County Times talks to six candidates in HMB “free for all”

For the County Times, Julia Scott interviewed six of eight candidates for the the Half Moon Bay City Council.  It’s a good place to start in understanding the field, but by no means complete.

Here are some sample quotes from a much longer story:

Deborah Ruddock: "I just could no longer sit by and watch what has happened in the past four years. The current council has demonstrated a lack of coherent vision for Half Moon Bay, and I think it’s time for a change of leadership," she said.

George Muteff: "It seems as though we’ve found a way to step in buckets — we can’t afford to step in any more buckets," said Muteff. "Maybe we can find some way to offset that debt, which we’re going to be paying for the next 30 years."

Rick Kowalczyk: "I really feel like we’re at a crossroads. We could be burdened with further debt. People have asked me whether we can get out of this and I think we can. The path we take to get out of this moment will dictate what we want our community to be."

Dan Handler: "The Beachwood debacle involved ideological decision-making rather than firmly grounded, reality-based decision-making," said Handler. "The people who live here on the coast live here for a reason — and to make decisions that go against your own self-interest, it’s dangerous to our lifestyle."

Sofia Freer: "We do need to maximize the value of that property, but we need to do it in a realistic way," said Freer, who has served on the Planning Commission and the Parks and Recreation Commission. "They’re pursuing the same kind of process that landed us in the this situation. Moving forward, I don’t think we can afford to make similar mistakes."

Allan Alifano: "Sometimes it’s a hard town to do things in. We’re all here for same goals. I think we sometimes forget that and tend to disagree."

Scott was unable to get Naomi Patridge or Charles Hoelzel to return her calls.