October 28, 2005

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Palo Alto Online

Are council candidates up a creek?

by Bill D'Agostino

A push to get Palo Alto City Council candidates to pledge support of an "interim" solution to the San Franciscquito Creek's propensity to flood, rather than relying on the Army Corps of Engineers, is being criticized by the race's two incumbents for being "very strange" and "too simplistic."

The pledge is the latest sign of frustration from residents anxious to expedite improvements to the volatile creek.

The San Francisquito Creek, which acts as the boundary between Santa Clara and San Mateo counties, has flooded a few times in the last century. Most recently, it jumped its banks in February 1998, causing an estimated $28 million in damages to homes and businesses in Palo Alto, East Palo Alto and Menlo Park.

The local flood control agency with authority over the creek -- the San Francisquito Creek Joint Powers Authority -- is currently partnering with the Army Corps on a long-term construction project.

The pledge, from the Crescent Park Neighborhood Association, notes that the project "will not be completed for 20 or more years" and asks candidates to "take a leadership role on the City Council in pursuing and supporting an interim course of action to reduce the risk of flooding from the creek at flow rates ... reached during the 1998 flood."

"We have no faith whatsoever that the [Army Corps' project] will ever come into being and if it does, it will be decades away," said Norman Beamer, the neighborhood association's president.

Five of the race's candidates -- Peter Drekmeier, Karen Holman, John Barton, Harold "Skip" Justman and Larry Klein -- signed the pledge, which was due back to the neighborhood association on Wednesday. There are 10 candidates competing for five open seats.

Councilman Jack Morton said he decided not to sign the pledge after consulting with City Attorney Gary Baum.

"When you make a pledge, whose implications may not be fully spelled out, then where's your flexibility as a council person?" Morton asked. "You pledge allegiance to the country but what is it to pledge allegiance to the creek? It just strikes me as very contorted, very strange that a section of the city would somehow think that -- as important as their issue might be -- that they would be entitled to get special standing with an individual council person."

The pledge is ambiguous, Baum said, and could be asking candidates to skirt the Army Corps' project. "It appeared to commit the council to take an action before the item comes before them," he said.

Candidate Peter Drekmeier said he didn't read the pledge that way and felt it was just asking candidates to get informed on the issue and work to speed up the process. "I don't feel that it locked me in to any one position," he said. "It seemed quite reasonable."

Councilwoman Yoriko Kishimoto said she didn't sign the pledge because she found it too simplistic. She said she's working to find a shorter-term solution, but warned even that is complex, could take a number of years and will require an "intense environmental analysis."

Part of the complexity with finding a solution for the creek comes because it is home to endangered and protected species, including steelhead trout.

The pledge, Kishimoto said, "seemed like a too-simplistic message that I'm afraid it would send a message to residents, 'We just need to have our elected officials sign it and now they can rest easy.'"

"They need to work with us to really understand the complex trade-offs," Kishimoto added.

The neighborhood association is primarily interested in removing the Chaucer Street Bridge, which constricts the flow of the creek during heavy storms. Last year, Palo Alto and Menlo Park awarded $3.5 million to 27 homeowners who sued the cities after the 1998 flood and specifically blamed the bridge for their homes' flooding. Palo Alto rebuilt the bridge in the 1940s.

"That represents a huge liability hanging over the city," said Beamer, the neighborhood association president. "It's really Palo Alto's problem, so they should try to fix it."

But Cynthia D'Agosta, the executive director of the Joint Powers Authority, warned that Palo Alto doesn't have the authority to replace the bridge alone, because Palo Alto, Menlo Park, Santa Clara County and San Mateo County own it jointly.

D'Agosta sympathized with the neighborhood's concern about the long timeframe of Army Corps's project. But she said the federal agency offered both expertise and matching dollars that were crucial.

Constructing the project is estimated to cost at least $75 million, and the federal government would match up to half. The Army Corps would also provide matching funds for the studies leading up to construction.

Civil engineers who've studied the creek believe there is no feasible interim solution, D'Agosta argued. Even if there was such a solution, she said, constructing it could risk the Army Corps' project. The federal government will agree to the project only if its cost outweighs its financial benefit. An interim fix could lead the Army Corps to abandon the project, according to D'Agosta.

Responding to that concern, Beamer said: "Well, so be it. This is more important."

Staff Writer Bill D'Agostino can be e-mailed at bdagostino@paweekly.com.

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