Publication Date: Friday Sep 22, 2000

CITY COUNCIL: Countdown for storm-drain fee election

As the last mail-in ballots for Palo Alto's storm-drain election arrive at City Hall over the next few days, the city faces its first major test of whether residents will open their wallets and pay to improve the city's aging drains, facilities and roads. Property owners have until 8 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 26 to vote on a permanent increase in their monthly storm-drain fees, raising the average homeowner's bill from $4.25 to $9 a month. If approved by a majority of property owners, the increased fee would raise at least $225 million over the first 30 years to pay for maintenance and improvements on the city's 100-year-old storm-drain system.

City officials are eyeing this election to gauge the public's spending mood, as the city ponders a whole host of multimillion-dollar projects to improve city services, which some people grumble have fallen behind those in cities such as Menlo Park and Mountain View. The list of projects include a new police building, improved libraries and community facilities and traffic-calming projects.

"There are more of these to come," said Councilwoman Nancy Lytle, discussing the election and the city's list of future projects. "We better learn how to do this."

The concern over the election's outcome next week led to a tense discussion at Monday night's City Council meeting, leading some council members to question whether the city has effectively informed residents about the election and the storm-drain issues.

In particular, Lytle asked whether the city's approach--sending property owners a brochure about the election in the summer and waiting until September to send out ballots--confused some residents. Lytle said she has spoken with people who didn't get the first brochure or didn't remember getting it, and were baffled by the ballot when it came.

"We've gotten e-mails from people saying, 'What is this ballot?'" Lytle said after the meeting. "Whether they vote for it or against it, I'm interested in good voter turnout. I'd hate to have it not pass because more people didn't vote."

With the storm-drain vote--which is the first city election of this kind under Proposition 218--officials say they're treading on uncertain ground. Passed in 1996 by California voters, Proposition 218 requires a majority of property owners to vote on any property-related tax. Officials said they had few, if any, models of previous elections to follow when holding this election.

City Attorney Ariel Calonne, who angrily defended his role in the election at the Monday meeting, said the city couldn't have sent storm-drain information with the ballots without appearing coercive and violating state election laws. When Lytle and others asked if it were possible to include "neutral" information in with the ballot, Calonne said it would backfire.

"When you include information in with a ballot, it's very hard for it not to be perceived as an attempt to advocate that people vote in favor of it," Calonne said after the meeting.

Calonne agreed the city could have sent a voter's guide--including arguments both for and against the fee increase--without violating the law. But, he said, the council never approved such a mailing or set up a system to solicit "con" arguments for such a guide. The city spent a total of $31,000 on public education and the consultant who wrote the voter brochure, which the council approved before it was sent out.

Other council members appeared less concerned about the city's outreach to voters. Vic Ojakian, who expressed confidence that voters will approve the increase, said the outreach effort was fine.

"I've talked to dozens of people who said, 'I got the ballot, it made sense to me, I checked 'yes,' and I mailed it in,'" Ojakian said.

The storm-drain issue has gotten some high-profile support from former City Council members and the League of Women Voters. The proposal has also resonated with some residents who say they're sick of water backing up near their houses after heavy rains.

"Vote in favor of the upgrade now and get the work under way," said Kent Price in a letter supporting the increase. "The modest $5-per-month fee is well worth the benefit."

But the proposed fee increase has also prompted vocal opposition among some residents and inspired the creation of a group called "Citizens Against Storm Drain Fee Increase." These residents say they're angry about the way the city has explained the election on its Web site and in the brochure it sent to residents.

In particular, opponents have complained that the city's materials didn't specifically say how much money it plans to raise from the fee increase or exactly how the money will be spent. In addition, critics say, the materials didn't emphasize the fact that the fee increase, subject to annual inflation, has no sunset provision, or ending point.

"There's no mention of a dollar amount, how long the terms of this particular fee would be in place, what the acceleration of the increase would be," said resident Charles Atchison. "I thought that was inappropriate."

Depending on the estimate, officials said the increased fee would raise $225 million to $237 million for the city's storm-drain system. That would include about $80 million for capital improvements, such as building 15 more miles of storm drains and adding two new water pumping stations. The rest of the money would go to maintenance, debt service on the system, efforts to manage San Francisquito Creek and water quality programs.

The improvements would target lower-level flooding from storms, but would not prevent the type of flood that damaged hundreds of homes in February 1998.

Some critics, even those who acknowledge the need for storm-drain improvements, have blasted the city for not including a sunset provision--or a way for residents to vote it down in the future if they didn't feel the city was spending the money appropriately.

"I want things in writing," said Elliott Bolter, a vocal opponent of the increase. "I don't want blank checks that go on and on and on."

Councilman Gary Fazzino said he wants to make the city accountable for the fee increase, if approved. Fazzino said the city could hold annual public hearings to discuss the increase and get a report every five years to check on work progress. Ultimately, Fazzino said, the public has the ultimate control over how the fee is charged.

"This is a democracy, for God's sake," Fazzino said. "If people are unhappy about the way money is being spent, they can vote out incumbents, they can recall incumbents."

Fazzino said voters shouldn't hold storm-drain improvements hostage to frustrations over how the city may have operated in the past. In particular, he criticized coverage of the Weekly, which recently ran an editorial urging residents to vote against the fee increase. The editorial raised questions about how officials would handle the open-ended increase, saying the city failed to bring a fee back to voters in the early 1990s for reconsideration, as it had promised.

If the fee increase doesn't pass, Fazzino and other officials have warned, the city would have to scale back on improvements to the system and take more money from the city's general fund, possibly harming other services. Some residents said that if the increase fails, the city should take it as a sign to reevaluate its spending priorities and drop some services in favor of public safety, roads and drains.

"At some point, they're going to have to come up with a plan that makes sense," said Wayne Martin, a member of the opponent group. "They could have done it this time." 

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