The Fresno County Council of Governments (“COG”) is to be commended for the collaborative approach it took in soliciting input on Fresno County residents’ priorities in drafting Measure S, the Fresno County Transportation Improvement Act. Community engagement is widely endorsed by governance experts because it builds trust, yields better policies, fairer investment and fosters accountability. Here is how the COG undertook the engagement process.
- 1. It collaborated with citizen groups like the Transportation for All coalition, conducting 34 community meetings throughout Fresno County. Meeting attendees came from 72 of the county’s 99 zip codes and provided 4500 responses.
- 2. It then formed the 38-member Steering Committee, with 26 members appointed by elected officials and 12 members representing the Transportation for All coalition. Supervisor Garry Bredefeld has characterized the Steering Committee as dominated by radicals. In fact, it was composed 2:1 by elected official appointees. Which members does he mean, and what evidence shows that they dominated the committee? Readers deserve specifics when the work of citizens who spent months studying, debating, and compromising is dismissed in those terms.
- 3. The Steering Committee consulted County staff, transportation experts, Public Works officials and reviewed the short and long-term plans of the three agencies responsible for public transportation: Fresno FAX, Clovis Transit and Fresno County Rural Transit Authority.
- 4. The Steering Committee adopted accountability measures including the establishment of public databases and performance metrics for each section of the measure, all to be reviewed annually by a geographically diverse citizen oversight committee that includes no elected officials. The previous two Measure C initiatives had no performance metrics.
- 5. Working issue by issue, the committee regularly achieved 90% approval on each section through a transparent process of education, discussion and compromise and wrote the final version of the measure.
The steering committee’s recommendations were approved by a COG vote of 11-4. It is supported by the mayors of the largest cities, Fresno and Clovis, and by the mayors of the smallest cities, Coalinga, Firebaugh, Fowler, Kerman, Mendota, Orange Cove, Parlier, Huron and San Joaquin. The mayors supporting Measure S serve a Fresno County population of 778,407. The mayors opposing the measure serve a population of 64,473.
Some opponents of Measure S urge a “no” vote under the promise of delivering a superior measure in March 2028. But promising a better proposal is easy; doing the hard work of uniting a diverse county with conflicting needs is not. The opposition has shown no willingness to balance the diverse transportation needs of Fresno County and none of the coalition-building skills needed to produce a successful measure. Quite the opposite. Their ad hominem name-calling has been personal, inaccurate and uninformative — behavior that guarantees distrust and opposition. Waiting until 2028 for their version of a transportation measure is a bad bet and a gamble Fresno County cannot afford.
Measure S is a carefully negotiated compromise drafted by citizens and government representatives who collaborated, studied the issues, worked through disagreements and made concessions to reach a workable proposal. It is the first of the Fresno County transportation measures to contain performance metrics and accountability standards. Measure S is a comprehensive, thoughtful replacement for the expiring Measure C and is worthy of a “yes” vote.
Dr. Alan Pierrot is a retired orthopedic surgeon and founder of Fresno Surgical Hospital. He is also chairman emeritus of the Central Valley Community Foundation board.
