2024 Concord City Council Candidate Questions: Eric Antonick
CONCORD, CA (Sept. 18, 2024) — The Pioneer newspaper presented a list of questions to the candidates running for Concord City Council in the 2024 election. To read other candidate answers, click here.
What is your name, age and occupation?
Eric Antonick
Age: 55
Construction/integration project manager
Why do you want to run for a City Council Position?
Like many with whom I have held conversations, I have grown frustrated with the overall performance of the Council, and I believe that there are certain elements that are needed in that body. We need far more accountability; transparency; outreach to, and engagement with, the public; strategic and innovative thinking; and consistent drive towards executing on the myriad projects needing to be undertaken by the City.
What experience or training do you have that qualifies you to make decisions for the City of Concord?
I have a long and diverse career of executing complex projects and achieving tremendous results and innovations across industries, companies, hierarchies, and functional roles. I learn quickly, adapt to change, and deal well with both executives and “ground-level” workers. I have a history of building cohesive teams that align towards meeting ambitious and changing demands. I have lived for 8 years in other countries (Venezuela and Mexico), and I am a unifying force for achieving great things across diverse groups. I have consistently demonstrated integrity in my professional life – even at risk and damage to my career – by being among the most vocal in support of righting wrongs in policies that adversely affected employees, and in rooting out fraudulent practices (in my most recent company, exposing millions of dollars of fraud and misrepresentations to the FCC, stockholders, and public). I have fought for the underdog throughout my professional life, and have done similarly in my personal life; particularly, spending years (eventually, successfully) battling the local school district for appropriate services for children with special-education needs.
What engagement have you had in Concord civic affairs? Do you regularly attend city council meetings?
I occasionally attend Council meetings. I have, over a few years, advocated to Council members for a fundamental change in direction to the Naval Weapons Station development project. What I consider to be a lack of proper priorities and due diligence on that project is one of the catalysts for my running against District 2s incumbent.
A community driven Grand Jury identified a City Council lack of transparency in regard to financial reporting of Concord Naval weapon station Reuse Project. What changes, if any, would you make in response to the report?
The Reuse Project is one of my primary “gripes” with the members of the Council, as I have been advocating to them for years for changes to the financial structure that they’re insistent upon for the project. I am running in order to “bust open” the operation of city government to a whole new level of transparency. From the budget, to how the many millions in contracts are awarded, to the gaping need for internal audits, to unreported activities involving other jurisdictions, to using data visualization to make the inner workings and key statistics far more relatable to the public, I’m going to be a gadfly of sorts to advocate for the public interest. This includes complete transparency with the Reuse Project – relevant communications with the principal parties, determinations of environmental studies, potential impact to our existing infrastructure and rates (water, power, etc) by the development as currently designed. Financials will be clearly disclosed, and not by simply posting something in an obscure location in a mind-numbing table format just to meet requirements; rather, the public need to have an enthusiastic outreach made in a clear format, using visualization tools that make apparent to all how our funds are being spent and how our designated contractors are meeting their deliverables. I have seen in industry how transparency is the first casualty of those in power, and this applies even more to those in government – even local government.
There has been some discussion among residents that the Naval Weapons Station development is too big a project for the City Council, and that the project should have regional oversight. Do you agree?
I’m open to the idea; however, I believe that in principle it can be effectively handled by a local City Council of our size. I do believe that we need far more involvement with many different groups, though, as the expertise needed spans so many disciplines that we need to be engaging with local and remote experts to get this right. The design phase of projects is the most crucial, and I firmly believe that this Council have *not* been sufficiently engaged or imaginative, and have not collaborated effectively with needed parties. Too much reliance on the prospective developer, and too much of a cookie-cutter design that isn’t at all inspiring or far-sighted. We can do so much more with strong and determined leadership unafraid to rebuff established forces.
The major issues in the city have been homelessness, roads/infrastructure, safety and housing. What have you done, or would you do to address these issues? Are there other issues you would champion?
I believe that it’s a travesty that it has taken nearly *8 years* for the District 2 incumbent to reach this stage of a plan to address our issue of homelessness in Concord. This needed to be Year 1! And all we have at nearly Year 8 (in the case of District 2) is a plan with little idea as to its eventual effectiveness. It is yet to be determined whether it will be executed satisfactorily or whether the design is based upon correct assessments and assumptions. A state audit recently discovered that much of the $24 billion spent towards homelessness has not been properly accounted for; so, do we really have the highest level of confidence in our current City Council – most of whom, once again, have waited many years to even get to this stage of having a *plan* — to maintain the proper oversight and drive towards executing the plan with transparency and accountability? I will not even seek reelection after an initial 4-year term if I haven’t made significant improvements to our crucial issues, let along seek a 3rd term, as our incumbent is doing. There is no mandate for *12 years of the same*, in my opinion. I’m not going to try to use a Council position as a steppingstone in a political career. This is it for me – either make waves and a huge positive impact, or accept failure and bow out for the next election.
On the issue of homelessness, we need people who will unrelentingly seek contrarian arguments/views, will provide a compelling argument to the public as to how the plan will meet the needs/expectations of both homeless individuals and the public’s concern for safety and for the wellbeing and peace-of-mind of their fellow residents, will post our current baseline statistics and some clear objectives and their measurements by which we will determine success or failure, and will have no fear of sounding the alarm when deliverables are not being met or the course needs to be corrected. 8 years into District 2’s incumbency, and I don’t see the level of transparency and accountability — or the results – that we deserve.
Transparency and accountability extend towards the state of our roads and infrastructure, as well. We need internal audits of, and clarity of process in, the awarding of contracts for our roads and other infrastructure, for example. I have seen how the awarding of contracts is likely the primary avenue for malfeasance to occur within organizations. Even with established procedures and safeguards in place, it’s just so easy for improper awarding of funds to take place. We need to ensure that the public have no doubts that contracts are being awarded properly and fairly, and we need to have an ongoing process by which we evaluate and document – and energetically making public to residents – the performance of all of our vendors. We need to dispense with assumptions and implement zero-cost budgeting, through which every expense is questioned, reevaluated, and adjusted for our current and anticipated needs.
Regarding safety, I want to see a quick but very comprehensive assessment of our current situation – by crime types/rates/trends, demographics, locations, etc. Safety is a pervasive problem, and we need to provide to the public an “education” of sorts as to how we’ve comprehensively assessed the scope and details of the problem. Once again, this much-needed transparency is only part; the other key factor is accountability, of which we have had far too little. Do the current Council have any objectives they offered the public years ago that they would agree to be judged by? No – they haven’t provided a minimum threshold (on aggravated assaults, burglaries, etc) by which they would agree that their performance rated a “Met” or “Missed” grade. This fear of accountability needs to end. Accountability doesn’t come just every 4 years at election time. Elected officials have a duty to provide reasonable expectations as to what they will achieve; and, failing to meet those objectives (commitments), they should explain to the public why they failed to meet them.
Housing is another complex issue, as we are aware. We know that supply and demand, in an unadulterated environment, infer that our high rental/housing costs are due to insufficient supply. Rent controls introduce distortions, as do market-influencers such as the Blackrocks & Vanguards of the world buying up single-family homes and pushing up prices. We don’t necessarily want peoples’ basic need for shelter to be subject to speculation and resultingly drive out of Concord many of our long-time residents, but neither do we want to preclude some from having a reasonable level of opportunity to generate additional income through rental income. We also probably don’t want unattractive, monolithic blocks of apartment complexes that have become the norm. Again, it’s a difficult issue, which is why it’s so crucial to have the right approach – people who are going to transparently and enthusiastically solicit feedback from all parties, present this in clear ways to the public, and make compromises for the overall good of the community. We definitely need more housing – but it should be attractive and located in a fashion that is integrated into each community with quality-of-life being a primary consideration, and it should be primarily for ownership and not as rentals (and the City should get creative about helping residents to afford to own their homes rather than to have to rent). We can also get creative about the types of housing that would allow for a drastic “barebones but safe” model of rental that could fill a need at the very low monthly rental rate.
A hugely-impactful issue for Concord and surrounding areas is the Naval Weapons Reuse Project. I have many thoughts about it across the many facets brought up by parties during Council meetings over the years, but my primary issue with this Council is that they are intransigent about giving ownership of the development to one corporation after another. I have asked them for years to do their due diligence in pursuing a different financial structure, one in which the residents of Concord (and surrounding areas) would own the overall development. The scope of the project has been estimated to be over $20 billion over the course of 30 years. The developers have been targeting at least an 18% IRR (Internal Rate of Return) on their investment (they’re gathering together the financing from various sources). An ESOP (Employee Stock Ownership Plan) is a financial mechanism in which the employees of a corporation own the entire organization through their allocated stock. At a grander scale, we can do something similar with this veritable *treasure trove* we have in our backyard. We could have a development firm manage the development, for which they would be compensated at a reasonable rate; however, the entirety of the stock for the umbrella corporation (could be a non-profit, perhaps) would be held in trust for individual residents of Concord. All of the development’s profits would be held as Retained Earnings. As the loans were paid off over the years, each individual Concord resident would become more and more “vested” in terms of their stock holdings. There would be a healthy balance in Concord between Supply (producers) and Demand (consumers), as the individual residents (consumers) would simultaneously be the owners (producers). Instead, the Council members are intent upon giving all of the profits to Lennar, then Seeno, then…on and on. We could be a model for the country, whereas the Council want to do some cookie-cutter deal with a developer through which the residents of Concord get only scraps. (If you like the concept, you can research Louis O. Kelso – inventor of “universal capitalism” and the ESOP. Also, a group who also have taken a shine to Kelso’s ideas is the Center for Economic and Social Justice, www.cesj.org).
A recent press release from the city announced the potential rezoning of selected areas of Concord to accommodate high density housing (Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing Projects). What are your thoughts on this proposal?
I’m not giving an opinion right now on the specific areas under consideration, as I’d need to delve into it in great detail.
I’m very much in favor of this, in principle, as long as some conditions are met. Developments need to be integrated into the surrounding areas, in terms of transportation and quality-of-life (from aesthetic, communal areas, and “walkability” standpoints). They should not be the monolithic blocks we’re seeing around town – we can look to Europe and other areas to get ideas on existing very attractive, high-density developments’ designs. They should also tend towards an ownership and not a rental model – our residents are increasingly being consigned to rent indefinitely rather than to own their residence, and our Council need to make this a primary focus. Our need for new housing can be an opportunity to create both attractive domiciles and innovative financing mechanisms through which we can help more of our residents own their homes, where possible.
If you had an extra $1 million in the general budget, what would you do with it?
I cannot say right now – that’s the only responsible answer for me at this point, prior to having a few months after the election to intensely scrutinize the budget; understand the internal processes; talk in depth to all of the internal department personnel at all levels; and, only then, have an iterative process of conversations with the public so as to properly prioritize that amount.
If you had to cut an extra $1 million from the general budget, what would you cut?
Same answer as above – it would be pure speculation at this point, and would be imprudent, to claim to know the best place(s) to cut without having a few months to immerse myself in the budget, learn all internal processes, converse at length with department personnel, and meet with the public for feedback on the direction I’m inclined to choose.
How do you feel about putting “red light” cameras at high-use intersections, and why? What about in parks?
I’m adamantly against this, though I like to think I’m always open to counter-arguments on any subject, and I do vigorously solicit feedback from those in opposition to my initial stances. This is one topic, though, on which I’m frustrated with the Council. These cameras at so many intersections have been installed without proper oversight and transparency. Adding a “red light” component to the ostensible “crime-fighting” component is just one more insult. We do not need a surveillance society in miniature here in Concord. The “why do you care if you have nothing to hide” argument just doesn’t fly – we should be free of government surveillance as a general principle, with exceptions only under rare circumstances and with strict scrutiny. Many nearby jurisdictions installed these cameras – the very same model, in some (many?) cases – at around the same time. That wasn’t coincidence. I want all of the behind-the-scenes correspondences to be made public. Agreements with other agencies (e.g., state/federal) to provide front- or back-door access to the cameras need to be made available. Members of the public should be on a panel that oversees every access of any of the cameras, and the public should have access to a maintained log of *every* access of the surveillance system (that is, if we do decide to keep the cameras only after a compelling public-safety argument is made).
The lack of transparency and safeguards by the Council on this issue has been overly acquiescent and neglectful, in my opinion.
How would you improve transparency and accountability in the city’s decision-making process?
I asked that Pioneer Publishers include this question in the final compilation because of how strongly I feel that those two practices are absolutely crucial for the integrity and performance of organizations of all types. The larger and more complex the organization, the more uncompromisingly these two practices must be embedded into the organization. I have seen organizations underperform and waste so much potential because their management did nothing more than pay lip service to these two pillars. The higher one goes in an organization, the more imperative it is for managers to have the courage to be thoroughly transparent and to hold themselves and others accountable for missed objectives. I’m running because I see the current Council as woefully falling short on these practices, in addition to not demonstrating the ability to see complex projects through to successful completion (particularly, doing their due diligence and hard work in getting the crucial Design phase correct).
I would in short order (a few months) become an expert in the finances, processes, personnel, and tools of the government operations. I would be the public’s portal for clear and impactful views into the key aspects of pending budget outlays, regulatory/zoning changes, and overall vision for the City. We need to provide a compelling vision to our residents of how we envision Concord in 5 and 10+ years. Then, we need to clearly show how we’re diligently working towards that in an integrated way. I relish calling out unfair practices, fraud, or simply subpar decision. I’m a team player, I like to win as a team, and I would work to build consensus among parties; however, I do not fear speaking up and being a gadfly in an organization or taking the brunt on behalf of others. I’m running because I see a need for something other than 12 years of the same for District 2. I see a need for someone who will advocate for the public like no other, someone who will fearlessly gather opinions/ideas/data and course-correct when warranted, and someone who has a long track-record of outstanding results in getting complex projects completed. I don’t see that at all on the Council. If I haven’t made a significant, positive impact after a first term, there’s no way I’ll ask for 4 more years.
If it’s of interest to any of you, I’m planning to add my thoughts on matters relevant to the City on a website. Please feel free to give it a look: https://www.ericantonick.com.
How would you address discord or disagreements between council members and/or with city staff?
There will invariably be disagreements, even vehement ones, on occasion. It’s about how a member handles this. Deal with others with respect and clear communication. Remember the big picture – you’re there to serve the public, and part of the process is to respectfully resolve differences of opinion. Dealing with people openly but politely is the right approach. People respect openness and courage, even if some will not conduct themselves similarly. Most situations resolve in a respectful and professional manner, even when strong disagreements occur, when at least one of the parties unwaveringly maintains decorum and does not resort to petty behaviors. I’ve found that openness with a quiet confidence and smile is an approach that consistently yields the best results in fostering productive relationships.
Do you feel the current measures taken by council on rent control and tenant protections are the correct ones for the city of Concord?
Obviously, a complex issue with highly-impactful consequences. We don’t want residents to be forced to leave Concord because of being “priced out” of their hometown, or to otherwise face hardship by paying a much higher proportion of their monthly income towards housing. We also don’t want to unduly infringe upon existing or potential property owners’ ability to pursue opportunities and a return on their investments, and we don’t want to disincentivize the creation of new housing. Additionally, we don’t want something as fundamental as a person’s need for shelter to be subject to speculation, as we’ve seen across the country with housing being bought up by Blackrock, Vanguard, and others, thereby exacerbating the price of housing for ordinary Americans. Finally, I think we can agree that there is a “community good” in having long-term residents continue to remain in their hometown without undue hardship.
I’m in favor of the “Just Cause for Eviction” – with the information I’m privy to right now, I think it’s the right balance of the interests of both tenant & owner. Particularly, there should be some protection for tenants to not be evicted, only for owners to then raise the rental rate for new tenants who are able and willing to pay a much higher amount.
One of my concerns is with the process by which the Council enacted this program – the lack of due diligence and transparency that is a concern I have with much of how this Council conducts its business. I don’t believe they conducted themselves thoroughly or transparently enough. Instead of only having people state their opinions and then have the Council vote “yea or nay”, due diligence should have been undertaken to seek and present far greater levels of data that could lead to a more informed decision. Their process of deliberating on this, and the factors and data used in reaching a conclusion on the overall plan and details of same needed to be better presented to the public and made subject to scrutiny. They did not set up objectives/measurements for defining success/failure. How will they know if 5 years if this program is working – cede that it’s not only if enough residents or property owners complain enough? These measurements should ideally be based on hard data that can be measured over time (we’d have to determine how best to measure the “interests” of residents, both renters and owners as well as the “interests” of rental-property owners), but even periodic surveys could serve as some rudimentary feedback mechanism.
Alternatives should have been better solicited, brainstormed, and considered.
- We need to increase supply, both through fostering a hospitable business/regulatory environment for investors and creatively developing mechanisms for financing new developments.
o There should be a new category of relatively-inexpensive (but safe and aesthetically-pleasing) unit permitted for development that would fill a need for those who cannot currently afford even a one-bedroom apartment rental at current market rates. Something the size of a dorm room or a small RV – a place to sleep, a kitchenette, a tiny bathroom/shower. Designs for these abound, and they’re able to be built in a cost-effective manner. The goal should be to have this tier of options available to those who want to spend approx. $800/mo to rent a safe, independent dwelling. This could also be built as units to be owned at very accessible prices. It would be critical to ensure that the areas where these are permitted and built are designed and implemented with safety and “livability” factors considered – proper design can ensure that they are an appealing addition to the community and do not bring negative, unintended consequences that we sometimes associate with low-income housing.
o The City should work with other government agencies and private equity/insurance companies to create a fund that can finance new developments in ways that foster ownership by the residents of Concord – a sort of ESOP (Employee Stock Ownership Plan) on steroids. The residents of Concord would benefit directly through ownership of a portion of the new multi-unit housing developments that are permitted by the City. Development companies would be contracted to manage the construction, but we – the residents – would own these developments.
- Besides the above ownership plan for the large-scale development of units, the City should also develop the financial wherewithal (through private-public partnerships) to aid residents in purchasing their homes. Our only focus as a city should not be on renting – there has been too much of a trend, mostly out of necessity, towards renting instead of owning one’s home. The nation is facing a steep decline in home ownership, but we at a local level can strive to provide more opportunities.
- We should look into limiting the ownership of rental units of all types, including single-family homes, to individuals and entities that are under a to-be-determined size. Again, we don’t want immense financial organizations like Blackrock inserting themselves into our community by jacking-up prices on our residents.
As with all issues, my approach is – even if I have initial directions I’m inclined towards – to energetically gather the best arguments and the most data, be honest about my lack of knowledge or experience on a particular matter, foster intense debate on the matters, be willing to change my mind upon being convinced of a better argument, and formulate a consensus on a plan of action. If a consensus cannot be fully achieved, then – at the very least – there will be certainty that a vigorous effort was made to deliberate comprehensively and transparently, and objectives and measurements will be publicly committed to so that decision-makers can be held accountable for our actions and can know if we as a community are progressing as we’d hoped. More here: https://www.ericantonick.com.
Visit the candidate’s campaign site.
To read other Concord City Council candidate answers, click here.