Belmont is dealing with storm fallout

City Manager Afshin Oskoui said the New Year’s Eve storm prompted an all-staff response by Belmont police, fire department and public works, with flooding, debris and fallen trees all occurring. During the New Year’s Eve storm, the city said Belmont’s pump station ran 20 times more water than the average daily flows. First responders evacuated an apartment complex on Carlmont Drive during the storm, Oskoui said. The city opened an evacuation center to deal with the issue. The city also opened an Emergency Operation Center on Jan. 3 to allow the city to coordinate better with staff and the county. Oskoui said staff had previously done lots of planning and preparation.

“I think the staff was at the ready even though it happened over a holiday,” Oskoui said.

Mayor Julia Mates thanked first responders and city staff for responding during New Year’s Eve amid difficult conditions.

“I’ve gotten a lot of great feedback from our residents,” Mates said. “People who thought that perhaps because trees had fallen on private property, it wouldn’t be taken care of, and our folks went out there.”

The City Council has also adopted a state of local emergency, allowing the city to receive state or federal financial assistance. Over the last week, the city has continued responding to residents to do damage assessments and surveys, along with preparing for future storms. Belmont, along with San Carlos and San Mateo County, is monitoring Belmont Creek as water levels rise and fall with the rain. The city is still bracing for future intense rains until mid-January, noting the ground is getting more saturated and decreasing ground stability. Jan. 10 saw strong winds around 2 a.m. that caused power outages in parts of town, debris and trash strewn everywhere, prompting more staff responses.

“This morning [Jan. 10], was probably one of the more severe over the whole period of tree damage and trees down and staff responding to clearing debris,” Oskoui said.

Oskoui said the city has been pushing information on social media, dashboards, webpages and alerts. Sharing information between the city and residents has been critical to understanding situations and where staff needs to respond. The city saw its Facebook page subscription grow by over 494% to reach 5,000. At the same time, other social media pages also grew in subscribers and engagement.

“It was really appreciated by a lot of the comments that we received from the community on the effectiveness of that information sharing,” Oskoui said.