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Monday, October 31, 2005

Scary Halloween Present for Los Osos

It was a creepy feeling sitting in last night’s CSD meeting, listening to and reading the Proposal Summary that came out of the week-long negotiations with State Water officials, the CSD negotiating team, Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee and others.

It was really disturbing to know that the State Water officials have given the green light to move ahead with this project, including moving the sewer plant out of town. Why was that disturbing? Well, for years the previous board has told this community – repeatedly—that they had examined all options, had looked at everything, that any out of town plan would be WAAAAYYYY more expensive, that Ag Exchange wouldn’t work, was pie in the sky, that the out of town site had restrictions on it and was impossible, that if we tried to move the plant we’d lose our low-cost State Revolving Fund loan. Even our Supervisor said the Coastal Commission would make it virtually impossible to get a permit to cross a creek with a sewer pipe. In short, we were repeatedly told by our elected officials that the Tri W site was the ONLY solution, the ONLY option.

So the majority of the community trusted and believed the old board and so did nothing as the previous CSD majority patiently, slowly eliminated alternatives, and then shut down and locked any and all remaining options, one by one, until it was nearly too late.

NOW, we hear that in negotiations the folks in that room, including the State Water Guys, all penciled out numbers and an out of town plan is both cheaper and/or allows you more bang for your buck. So the State Boys said, We’re confident the out of town plan will work, we’ve gone over the timelines and permit processes, so, sure, keep the State Revolving Fund and go ahead, put the plant out of town.

NOW we’re told the move is doable? NOW we are told there always were options? NOW we’re told the move penciled out as either cheaper or, since it offered lower O&M costs, more options and flexibility on the plant site, it gave the community more bang for their buck? NOW we find out the State Water Guys are willing to keep the SRF loan in place for a move out of town?


The mere fact that the State Boys even offered some of the terms to this proposal, even stayed in the room for a week, is evidence to me that our previous CSD Board majority has lied to us. This goes beyond “bait and switch.” To me, it’s clear that this community has been the victim of a multi-million dollar fraud. We were Told & Sold & Locked Down with Plan A and are only now told, “Oh, did we forget to mention, there always was Plan B & C and maybe D available to you. Too late, too bad, heh-heh.”

Yet, as the discussion in the meeting made clear, those options had been severely limited by the previous CSD majority which moved heaven and earth to lock us into enormous debt, sign contracts, stick the town with impossible-to-overcome obstacles and then pound as much money and pipe into the ground before the recall election so as to permanently cripple this community.

Which makes the Proposal hammered out both an opportunity and a sad reminder of just how much harm this previous CSD majority did to a town they professed to love and lead. And which makes the suspicions and trepidation evidenced by many speakers totally plausible. There was mention of a Trojan Horse. Understandable.

For now, the devil will be in the details. Will the community negotiate through the rock and the hard place they’ve been jammed into? Will they be betrayed again? And, the biggest question of all: The Deal requires a Prop 218 assessment vote to secure the State Revolving Fund. The vote will probably be by mail-in ballot. In the original mail-in ballot assessment vote of 2000, 40% of the ballots were never returned. In the recent election, about 34% of the voters didn’t bother to vote. So, in the upcoming assessment vote, will The World Famous Los Osos Apathy O Meter top those numbers? Stay tuned.

Meantime, the community certainly owes a debt of gratitude to Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee. He took enormous political risk in going into a cave with a bunch of growly bears armed only with a sharp pointy stick. While many may think the Proposal as it now stands wasn’t the best possible outcome, it probably can fairly be described as being the best of a really bad lot, given the handicaps the previous CSD had deliberately saddled this community with.

As for Mr. Blakeslee, he’s a public servant who knows what public service is all about.

The rest now is up to the voters of Los Osos. It’s our Sisyphean task to choose the best of a bad lot and to now get that ginormous sewer rock OVER the hill, not merely up it.

Good luck to us.

5 comments:

Ron said...

"NOW we’re told the move is doable? NOW we are told there always were options? NOW we’re told the move penciled out as either cheaper or, since it offered lower O&M costs, more options and flexibility on the plant site, it gave the community more bang for their buck? NOW we find out the State Water Guys are willing to keep the SRF loan in place for a move out of town?"

It sucks being rightall the time.

It's amazing what can happen when all other sites are NOT "rejected" because they do not meet the "project objective" of "centrally located community amenities."

Can't run a pipe across a creek? That has always been one of my favorites. Civil engineers can create massive freeway overpasses, but they stand on the edge of a creek, look 50 feet to the other side, and say, "Oh no, no ,no. You want us to run a pipe from here to there? Who do you think we are? Houdini?

Ann's right, as usual:

..."our previous CSD Board majority has lied to us."

They lied to you, the Regional Water Quality Control Board, the State Water Resources Control Board, and the California Coastal Commission.

Now what?

Shark Inlet said...

There you go again, you two.

Might I suggest again that you shouldn't assume malice over ignorance.

Before the election you hopeful dreamers were saying "once we get a new board the state will have to negotiate." Indeed, it looks like the state read Measure B and the new board's campaign lit and thought the community might actually cancel the TriW plant. One group threatened fines. Sam steps in and says "let's have a sit down, it might help." Indeed, from the paper, it sounds like the agreement was only after some comprimise on both sides and after both sides were ready to walk.

Why is the state's willingness to be flexible now, just like you predicted, evidence of lies on the part of the previous board? Can't it be, just like you predicted, that the new board has convinced them to listen to their new ideas?

By the way ... I found it interesting that the SWRCB forced work on the gravity collection system to continue becausee step-steg was too expensive (due to the need to replace so large a fraction of the septics). This is something that we knew long before the recall ... this was something that Ron tells the state has been telling us since 1998. So, if the solutions group CSD lied back then because they should have known better, why aren't the two of you telling us today that the current board lied to us recently when they ran on the idea of using a step-steg collection system to save money?

Shark Inlet said...

It is sad that the first thing Ron and Ann have to say about this new agreement is something about the old board.

I think it would be more profitable to move forward and consider issues of this agreement carefully.

Along those lines, it seemed pretty clear that the CSD caved on most of their important issues just to keep the SRF and to keep alive the hope of an out-of-town plant. What did the CSD give up? The "cheaper" collection system, the promise to never build at TriW and Measure B (which many campaigned for).

The collection system: step-steg was a non-starter. The state has been clear on this in the past, the current board knew this when running. They chose to gloss this issue over because they wante to be able to promise us a cheaper system. No real loss here, no matter what Al Barrow and Linde Owen may think.

The price for being allowed to explore the out-of-town site was a promise to return to TriW if an out-of-town site was found to be unrealistic. Wise move because to do anything else is to guarantee chaos. [Note: from the state POV as well, this is a good bargain ... they get to make sure that something gets built.]

The fact that they would give up Measure B for a new measure that would replace B but is "in the spirit of measure B" suggests they should never have supported B in the first place.

What was gained?

Time to study a possible out-of-town solution. We get to pay additional dollars now to see if this hope is even feasible. If we have to pay to do the study, I certainly hope that we are able to find a net savings somewhere! If we don't find that we can do study/EIR/design/permitting within 2 years it will have been wasted money ... other than it will make a few people feel better about the TriW project if it does get built.

What will happen now?

I don't know, but I would suggest that to get the citizens to repeal B without the property owners first having signed on to pay for the costs of an out-of-town plant will be tough. It will be even tougher to get property owners to vote themselves financially liable for a future plant unless the citizens repeal B.

As the CSD and state will have already signed on to this agreement before any vote would take eplace, I would imagine that property owners could simply vote "no" to get the TriW project back. If the new board doesn't do a great job convincing owners that the out of town site will be less expensive, this risk-averse group will just vote no.

If nothing else, this board has made a wise decision. If you take as a given that they won't vote to move the project back to TriW, they've made the wisest possible choice ... to limit our future bills by continuing work on the bulk of the project now and by limiting the timeframe for exploring other options before returning to TriW.

Along those lines ... Ann, would you be interested in an excel file that would allow you to put in any numbers you want to play around with to see what the monthly costs will be?

Anonymous said...

Once again,

read the agreement. It does not assume that it is cheaper to put it outside of town. It uses the present technology as a baseline out of town, and allows further comparison to see if there can be cost savings going out of town.

The agreement doesn't address any out-of-town land-use issues, which are not trivial.

The best thing about the agreement is it means Blakesee's got a huge political incentive to help make sure Measure B fails and the assesment passes.

Watching the meeting, quite interesting. Recall supporters nervous, supporting, and opposing the plan. Anti-recalls nervous, opposing, and supporting the plan.

It puts everyone off-balance - so it must be a good plan.

Churadogs said...

Dear Everyone. Just posted a new comment. Bwa-hahahaha. "The process failed." Oh, Lord. It just keeps getting richer and richer.