Murrieta Measures C D E

Measure C sets term limits for Council members in Murrieta. It takes away your constitutional right to choose the candidate of your choice. Many times there are only a few candidates running and not much of a field to choose from. If there was someone on the Council who had been doing a great job, had a proven track record and was the best candidate but their two terms were up, you would have to vote for someone else - a novice less qualified or perhaps a candidate with a hidden agenda. Your freedom to choose has been effectively denied you. Vote NO on Measure C.

Measure D addresses payments made to City Council members, and here, both the written proposed Measure and recent newspaper comments are not half-truths but outright lies. The proponents say that Measure D will keep Murrieta from becoming another "City of Bell." Apples to oranges: Murrieta is a general law city and Bell is a charter city. The state and federal governments control stipends and other benefits paid to general law City councils, in a charter city the council members can set their own payments. We are not a charter city, we cannot become a Bell. In addition, the stipend paid to our Council members is $600 [per month], equating to an hourly wage of $3.75 - no one is getting rich here. There are no "Club" memberships, and here again the implication is directly misleading to the voters. Our council members represent us on interagency Committees with other cities or with the County - they are paid a set fee to attend the meetings, and that fee is not set at the local level. Their representation ensures that Murrieta gets their fair share of state and county funds for road improvements and other capital improvements - and we could not exist and grow without that interaction. The proponents want to stop the memberships, if that happens, it will shut down our City and we will die on the vine while other cities in the County will thrive and move forward. Vote NO on Measure D to keep our City on the forward track!

Measure E - the most far fetched and most damaging of all, the limiting of the salary of our City Manager and thereby limiting the salary of all of his/her direct reports including the Chief of Police and the Fire Chief. We live in a market-driven society, and the proponents are using an average salary based on City Manager salaries throughout the US. A City Manager in my home town of Sterling, IL will never make the salaries paid in CA. There is a vast difference in the salaries across our nation - we need to look at what is paid in our area. Out of 41 cities of the same size as Murrieta, our City Manger is 28th on the list. You get what you pay for, and we need to make sure we have a highly qualified person to lead us into the future; limit the pay at the top of the grapevine, it will eventually dwindle down the grapevine to departments like police and fire, and Murrieta will die on the vine. We cannot attract and keep well qualified personnel without proper compensation. The proponents had no idea of the salary system set up in Murrieta, all of the City manager's direct reports make 5% less than he does, and that keeps trickling down. If our current City Manager chooses to leave in two years when his salary goes down, the next City Manager will be paid $141,000 based on the proponents formula. That means when a new Police or Fire chief is hired their salaries would be 5% lower at $137,000. We are creating a glass ceiling as all of our highly qualified captains, lieutenants, corporals, etc. in the PD and FD already make more money than that and would have to take pay cuts to get promoted! They will leave Murrieta in droves and go elsewhere for promotion opportunities. With that trickle down effect, we will lose our position as the 2nd safest city in our nation as we will no longer attract the most highly qualified candidates to Murrieta. Measure E is another non-solution. Vote No on Measures C, D, and E. Contributed by Barbara Nugent, Murrieta