In early 2008, Daly City Councilmember Mike Guingona was removed from the seat he held on the San Mateo County Transit District (SamTrans) board for nearly a decade. Karyl Matsumoto, a South San Francisco City Councilmember, was elected to the seat in his place via the arcane processes that govern the appointments to this important public board and many others. The 2007 battle for the SamTrans board seat was a doozey with Guingona enlisting the aid of Supervisors Adrienne Tissier and Jerry Hill to make calls and twist arms on his behalf but to no avail.
At issue was Guingona’s miserable attendance record. In 2006, he missed seven of 12 monthly meetings for both the SamTrans and San Mateo County Transportation Authority (SMCTA) boards earning by far the worst attendance record of all members combined on both the SamTrans and TA boards combined. Guingona’s attendance in 2007 was slightly better but for the two years combined Guingona missed nearly 12 monthly meetings or almost a full year of meetings out of the last two years he served. At the time Guingona blamed the missed meetings on a variety of personal issues, ignoring that he was also filming a now defunct television show in the Philippines in which he starred.
The SamTrans board is comprised of nine members including three representing the cities of San Mateo County via elected city council members. The three seats reserved for city council members are elected by a collection of their peers in the county through the Council of Cities, an organization of the 20 cities in the county. The SamTrans seats are sought-after positions as The SamTrans board oversees a $94-plus million annual operating budget and employees 765 people in the county bus, Caltrain and paratransit services for all of San Mateo County. The position pays approximately $400 a month and board members are eligible for health care benefits. The transit board seat is singularly important but is also a conduit to a seat of the San Mateo County Transit Authority (SMCTA), the sister agency that oversees the voter approved Measure A ½-cent sales tax that will run through 2033 and generate $1.5 billion for primarily capitol investment in local transit infrastructure – a plum position for capturing rare transit dollars for local cities and a power position to leverage.
Guingona has served on the Daly City Council since 1993 and was just elected to his fifth full term. It is commonly known in political circles that Guingona wants to move up the political ladder but the loss of the SamTrans seat was a major embarrassment and one that played out in the press and among local leaders throughout San Mateo County. Correcting this blunder may be of great interest to Guingona. Whatever the reason, Guingona is circulating a letter to local council members and mayors who will have the final say this December 17 at the Cities Selection Committee Meeting of the Council of Cities when the members gather in Colma.
In his letter to council colleagues on the Peninsula Guingona touts his long tenure on the SamTrans and SMCTA boards – totally omitting direct reference to his egregious absenteeism - and his direct involvement with “…some of the most important transportation initiatives in San Mateo County’s history – including the extension of BART to SFO and the reauthorization of Measure A in 2004.” It is curious of course that Guingona references the BART to SFO extension as that project is generally regarded as an unmitigated disaster for SamTrans that wrought substantial financial damage to the San Mateo County transit agency until it was able to disentangle itself after a lengthy and failed partnership with the Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART), but the battle is on again.
In the 2007 battle for the SamTrans seat against Matsumoto, Guingona garnered votes from the cities of Brisbane, Colma, Daly City, Foster City, Redwood City, San Bruno, San Carlos, and San Mateo. Guingona’s strong showing belied the justifiable reasons for his removal and despite the lobbying of powerful local pols against her Matsumoto dominated the mid and south county, finally winning 12 votes from Atherton, Belmont, Burlingame, East Palo Alto, Half Moon Bay, Hillsborough, Menlo Park, Millbrae, Portola Valley, South San Francisco, Woodside and Pacifica at a Cities meeting in February 2008, following two rounds of votes.
It is unlikely that Guingona gathers similar support this time around as he is no longer the sitting incumbent and still carries the baggage of absenteeism. Nonetheless, this should be interesting.
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