Remembering Michael Kyes, Sebastopol's Most Courageous Leader
Remembering Michael Kyes, Sebastopol's Most Courageous Leader
By Jonathan Greenberg
For WaccoBB.net
May 26, 2014
It was with great sadness than I learned of the death Michael Kyes yesterday morning. On this Memorial Day, I feel Michael's passing not just as a personal loss of an engaging friend, but also as a loss to Sebastopol, of our community's most courageous political leader.
First elected to City Council in 2010, then serving as mayor in 2013, Michael was not the City Council's most diplomatic leader (that would be attorney/mediator Sarah Gurney). He was not our most charismatic leader (Robert Jacobs takes that honor). But Michael was our most courageous leader, and he leaves our City a far better place for his caring and commitment.
Michael said what he thought. When Sonoma Clean Power's big hearing seeking Council approval came to the public, Michael had read through the complex proposal, added hours of independent research to the mix, and emerged with some of the most pointed, insightful questions that I have ever heard asked by any politician, anywhere.
Before our city voted to join the program (which we did), Michael insisted on making sure, on our behalf, that the establishment of Sonoma Clean Power would REALLY reduce carbon emissions And that the renewables promised would soon result in additional renewable capacity, instead of shifting “credits” around from existing projects, without incrementally funding new renewable energy projects.
As Cotati Councilman Mark Landman, vice chairman of the agency's board, told the PD today, Michael “was dedicated to supporting and growing local solar power. He just constantly worked to remind us, to push us toward that. He was truly the voice at Sonoma Clean Power for local, distributed solar power.”
Michael walked the walk. Except for a gas stove, the Sebastopol home that he shared with Coastal Coastwalks Executive Director Una Glass, his loving wife of 34 years, was entirely solar-powered. Last year, Michael helped write and pass an ordinance that requires solar power on all new construction in Sebastopol, making us one of the first cities in the United States to pass such a law. I recall a Council meeting in which he treated the public, and his fellow Council Members, to an impromptu lecture about a simple electrical device that he pulled out of his pocket, which worked much better than a Smart Meter to assist homeowners in learning where electricity was being wasted.
Michael advised that it could save most of us $25 a month for the rest of our lives.
To honor his memory, I am going to buy one!
The Smart Meter battle with multi-billion dollar power monopoly PG&E was a classic David and Goliath contest. Council Member Michael Kyes wielded a courageous slingshot on behalf of We, the People. Many Sebastopol citizens were concerned about the radiation and privacy implications of the Smart Meters, especially since many of them will act as a radiation-emitting, continual relay devices for as many as hundreds of other Smart Meters surrounding them. I spoke to Michael, a leader who, remarkably, still knew how to listen, about PG&E’s outrageous “opt-out” system for a $70 one time fee and $10 a month. I calculated that for my home, the privilege of rejecting the new meter would cost me about $25,000 over the next 20 years. Why not insist upon a free opt out--and keep the meter readers in our area gainfully employed?
Michael went to bat for me, and my many fellow citizens who spoke out about this. The City Council banned Smart Meter installations until they stopped, or a free opt out was implemented. When PG&E refused to listen, the Council passed an ordinance attaching a $500 fine to installers defying homeowner’s express desire to refuse the meter. Sebastopol became the only city in the country to criminalize installations. And the Council ordered our Police Department to respond to citizen enforcement complaints.
When PG&E installers balked and the potential of being busted in Sebastopol, the mega-corporation freaked out. They literally pulled the plug on the city’s important new Barlow development. It had nothing to do with Smart Meters. This was an act of unprecedented corporate “collective punishment” of our City for daring to pass a law the people supported. It was sheer corptocracy bullying, as in: “We may not have the law, or the people, or local government on our side, but we have the power, and the money.”
Sebastopol won a compromise, one that soon drifted to homeowners statewide. PG&E’s outrageous $2,500 opt-out practice was tabled statewide, as were installations in Sebastopol, as the state regulatory agency reviews (to this day) the Smart Meter opt-out policy. Meanwhile, the Barlow got its juice back.
Michael Kyes always had our back. In the CVS battle, the most heated political controversy in modern Sebastopol history, Michael was a brilliant truth teller for the public interest. This meant little David helping Sebastopol Tomorrow, Progressive Sebastopol, Occupy Sebastopol, and many others, take on the $100-billion a year CVS Goliath and its armies of San Francisco lawyers and shills. In addition to the largest private real estate interests in town, Sebastopol’s unabashedly pro-development Chamber of Commerce, and their many agents. It was a pitched battled over the most congested, dangerous traffic corner in town. Prior to the big CVS City Council election of 2012, which brought anti-CVS candidates Robert Jacob and John Eder to office, Michael sent a letter to every household on Sebastopol. This factual, “what’s really going on” letter from a standing Council member and pillar of our progressive community helped turn the tide of one of the most important Council elections ever. Michael, along with his outspoken Council ally Sarah Gurney, was pilloried by a local columnist for "mud-slinging." But there was nothing malicious, muddy, or muddled, about the inconvenient facts that his courageous, and timely letter revealed.
Michael was an outspoken ally in our struggle to regulate leaf blowers in Sebastopol. When another Council Member spread dubious information citing claims from a leafblower manufacturer's website, Michael spoke of the insanity of a neighbor covering his car in pollutants and scrapings after blowing their lawn debris from their house onto the road, and his property. He was instrumental in insuring that Sebastopol's park's maintenance workers ended their polluting weekly leaf blowings in parks filled with our children.
While Michael was not afraid to be a courageous leader, or an informed contrarian, he never sounded vindictive, or angry. His had a beautiful sense of humor, and an an impish smile and glitter in his eye when he revealed what he thought was really going on.
Michael loved Sebastopol. He credited Dr. Jorge Gonzales, and Palm Drive Hospital, less than a mile from his home, for saving his life when he suffered the aortic aneurism in 2011, a condition that ultimately killed him. Michael recently talked to me about that operation, and how he did not emerge to consciousness for 18 days.
Back in 2011, I did not know how threatening his illness had been. It surprised me when it took months for Michael to return to Council meetings. He walked in feebly, on a cane, to a roomful of applause. Like many citizens, I was grateful when his strength was restored, and when his Council colleagues voted to make him Mayor, at the end of 2012.
A few lasting recent memories of Michael …
The Barlow had not quite yet opened, and I ran into him resting on a ledge. We spent an hour touring the development together, talking issues, while we strolled through every building and nook and cranny, Michael wide-eyed and curious of every detail, like a boy exploring a big new playground.
Then, just a few months ago, we met for a budget talk at Taylor Maid, in its beautiful Barlow space. I expressed my interest in seeing that 10% of road funds were earmarked to fund bicycle trails. Michael was determined to prove to me that road maintenance was more urgently needed, and we disagreed about this. He sat there at the table, cane nearby, with a 300 page binder detailing the conditions of every street in Sebastopol. We talked for hours, and never did a defensive, or agitated word pass either of our lips. He was informed beyond belief--and very effective.
How Michael Kyes loved our small, green city!
And how he was loved, by those who knew him: his caring, his competence, his commitment.
Hail and farewell, Michael Kyes.
We miss you already.
Re: Remembering Michael Kyes, Sebastopol's Most Courageous Leader
Beautifully said Jonathan. Thank you!
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Posted in reply to the post by Peacetown Jonathan:
Remembering Michael Kyes, Sebastopol's Most Courageous Leader
By Jonathan Greenberg
For WaccoBB.net
May 26, 2014
It was with great sadness than I learned of the death Michael Kyes yesterday morning, On this Memorial Day, I feel Michael's passing not just as a personal loss of an engaging friend, but also, as a loss to Sebastopol, of our community's most courageous political leader. ...
Re: Remembering Michael Kyes, Sebastopol's Most Courageous Leader
Our wonderful City Council member and former Mayor Michael Kyes has passed away.
Our wonderful City Council member and former Mayor Michael Kyes has passed away.
Re: Remembering Michael Kyes, Sebastopol's Most Courageous Leader
A beautiful tribute to someone who walked the walk. Something we should all aspire to.
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Posted in reply to the post by scamperwillow:
Beautifully said Jonathan. Thank you!
