Jun 28, 2025
One joy of being city manager is having everyone crawl through your pay package.
A city manager’s salary and benefits are posted in public. The manager makes good money but far less than the worst Kings player.
The shelf life of city managers and basketball scrubs can run about the same. As for responsibilities and consequences, there’s no contest.
Ambiguities over city manager pay vs. value make residents jealous, frustrated or both. Especially in Sacramento, where $420,684 flows to the city manager each year.
Is the city manager worth all that dough when homeless tents crowd sidewalks? Is anyone worth that much?
Jun 28, 2025
Communication should be easy. Just open your mouth and talk. Which makes me wonder why the city gets tongue-tied about a bicycle bridge.
I’ve found a half-dozen experts eager to talk about the city’s doomed bike bridge over Interstate 5 at Riverside Boulevard—engineers, lawyers, even a guy who investigated construction fiascos for insurance companies.
They are knowledgeable and informative. One word at a time, they helped me understand what probably went wrong when the city accepted a low-bid contract for a $12 million bridge connecting the Del Rio Trail to the Sacramento River Parkway bike path.
Jun 28, 2025
Forget funnel cake. For me, the State Fair means horse racing. After losing my bets, I visit the barns where kids in white uniforms pamper hogs, sheep and goats. Then home.
Now there’s no horse racing. And apologies, but once you’ve seen 1,000 hogs tended by intense, apple-cheeked teenagers, there’s no need for 1,001.
Which leaves zero reasons to attend the State Fair.
Don’t blame the State Fair. Cal Expo is collateral damage, trapped in a mess of economic pressure, incompetence and indifference.
May 28, 2025
Thanks to sports, Sacramento State University has become an institution of higher incoherence.
The school is on a mission to Jupiter without a guidance system. If there’s a realistic destination, it’s not on Google Maps.
Sac State’s foolishness became obvious several weeks ago when the athletics department circulated an email titled, “Future Hornet Stadium Survey.”
As an alumnus (graduation pending from 1978, nine units short), I couldn’t pass up the survey.
There are questions about how often I visit campus (about once a year), why I visit (to look at the buildings) and how often I attend Hornet football games (maybe once every three years).
May 28, 2025
The city’s condemned bicycle bridge over Interstate 5 and Riverside Boulevard insults a local icon. Recently poured substandard concrete embarrasses a 52-year-old monument.
I’m talking about the railroad bridge next to the doomed bike span.
These days, the old rail bridge is defaced by graffiti and brutalized by construction framework related to the new span next door. But there’s nothing wrong with the old freeway overpass.
Apr 30, 2025
As Golden 1 Center nears its 10th birthday, I’ve been thinking about the people who brought the sports arena into existence.
There was NBA Commissioner David Stern, who orchestrated the eviction of the Maloof family as Kings owners and welcomed managing partner Vivek Ranadive.
There was Mayor Kevin Johnson, who followed Stern’s playbook and convinced the City Council to help finance Golden 1 Center.
