A recent grand jury report stated that Foster City’s water district doesn’t have sufficient water supply or fuel storage in the event of an emergency, but the city says it “wholly disagrees” with some of the findings.
On July 8, the San Mateo County Civil Grand Jury released a report of its study looking to what extent water providers prepared to supply water to customers in the event of an emergency. A year’s investigation looked at five various water districts that operate within the county to see if they’re well prepared.
Despite the region’s vulnerability to earthquakes, wildfires, tsunamis, the grand jury found “several water providers have not conducted full-scale emergency exercises and lack adequate backup water and fuel reserves,” which “raises serious concerns about whether the water providers are adequately prepared in the event of a crisis,” the report found.
The civil grand jury investigated the infrastructure various water providers had so they could supply three days worth of water to its residents should a natural disaster or other emergency interrupt service.
The Estero Municipal Improvement District provides water service to all of Foster City and parts of San Mateo, serving approximately 37,443 residents.
The special district improved its water storage by upgrading its tanks — one 8-million gallon tank and three 4-million gallon tanks — which can provide enough water for at least two days.
The report recommended that EMID develop plans to provide water pumping capabilities to provide emergency water to its community for a minimum of three days, a recommendation that Foster City staff say they have implemented since the recent completion of a water tanks and facilities improvement project.
“That project provides a water circulation system that basically increases the shelf life of the water, and that also allows us to have that water last longer, leading to the district’s ability to maintain a greater volume of emergency supply,” Public Works Director Andrew Brozyna said during a council meeting Sept. 15. “We’re slowly introducing additional water into our system, and we believe that we’ll achieve three days of minimum water if not more in the coming months.”
In addition to water supply levels, the civil grand jury report also stated that the district does not have three days of energy sources needed to distribute the water. In a response letter to the grand jury, EMID stated it “wholly disagrees” with the finding.
“In fact, we’ve got much more than that, exceeding the three days,” Brozyna said. “We have the natural gas source, we have the diesel source, and we’ve got a propane source, so combined it’s well over three days of fuel alternatives.”
The letter also states that the city is replacing the generators that power the Corporation Yard and upgrading the propane fuel system.
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