Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout2004-11-08 City Council (5)TO: FROM: HONORABLE CITY COUNCIL CITY MANAGER ® 14 DEPARTMENT: PUBLIC WORKS DATE:NOVEMBER 8, 2004 C1VIR:464:04 SUBJECT:~SULTS OF OUTREACH FOR STORM DRAIN ELEC~ON RECOMMENDATION Staff recommends that Council direct staff to return on December 6, 2004 to secure Council authorization for a property owner election in February/March 2005 for approval of an increase in the monthly Storm Drainage Fee to $10.00 per Equivalent Residential Unit (ERU) to fund the proposed enhanced storm drain program. BACKGROUND The City’s storm drain capital improvement, maintenance and water quality protection programs are funded through the Storm Drainage Fund, an enterprise fund established by Council in 1989. Revenue is generated by a Storm Drainage Fee, which is collected through monthly City utility bills. The fee, $4.25 per month for a single-family residential parcel, has not been increased since 1994 and is insufficient to cover the program’s operating costs. The Storm Drainage Fee is a property-related fee subject to the provisions of Proposition 218. A majority of property owners must approve a fee increase. For the current year, the General Fund is providing $800,000 in supplemental funding to maintain a baseline level of service for storm drain maintenance and storm water quality protection. There is no funding provided for storm drain capital improvements, despite a backlog of capital needs. At the September 13, 2004 Council meeting, staff presented and endorsed a plan of action recommended by the City Manager appointed Blue Ribbon Storm Drain Committee (CMR:393:04). The plan includes a set of high-priority capital improvements totaling $!7 million, $500 thousand per year for storm drain system repairs, additional funding for storm drain maintenance, and annual funding for innovative projects to reduce storm water runoff. The plan would be funded via an increase in the Storm Drainage Fee to $10.00 per month for average-sized single-family residential parcels, with provision for annual fee adjustments and a fee "sunset" after a period of 12 years. Staff and the Storm Drain Committee recommended that the City conduct a property owner election to approve the proposed fee increase in February/March 2005. CMR:464:04 Page 1 of 4 Council was generally supportive of the storm drain fimding plan jointly recommended by staff and the Storm Drain Committee. In addition to endorsing the recommended program elements, Council was interested in gauging the level of public support for increasing the fee by an additional $1 per month to fired curb and gutter repairs and/or an additional $1 per month to establish a reserve fund to pay for future storm drain equipment and infrastructure replacement needs. Council directed staff to solicit public input on these additional storm drain expenditures, including the use of web-based survey techniques, and to report back with the findings. DISCUSSION Staff undertook three distinct efforts to solicit public input on the recommended storm drain funding plan and the potential program additions identified by Council. Staff and Storm Drain Committee chair Larry Klein attended the Midtown Residents Association’s Ice Cream and Issues Social on Sunday, October 3 in order to facilitate some one-on-one discussions with local residents. Staff also posted a message to the e-mail groups for the Crescent Park Neighborhood Association and the Midtown Residents Association containing basic information on the proposed storm drain funding plan and invited group participants to submit their comments and preferences electronically. Lastly, staff scheduled a presentation regarding storm drain funding to the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce’s Government Action Committee on November 4. Staff will summarize the feedback received from members of this forum at the November 8 Council meeting. Staff manned an information table at the Midtown event from 1:00 to 4:00 pm at Hoover Park. The table was stocked with information, maps, and photos describing the current state of the City’s storm drain system, its deficiencies and needs, and the various alternative program elements and funding levels under consideration. Attachment A is the fact sheet/project map that was distributed to the event attendees. Staff, supported by Larry Klein and Council Member Morton, engaged residents in conversation regarding storm drains in the neighborhood, answered their questions, and solicited their input on the proposed funding options. Participants were invited to endorse a particular alternative by signing their name to one of four statements (see Attachment B). Staff spoke to about 20 neighbors during the course of the afternoon. Seven people were willing to state their opinion. Three neighbors felt that the proposed fee increase was nominal and minimized the difference between $10 and $12 per month -- they believe that the drainage improvements are needed and supported the $12 option. A couple of people expressed concerns about rising costs and advocated the $10 proposal (they both mentioned the financial impact of the upcoming School District parcel tax as a reason to limit the Storm Drainage Fee). Two residents were opposed to the fee altogether and argued that the City should find the money to make the storm drain improvements without imposing higher fees on residents. In order to obtain additional input from residents, staff worked with representatives of the Crescent Park and Midtown neighborhood associations to send information about storm CMR:464:04 Page 2 of 4 drain funding to the members of their e-mail groups. The e-mail message contained basic information about the need for additional storm drain system improvements and requested feedback on the funding plan endorsed by the Storm Drain Committee as well as the options identified by Council for higher fees to ftmd additional program elements. Attachment C is a copy of the e-mail message that was distributed to the two e-mail groups. Recipients of the e-mail were asked to submit responses directly to staff. The 15 responses to the e-mail posting are included as Attachment D to this report. The variety of responses was similar to the spectrum of opinions that staff heard during the live discussions at the Midtown event. There was one response each favoring the $10 and the $11 per month options. Eight respondents advocated the $12 per month alternative, citing the need to improve the City’s storm drain system and a ~gness to pay for it. Five persons dismissed all of the proposed options as unacceptable, disputed the concept of a separate storm drain enterprise fund, and requested that the City fund the needed storm drain improvements through the General Fund. Staff’s efforts to solicit public input were limited due to time and financial constraints. There was insufficient opportunity to provide the detailed information needed to educate people on the complex technical and financial issues concerning the storm drain system and funding alternatives. Absent such a public education effort, staff does not believe that it is appropriate to use the responses to change its recommendation for storm drain funding. Polling experts note that public opinion can be substantially modified through effective dissemination of information and education of the electorate. The abbreviated nature of the recent outreach effort did not allow staff to impart adequate information to those being polled. Staff intends to perform such informational outreach during the months prior to the election. Furthermore, the independent campaign committee that is expected to form in support of the storm drain ballot measure will have the opportunity to conduct public outreach during its campaign. Feedback received from the recent outreach efforts will be useful in helping to identify some key issues and community concerns that need to be addressed through public outreach efforts. Staff believes, however, that the input received to-date is not sufficient to justify modifying the recommendation presented at the September 13 Council meeting. TIMELINE In order to conduct the protest heating and mail ballot process during the 2004-05 rainy season, Council must authorize the process and adopt a resolution establishing implementation procedures on December 6, 2004. ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW Consideration of financing options for storm drainage program operational enhancements and capital improvements does not require additional California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) review. Individual storm drain infrastructure improvement projects will be subject to additional environmental review as they are developed. CMR:464:04 Page 3 of 4 ATTACHMENTS Attachment A: Attachment B: Attachment C: Attachment D: Summary of proposed storm drain improvements List of alternative standard poll responses E-mail message sent to Crescent Park and Midtown association e-mail groups E-mail responses received from e-mail group members neighborhood PREPARED BY: Senior Engineer DEPARTMENT HEAD: GLENN S. ROBERTS Director of Public Works CITY MANAGER APPROVAL: ~ON Assistant City Manager Storm Drain Committee Margaret Feuer, Crescent Park Neighborhood Association Annette Ashton, M~dtown Residents Association CMR:464:04 Page 4 of 4 Attachment A On September 13, 2004, the Palo Alto City Council gave conceptual approval to a joint recommendation by staff and the Blue Ribbon Storm Drain Committee to improve the City’s storm drain system. The proposal addresses the most severe drainage system deficiencies throughout the city. Palo Alto’s storm drains are funded through the Storm Drainage Fee that is assessed on your monthly utility bill. The fee, which has not been increased since 1994, is no longer sufficient to cover the cost of storm drain maintenance, and there is no funding available for capital improvements to the system. The City will be conducting a mail ballot proc&ss early next year asking property owners to approve an increase in the Storm Drainage Fee in order to pay for storm drain improvements. The following is a summary of the proposal: Recommended Storm Drain Improvements o $17 million in high-priority storm drain improvements to address chronic flooding problems throughout the City (see map on back of this sheet for project locations) o $500 thousand per year for storm drain system repairs o Additional funding for storm drain maintenance/cleaning o Annual funding for innovative projects to reduce storm water runoff Proposal Elements Responsive to Community Preferences o Proposed storm drain improvement package developed in coordination with Blue Ribbon Storm Drain Committee of local residents o Higher Storm Drainage Fee to expire after completion of capital improvements (12 years) unless reauthorized by property owners o Annual fee adjustment capped at Bay Area inflation rate or 6%, whichever is lower o Citizen Oversight Committee to be appointed to monitor use of funds Proposed Election Process and Timeline o Per Proposition 218, property owners vote on proposed Storm Drainage Fee increase through mail ballot process o Fee increase requires approval by a simple majority of those returning ballots o Key dates: ~November 8, 2004 - Council approval of storm drain funding proposal o January 31, 2005 - Public hearing ~February 28, 2005 - Ballots mailed to property owners ~March 21, 2005 - Final day for returning ballots to City Clerk Attachment A NEW PUMP STATION @ ""z ....... - SAN FRANCISQUITO CK // / The Cily of Palo Alto Proposed Storm Drain Capital Improvements This map is a product of the City of Palo Alto GIS Attachment B Standard Storm Drain Poll Responses support the status quo o Storm Drainage Fee remains at $4.25 per month o Continued need for General Fund subsidy to pay for ongoing storm drain maintenance costs o No new funding for storm drain capital improvements o Continued deterioration of the storm drain infrastructure o Continued chronic flooding of streets and neighborhoods Option 1: I support the storm drain improvements endorsed by the Storm Drain Committee o Storm Drainage Fee increases to $10.00 per month o $17 million in high-priority storm drain improvements to address chronic flooding problems throughout the City o $500 thousand per year for storm drain system repairs o Additional funding for storm drain maintenance/cleaning o Annual funding for innovative projects to reduce storm water runoff Option 2: I support Option 1, ~ funding for curb and gutter repairs o Storm Drainage Fee increases to $11.00 per month o Funding for all Option 1 program elements, R.~ o $500 thousand per year for curb and gutter repairs Attachment B Option 3: I support Option 2, plus establishment of a reserve fund for future equipment and pipeline replacement Storm Drainage Fee increases to $12.00 per month Funding for all Option 2 program elements, ~ $500 thousand per year for a reserve fund for future storm drain equipment!pipeline replacement Attachment C E-mail Message Sent to Crescent Park and Midtown Neighborhood Association E-mail Groups On September 13, 2004, the Palo Alto City Council gave conceptual approval to a joint recommendation by staff and the Blue Ribbon Storm Drain Committee to improve the City’s storm drain system. The proposal addresses the most severe drainage system deficiencies throughout the city. Palo Alto’s storm drains are funded through the Storm Drainage Fee that is assessed on your monthly utility bill. The fee, which has not been increased since 1994, is no longer sufficient to cover the cost of storm drain maintenance, and there is no funding available for capital improvements to the system. The City will be likely be conducting a mail ballot process early next year asking property owners to approve an increase in the Storm Drainage Fee in order to pay for storm drain improvements. The attached document is a summary of the joint staff!Storm Drain Committee proposal. The proposal would result in the monthly Storm Drainage Fee increasing from its current rate of $4.25 per month for single-family residential properties to a revised rate of $10.00 per month. The City Council was also interested in gauging public interest in paying a slightly higher rate in order to fund additional improvements. For example, an additional $1.00 per month would fund expenditures of $500,000 per year for repairs to darnaged curb and gutter. Currently, some curb and gutter repairs are made as part of City street resurfacing and sidewalk replacement projects, but there is no funding specifically budgeted for such repairs. An additional $1.00 per month could also fund $500,000 per year for the establishment of a reserve fund for future storm drain equipment and infrastructure replacement. There is currently no reserve funding to pay for future replacement of storm water pump station equipment and storm drain pipelines, manholes, and catch basins. Please read the attached summary and then provide comments and!or questions to Joe Teresi, Senior Engineer with the City’s Public Works Department, at joe.teresi@cityofpaloalto.org or 329-2129.You may want to indicate your approval of one of the following statements: A)support the status quo: Storm Drainage Fee remains at $4.25 per month Continued need for General Fund subsidy to pay for ongoing storm drain maintenance costs No new funding for storm drain capital improvements Continued deterioration of the storm drain infrastructure Continued chronic flooding of streets and neighborhoods Attachment C B)OPTION 1 -- I support the storm drain improvements endorsed by the Storm Drain Committee: Storm Drainage Fee increases to $10.00 per month $17 million in high-priority storm drain improvements to address chronic flooding problems throughout the City $500 thousand per year for storm drain system repairs Additional funding for storm drain maintenance/cleaning Annual funding for innovative projects to reduce storm water runoff c)OPTION 2 -- I support Option 1, ~ funding for curb and gutter repairs: Storm Drainage Fee increases to $11.00 per month Funding for all Option 1 program elements, plus $500 thousand per year for curb and gutter repairs D)OPTION 3 - I support Option 2, plus establishment of a reserve fund for future equipment and.pipeline replacement: Storm Drainage Fee increases to $12.00 per month Funding for all Option 2 program elements, plus $500 thousand per year for a reserve fund for future storm drain equipment/pipeline replacement Attachment D E-mail Responses to Storm Drain Poll I currently live on Ashby Drive in Palo Alto. Our street was constructed in 1985. I have lived here since the street was put in. We experience storm drain backup and subsequent flooding of a portion of Ashby Drive every time we have a heavy rain. The water often times is higher than the curb. I fully support increasing the storm drain fees on our utility bill. I would be in favor of increasing the fee to $12 per month in order to establish a reserve fund to deal with future maintenance. 2. I will support Option 3 if given the opportunity to vote. With regard to storm drains, none of proposals A-D are acceptable to me. The work described in proposal D is reasonable, while the taxes described in A are reasonable. In other words, I expect the City to fund the storm drain, curb and gutter improvements and repairs out of the general fund. The reason this position seems reasonable to me is that the city administration is currently overstaffed, primarily in the staff whose offices are in the main city government building on Hamilton. This overstaffing comment does not apply to "on-the-ground" staff such as fire and police. The overstaffing may run to two hundred or more employees, based on staff- per-resident ratio comparisons with Mountain View, Menlo Park and other cities with a high standard of services. The Five Cities study did nothing credible to justify the differential. So I am one of a growing number of residents who will support no new taxes until this situation is acknowledged and corrected. A sizing of the city staff appropriate to the services it provides would free up a minimum of $10M per year, which is enough to improve the storm drains properly, and, over time, implement a multitude of other worthwhile projects (including flood control). Note that I will vote for Proposition I, because the school district is generally in line with best practices of other school districts, in terms of percent of budget spent on teachers and facilities vs. administrators (and because it is an excellent investment in our children’s futures, not to mention property values). My position does not imply that Palo Alto City employees do not work hard enough. What has happened is that present and past councils have been Attachment D unaware of Parkinson’s Law. This lack of awareness has allowed staff to increase, as it inevitably will if not managed. Processes become steadily less efficient, so that at some point service levels actually drop, even while employees work harder. Note that with modem information technology, the ratio of staff to residents should have been declining during the last decade as it has in private industry, while in fact it has increased. So I request that you propose to your management that the storm drain improvements be financed by a city-wide reduction in administrative staff, excluding those on the ground directly providing services. I realize that it would be unlikely (and possibly career-limiting) for anyone on the city’s administrative staff to actually take this position, but since you offered citizens the respect of asking for input, I am offering you the respect of giving a reasonable response. o I have read the options as distributed to the CPNA today. I support D). Paying this extra small amount on our utility bills to eliminate the subsidy from the general fund and to perform both corrective and preventative maintenance seems well worthwhile. I would support an increase in the storm drainage fee to $11.00 per month, with the extra $1 per month for the establishment of a reserve fund for future equipment and pipeline replacement. However, I want to point out that I support this only because I believe that storm drainage system maintenance is an essential service, and having a dedicated fee seems like the only way to ensure it is provided. I frankly don’t understand how the City can spend $5 million on the new bike / pedestrian tunnel under the railroad tracks at Homer, but can’t maintain the storm drainage system. Clearly, something is very wrong with the City’s spending priorities. If the options and implications noted are credible (and I have no independent means to assess this), then it would appear that OPTION 3 would be the responsible approach for this community to take. Attachment D I support Option 3: Option 2, plus establishment of a reserve fund for future equipment and pipeline replacernent: -- Storm Drainage Fee increases to $12.00 per month -- Funding for all Option 2 program elements, plus -- $500 thousand per year for a reserve fund for future storm drain equipment/pipeline replacement 8.I support OPTION No. 1 -the storm drain improvements endorsed by the Storm Drain Committee only. I support option D but would support B, C or D if it would help persuade people that the status quo is not acceptable--we were flooded in 1998 & demand to have progress on this and all flood control issues. 10. I support Option D. 11.I support Option D. For less than $150 per year, we can take care of much- needed storm drain, gutter and curb repair as well as keep our equipment up-to- date. 12.As a member of the Storm Drains Committee I have followed the storm drain issue closely. The "poll" provided by the city, listed below, fails to include important information and options and merits your consideration of related issues. Palo Alto turned storm drains into a utility in the early 1990s to generate cash. About half of the cities on the Peninsula do not charge for the use of rain storm drains. Sunnyvale, Los Altos, and Mountain View do not charge residents. They pay for street drains with general revenues. Others charge a fraction of Palo Alto’s current $51 annual fee: Campbell $19, Cupertino $12, Los Gatos $20, and Monte Sereno $16. San Jose charges $40 per year. Under California’s Proposition 13 new taxes require 66.66% voter approval. Attachment D The exception is for "utilities." Assessments and user fees only require a 50% plus 1 majority vote and utility charges can be adopted by the City Council with a majority vote. In 1996 voters adopted Prop 218 to stop that practice and the Sixth District Court of Appeals ruled in June, 2002 that the Salinas city council did not have the legal authority to adopt a storm drain fee without a public vote. Little has been spent by Palo Alto on storm drains since 1967. Actually, city engineers report that between 1967 and 1990 NOTHING was spent on storm drains. Since 1990 the city has spent only $13.4 million on storm drains despite record development at Stanford and the Industrial Park. This sum includes $1.3 million for curb and gutter repair that should have been paid by the general operating funds as part of the budget for street repairs. There has always been MORE than enough money to pay for civic improvements in Palo Alto because this town is THE WEALTHIEST SMALL TOWN on the basis of per capita income, which is the most important criteria. The attached Excel sheet was prepared in 2003 and it shows tremendous spending in comparison to other towns. Our city council and city staff will tell you Palo Alto spends more on services, without describing how those services have improved, if at all, over the last 20 years. In my view we still have the same number of libraries, fire stations, children’s zoo and theatre, etc. Specifically, what has improved? It would be good for you to ask that question as well. What has improved are salaries, cash loans to the top ten managers to buy homes in Palo Alto, and INCREASED CHARGES ON YOUR UTILITY BILL which now includes the cost of services previously paid by the city’s general fund. For example, STREET SWEEPING, SIDEWALK WASHING, STREET LIGHTS AND TRAFFIC SIGNALS ARE UTILITIES IN PALO ALTO, WHICH MEANS THE CITY DOES NOT PAY FOR THEM, WE ALL DO ON OUR UTILTY BILLS. Attachment D Supporting increased storm drain fees at $10.00 plus an annual increase for inflation is simply approving a tax for a public entity that cannot and will not honestly explain why Palo Alto spends so much more money per capita than any comparable town. The claim that there is "chronic" flooding of streets and neighborhoods is an overstatement. Storm drains have NOTHING to do with San Francisquito Creek flooding and in fact when the creek floods the storm drains are incapable of functioning by design. The "flooding" claimed by the city is a "ten year rain," i.e. 1.62 inches of rain over 6 hours, which causes some streets to TEMPORARILY have ponding of water for several hours until the drains clear. This happens relatively rarely. It is worse in some places than others, such as the neighborhood to the south of Churchill and east of E1 Camino, just south of Paly, where there are no storm drains at all. There have been reports of some homes where rain water edges up to the front door, BUT NO EVIDENCE OF ACTUAL WIDESPREAD FLOODING DUE TO STREET PONDING. A handful of individuals have valid complaints about rainwater ponding, but overall the matter is not urgent. The new $10 charge also envisions shifting another of the city’s regular expenses from the general fund to utility status so it can be charged on your utility bill. For example, the plan is to include the cost of curbs, both the rolled cement curve that is part of the sidewalk structure and the vertical curb as well. Funding "gutter" repairs with an extra dollar charge ignores the fact that our gutters are in excellent condition. We do not have freezing water that causes real havoc. Engineering testimony at the committee hearings confirmed that vertical curbs last 50 years and it appears the "rolled" curbs last much longer. The only risk to "vertical curbs" are heavy trucks and tree roots. It has been the goal of city staff to make sure the City of Palo Altols general operating fund will pay as little as possible and that property owners will pay all the costs of street drains: staff salaries [retirement, health, dental, vacations, and sick leave], emergency response charges, cleaning, pipe replacement, pump purchase and maintenance, water quality compliance, permit fees, consultants to videotape and prepare computerized models of drain deterioration and more. Attachment D Before asking the voters to take on a new tax, Palo Alto must prove that it can spend responsibly. The following questions must be asked by our Council and answered by our city managers and city auditor. -- Why is Palo Alto spending four times more than 20 years ago? -- Why has the number of city employees doubled in 20 years when the population has stayed nearly the same? -- What are the specific services, if any, that we have now, that we did not have in 1979, that justify a $115 million budget? -- Why does this wealthy city have special assessment taxes for street drains when other cities charge nothing or a small fraction of what Palo Alto charges? -- What are you doing to assure us, as the Palo Alto Weekly pointed out, that we have the best management, not the most expensive? The issue here is much greater than the storm drains alone. Palo Alto has proven unable to maintain libraries, storm drains, and parks. Undergrounding of power lines is glacial. Shaded tree-lined streets are no longer the hallmark of our town. Streets are scorched with sun and tree planting has been taken over by a private foundation. Our utilities "gave away" $300,000 in 2001. Our streets are pot-holed. Our great town formerly was in "top shape." Today it is not. That is the sad reality. There is a sea change going on in Palo Alto politics. Voters said "no" to storm drains vote with a 63% vote. Voters rejected the historical ordinance [after the city spent $1 million on consultants] and on Prop J and the Planning Commission voters also said "no" to a council recommendation. The June 2002 library poll showed that 48% of all voters rejected a downscaled $78 million plan to rebuild libraries and the Art Center, which the city council submitted for voter approval by a vote of 8-0. Voters said "no" to the library proposal which went down in defeat. Palo Alto needs to restore confidence in government by a firm commitment not to repeat the mistakes of the past. Responsible stewardship of community resources must begin with a full report to the public explaining how over 20 years so much money was spent with so little to show for it. Unless that happens we can expect to make the same mistakes in the future. Attachment D 13.In addition to the points made by Mr. Alexander, there are some other factors to consider before we embark on program to raise rates and make significant changes to the storm drain system. As Elizabeth Dahlen, a PhD in civil engineering and a member of the Utilities Commission and the Storm Drains committee, pointed out in her minority report on Storm Drains. Significant rebuilds (not normal maintenance) in the Storm Drain system should wait until the San Francisquito Creek flooding problem is solved. Palo Alto and Menlo Park have already spent $3.5M to settle the suit over the 1998 flood. The next suit will cost significantly more unless the City does something about restoring the Chaucer Street bridge to its original configuration. (The storm drain rate increases will be lost in the noise.) The city attorney argues that removing the bridge will result in suits from properties downstream of the bridge that get flooded by water that the damming effect of the present Chaucer Street bridge removed from the creek and caused properties in the Crescent Park and St Francis areas to be flooded in 1998. (The "keep the water in other people’s backyard; not mine" principle). The California State Supreme Court has ruled that municipalities can’t be sued by property owners downstream for making changes that prevent flooding upstream. However, making any changes that increase the flow of the storm drain water into SF Creek might be a basis of a suit if future flooding occurs. Let’s just insist that the normal maintenance of our storm drains be performed in a timely manner within our present budget before we raise rates to design new storm drains which, in reality, is an excuse to provide more staff to plan and supervise the changes. 14.I’m afraid none of the possible options being proposed for storm drains. This is the option I favor: OPTION 4 -- I don’t support any of this extravagant nonsense. Instead: Current $4.25 per month Storm Drainage Fee is eliminated immediately City Council reduces per capita expenditures (and related personnel costs) so that they are no more than 50% greater than average of neighboring cities Storm Drains (and Libraries and Streets and Sidewalks, etc.) are paid for out of general revenues Attachment D City Council eliminates Utility Users Tax with the remaining surplus in General Fund Budget. 15.I am writing to take exception to the manner in which you have presented this survey. The first choice is Status Quo which is stated in the mamner of the classic "gotcha" format, i.e. "When did you stop beating your wife?" To present such a question to the residents of Palo Alto is insulting and degrading of our intelligence and knowledge of the way in which this city is being managed. Your survey either requires one to take the position of Status Quo, which says that one prefers the storm drains to remain un-repaired and to continue to deteriorate, or to select Options 1.2. or 3. each of which offers increasingly more expensive ways to make storm drain repairs as well as add other repairs and added costs to the program. A manager in your position, at the salary and benefits we pay you, should at least have more respect for the citizens who pay your salary, and should be creative enough to be able to present an honest survey that seeks real input and new ideas, rather than a survey that almost forces one to select one of the city staffs or study commission’s or city council’s preferred recommendations. If one doesn’t select one of these options, then one is forced to opt for "continued deterioration of the storm drain infrastructure". Where is the honesty in this approach? There are serious flaws in Options 1, 2, and 3. Currently, it is my understanding that the city uses $800,000 per year of General fund money to repair storm drains. This is as it should be. Storm Drain repair and maintenance should come from the General fund, since those who benefit are not just residents but every person who comes into or out of this city whenever it rains. That must be thousands of people every day. Since all such persons would benefit from improvements in the alleged (but not yet proven to my knowledge) serious and damaging flooding that occurs every time it rains, then the fund that is meant to serve all, the General fund, should pay the cost. This is how most cities in California fund storm drain repairs. Options 1, 2 and 3 assume that storm drains are a utility. They are not. A utility is a service contracted for by specific users, who have some choice in the level of service they will have and pay for. Utility services are electric, water, gas, sewers and waste collection. One can use as much or as little as these services as one wants and pay accordingly. Telephones, storm drains, streets with sidewalks and curbs, street traffic signs and control lights, are not Attachment D utilities. They never have been and they never will be, regardless of what clever accountants and city managers might do to classify them as such. They are benefits for the common good, for the benefit of everyone whether they are residents, property owners or renters, passers-through or daytime workers. Rain falls on the innocent and the guilty alike, and covers all the town and the streets. Just as the benefits of rain are indiscriminate, so are any adverse effects resulting from the rain and therefore should be a community wide expense and not an expense born only by utility users. If one wants more coverage or service than provided by the city, one can buy flood insurance. When such services other than those I’ve described above as utilities are classified as utilities and then charged to residents’ utility bills, the city that does this is engaging in smoke and mirror accounting. If a city staff is bamboozling the city council into thinking that such services are utilities, then such a staff should be ashamed of itself for abandoning principles of ethics of public service. Of course, if a city council accepts such a recommendation because it can then gleefully claim that it is balancing its General Fund budget, such a council is either engaging in massive fiscal self denial, or is abandoning its responsibility to the citizens who elected them to do an honest job in the first place. This becomes especially egregious when that city then tries to hide that fact from its citizens, whether on its own or through blue ribbon commissions who may themselves be unaware of what is going on. Palo Alto staff and council do not engage in such tactics, do they it? Or do they? The only way for you to get out of the conundrum you have created, Mr. Teresi, is to re mail your survey, this time to a much wider group of people, and while you can suggest the options recommended by staff and the commission, ask for input from the residents about what .they would like to see done, and how this should be paid for. It would be very helpful if some real data as to actual street floodin~ and damage caused thereby were given. I have lived in Palo Alto since 1962. I am and have been an activist in this town all those years. I traverse the city on a regular basis rain or shine. And while I do not cover every street in a storm, I have covered many in all those years. I have yet to see a problem that either impeded my progress, or that appeared dangerous to traffic flow. This is not to say that such conditions do not exist, but how frequently, and where? Your information should honestly describe the conditions that need to be real and correct, not just in support of your department’s preconceived notion or as a response to the continuous complaints of a half dozen residents who have a problem. With this kind of data, we can then decide if just one or two areas need a major fix, with the rest of the system being improved over time, using General fund money. Attachment D This is a problem, and it is a problem that is NEVER going to be solved until the council and the city staff begin to work together to resolve the underlying problem which is: The city is in fact mismanaged in that it has too many staff (twice per thousand residents than any other city in Northern California) and spends nearly twice the General Fund money per resident (with deteriorating or non improving services) compared to any number of city in the area. This fact has been demonstrated by my own studies which I have shared with staff and council, by studies done by other residents and also made public, and has even been reported by the city auditor, the city director of libraries and others who have spoken out. No council member or city staff person has ever contradicted the data presented or adequately defined the services justifying the existing staff levels and expenditures (Dr. Benest’s Five City Report notwithstanding). Even the minority report of the storm drain commission has given better data and solutions to our problems than the staff or the majority of the cormnaission have. Because one is in a minority, does not mean one is wrong, does it? It is not a crime or a matter of shame or embarrassment for a city council and staff of a sophisticated city like Palo Alto to take a new and total look at how it is doing, and try to see if things can be done better. With declining revenue and a deteriorating infrastructure, with the economy not going to improve over the next five years, and with matters like oil depletion and global warming bringing on tremendous problems that we will all have to face in the next five to ten years, it would behoove you and all of us, to begin to look creatively at these problems. Options 1, 2 and 3 are not those creative options. So until you offer some, I guess I will go for the Status Quo and hope for the best. You leave me no other intelligent choice.