New Foster City levee officially opens

“This marks a milestone for our city, because this achievement is not only the completion of the construction of the project, but it will help our city for looming sea-level rise,” Hindi said.  

He added that when conversations for the effort began around 2014, navigating the labyrinth of regulatory agencies was an expected obstacle. But residents didn’t seem to have much of a choice, as the Federal Emergency Management Agency deemed Foster City’s prior levee system inadequate and planned to designate the entire city as a flood zone, triggering costly flood insurance requirements for all properties. Because the city was moving forward its initiative, FEMA labeled the area a seclusion zone, a temporary label that doesn’t carry the same requirements as a flood zone, but was predicated on demonstrating sufficient progress was being made on the levee. 

“We did not have the luxury of time,” Hindi said. “This was so critical. We are a resilient and innovative city, but it is built on marshland and landfill. The world is changing, and so the rules of engagement should change as well.”

In 2018, 81% of the city’s voters passed Measure P, a $90 million bond measure to fund levee improvements, imposing a $40 cost per $100,000 of assessed property value. Unlike many similar projects of its kind, Hindi said, the upgraded levee — which has a higher height and width — did not use state or federal finances and was fully funded by the city and its residents. Additional funding brought the project costs to just over $93 million as of last year. Construction started on the project in 2020 and was largely open to the public since July, although small-scale construction work has remained active until this month. 

The city is still waiting on FEMA approval to remove the seclusion zoning designation; however, Hindi is optimistic, as the effort far surpasses what the federal agency initially required. 

“We are at sea level, so if [climate change] impacts anywhere in the Bay Area, we will be the first to feel it. We decided to plan for the future and say, let’s make a levee that is resilient to 2050 sea-level rise,” Hindi said.