225810# US (San Jose)
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