Registered Belmont voters, please get out and vote next Tuesday and release Belmont from the stranglehold of Coralin Feierbach and her cronies. Here is a short list of what I am talking about:

1. Almost $1 million in city dollars spent to buy land in San Juan Canyon to protect it from development - land that is largely undevelopable in the first place.

2. Empty storefronts and the blighted lot at El Camino and O'Neill.

3. Traffic congestion during peak hours on Alameda by Carlmont High due to a lane removal.

4. A downtown area that continues to fall short of being a true city center.

5. A smoking ordinance on apartments and condos that is unenforceable, when Coralin and the council could have given complex owners incentives to install filtering systems that would actually would have improved air quality. Instead, they chose to grandstand with their self-serving ordinance instead of actually providing a workable solution, driving smokers off their balconies to hide their habit indoors, and ironically making air quality in these buildings worse.

6. Unfair restrictions on the usage of NDNU's Koret Field imposed by the council (which will again come up before the planning commision before end of year).

7. Bad relations between the city and local private schools, which are often treated with derision and disrespect by Coralin and the council.

8. Poor treatment by the council-appointed planning commision toward local businesses, which is exactly what Belmont doesn't need in this struggling economy.

9. Rude, arrogant, and disrespectful behavior by Coralin and planning commision members toward residents in public meetings.

Gin Nikoloff and Mike McGuinness will bring a breath of fresh air to Belmont politics. They have a positive attitude and open-mindedness similar to that of incumbent Warren Lieberman, which will help to shape a council that represents the interestes of all of Belmont, not just a select few. Please take the time on November 3 to vote and make a difference, and bring about a new Belmont.