NADIA LOCKYER RESIGNS
April 23, 2012 | Nadia Lockyer’s District 2 seat on the Alameda County Board of Supervisors needs to be filled in the next two months. Last Friday, The Citizen reported a short list of candidates already exists, but the seat belongs to you, not the remaining members of the board.
According to a high level county source, the list is led by former Union City councilman Richard Valle, Hayward Councilman Mark Salinas, Newark Councilwoman Ana Apodaca, former assemblyman Richard Torrico, State Sen. Ellen Corbett and Assemblywoman Mary Hayashi.
Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors will vote whether to accept her resignation. That’s a given, but readers of the East Bay Citizen want a say. Join the fray and add your own name to the list of possible candidates to replace Lockyer and tell the East Bay why.
Readers have already nominated names like former Hayward councilman Kevin Dowling and Union City Mayor Mark Green. Who do you want representing Hayward, Union City, Newark and portions of Fremont?
ebcitizen.com 
I like the idea of going in the direction of the Czech Republic and electing a writer, scholar, or teacher and avoiding the “experienced” politicians all together. Their “experiences” as of late have been all to wierd.
How about Bishop Macklin from Glad Tidings Church? His congregation includes significant numbers of people who live in all areas of the district. He is adept at creating programs and finding resources. He could also work for unity in a district that is seeing a rapid increase in serious issues between Black and Brown people. No one else who has been mentioned to this date is at all interested in this very important issue.
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How do we know that Carson and other Steele supporters will not convince her to run for re-election? They've already gotten her to consider coming out of retirement.
It's not legally possible to enforce a policy of “we'll only give you the Supervisor appointment if you keep a promise not to run for the seat later”. Many, many politicians have broken such pledges in the past. Hell, at this moment we don't even know if Gail would make such a pledge; we do not know if she has made such a pledge now. The public has not heard from her.
By the way, people forget that Steele was wearing out her welcome by the end. In 2006, Richard Valle ran against her and recieved nearly 16,000 votes from citizens from this District; incumbent Steele won by only about 500 votes. Fair and square, but would Steele supporters claim that Valle does not hold a great deal of support from the voters of the District? Evidence shows otherwise.
If you think Gail is a better representative of the District, make that argument for her appointment. Don't hide behind “let the voters decide”; that is cowardly. The voter will decide in November, anyway. 2006 proved that incumbency, even decades of incumbency, does not prevent “a real and legitimate contest.”
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By MW:
I like the idea of 9:12AM. In other words if instead some John or Jane Doe is appointed to fill the temporary opening that has been created by the resignation of Nadia Lockyer, then when the regular election comes, that temporary fill in, and no matter how totally unqualified he or she might very well be, would very likely win simply due to name recognition.
In fact once a person gets on the AC Board of Supervisors, usually automatic re – election basically forever is virtually assuured simply due to name recognition, and no matter how horrible a job he or she does, in other words until he or she willingly retires.
So let's instead give the opening to fill Nadia Lockyer's now temporary spot to Gail Steele, and including since due to her age and also the fact that she is considerably more honest than most of the characters who have filled the higher ranking positions in AC government in recent decades, we could probably trust her to keep her word that she would not run again for re – election.
And that way when the regular election comes up, we might have a real and legitimate contest among the various candidates, and rather than probably merely rubberstamping whichever incumbent was appointed to fill the vacancy created by Nadia's resignation.
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I think Mark Salinas would give an important voice not only to latinos in the district, but be helpful for the youth. His outreach with his breakfast's is amazing.
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One simple solution would be to have Gail Steele take on the position again for the few months until the November election. Then the people will truly decide who takes on the post. Using this strategy, all candidates would start on equal footing. There would be no “incumbent” who could parlay a BOS temporary appointment into a career.
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12:54 am … I would hope your support would be based on more than just having your politics aligned. This is Alameda County where a majority are progressive. Most who will apply for this position will have similar politics.
So your own stated reasoning lacks depth itself.
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Richard Valle would be a good Supervisor; his politics represent the voters of the District well.
If our few commenters who love to hate on Bill Lockyer actually support another candidate here, rather than execute their nonstop bitching (as seen above), then we can have a real discussion over who has the experience to do the job best and who the voters will support. Until then, their complaints don't amount to squat.
That's because the Tea Party People don't want to govern; they want to tear governance down. More starving, poisoned, defrauded, homeless and suffering people? Not our problem, the Tea Party says. But keep your government hands off their Medicare, hippie!!!
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By MW:
Some of the people we should seriously consider for the open seat on the AC Board of Supervisors are: one, Mary Hayashi; and two, Bill Lockyer.
Mary Hayashi, and since her level of “honesty” and “integrity” would mesh perfectly with most of the supposedly “wonderful public servants” who already infest the majority of the higher ranking positions in the Bay area's government agencies.
And Bill Lockyer, since there was never any intention by him that his wife would be the real Supervisor in the position he bought for her, but only that she would be the pawn, the front, and the puppet on a string, and while actually he would be the real Supervisor and would tell her what to do and say. So since his puppet on a string has been forced out, rather than the Board having another one of Bill Lockyer's stooges and puppets on a string pretending to be the Supervisor, and as Nadia did, let's skip the games and charades and have Bill Lockyer himself officially and openly be the Supervisor.
Besides, since some parts of California are not as totally insane as the San Francisco area, so therefore the resulting fallout from the Nadia scandal and circus might make it extremely difficult, or even impossible, for Bill Lockyer to again win a major statewide office.
However since the Bay area is so completely in love with total insanity, therefore the Nadia scandals might not be nearly as big a negative in Alameda County to Bill Lockyer as it would be in much of the rest of the state.
A couple of final parting thoughts. I am ashamed of Nadia for resigning at this time, and rather than her hanging on for at least a few more weeks, and preferably a few more months. In other words, I wanted her to keep on engaging, AND VERY PUBLICLY, in her recent level of performances, and until she and Alameda County made the front cover of the National Enquirer. Also, I do not have cable TV. However if such comedies of the politicians as THE BILL and NADIA LOCKYER SHOW of CIRCUS CLOWNS are removed from public viewing, then I might have no choice but to get cable TV so as to get my entertainment.
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The next supervisor will be whomever Bill Lockyer wants. I hear he's pushing for Nadia Lockyer.
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