While most of the officials attending the U.S. Conference of Mayors gathering
were only too willing to be feted by tobacco giant Philip Morris on Sunday night
at the University of Wisconsin Memorial Union, one of the conferees was on the
outside with those protesting the closing of the campus building for the corporate
luau.
Among several hundred protesters peacefully chanting "Who's union? Our union"
was Santa Monica Mayor Mike Feinstein. Feinstein, still wearing his official Conference
of Mayors name tag, said the marchers were right that corporate sponsors had far
too much influence over the agenda of this year's gathering of mayors.
"The corporate presence is far greater than is healthy," said Feinstein, who
has served as mayor of the California city of 84,000 since 2000, and who has been
extremely active in a number of national organizations dealing with municipal
issues.
"I know people say that the Conference of Mayors needs corporate sponsorships
to pay for events like this," Feinstein said. "But that calculation misses the
point that many of these corporations are responsible for blocking the agenda
that's best for America's cities."
Corporations that help pay for Conference of Mayors events also lobby at the
federal, state and local levels for budget priorities that make it harder for
cities to serve the vast majority of their citizens, Feinstein noted. In addition,
he says, these same corporations, through their political action committees and
the special interest organizations they fund, are often some of the biggest campaign
contributors to political candidates who oppose urban America's agenda.
"It is not hard to connect the dots," says Feinstein. "It's just ironic that
so many mayors don't understand that when they open the doors to corporate sponsors
they are also opening the doors to corporate influence over the discussion."
As an example, Feinstein pointed to the debate over affordable housing at this
year's Conference of Mayors gathering.
"When you have a session where one of the main speakers is a representative
of the banking industry, like we did this weekend, the discussion is steered toward
charges that public processes and regulations are the problem," Feinstein said.
"What is not discussed is the role that public processes and regulations play
in making cities livable. What is not discussed is the whole issue of whether
it is necessarily good for a community when property values rise and a few developers
and real estate interests make enormous profits."
A Green Party activist, Feinstein has worked with Santa Monica labor unions
to promote union organizing and living wage campaigns. Like those protesting outside
conference events, he says city officials need to focus a great deal more attention
on issues of income equity. And, like the protesters, he is certain that the access
corporate lobbyists buy at events like the U.S. Conference of Mayors gathering
limits the attention to those issues.
"The access to public officials that corporations have leads directly to the
maldistribution of wealth that we see in this country. The maldistribution of
wealth at a national level means that municipalities don't have the resources
that are needed," explains Feinstein, who has attended issue-oriented sessions
at this year's Conference of Mayors gathering while skipping many of the corporate-sponsored
parties.
The Santa Monica mayor says the U.S. Conference of Mayors should reject corporate
money and hold more "bare-bones" conferences where corporate glitz is traded for
substance and frank discussions about the economic concerns that ail American
cities.
"The problem is that we get together at meetings like this and complain about
the lack of resources," says Feinstein of his fellow mayors. "And we do that complaining
while surrounded by the very people (corporate lobbyists) who create the problem.
If we want to make a better future for cities, we should start by changing how
the Conference of Mayors does business."
John Nichols is associate editor for The Capital Times.
Copyright 2002 The Capital Times
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