Week in review

school budget gets OK

After ending the year with $7.28 million in the bank, the Sequoia Union High School District is planning a year with the luxury of spending about $1.5 million in one-time funds and maintaining a 5 percent reserve. The $93 million budget is $1.4 million more than the revenue brought in causing the reserves to drop to $5.8 million — or 4.57 percent. During the previous school year, the district received money from the state late in the year that makes up the difference, explained Ed LaVigne, assistant superintendent of administrative services.

Jail flushed with problems

Jail inmates are sending officials the message to stuff it — literally.

A glut of orange jail jumpsuits, sheets and garbage are being flushed down jail toilets, clogging up the Redwood City sewer system and at times flooding the Maguire Correctional Facility.

The mixture clogs some pipes and flows into sewer pumps. The exact motivation for the fabric flushing is speculative but might be to escape punishment as well as cause havoc at the jail. Inmates are issued one jumpsuit, a sweatshirt, two pairs of underwear and sheets weekly during laundry night. The men can be written up for having more items than allowed.

Redwood City officials are also not amused by the jail house antics and sent the county a bill of approximately $600,000 to $700,000.

SamTrans gets payment plan

A $53 million deal between San Mateo, Santa Clara and San Francisco county transit agencies was approved by the Metropolitan Transportation Agency Wednesday, possibly ending a 16-year-old debt surrounding the purchase of the rail right-of-way for passenger service on the Peninsula.

The deal would funnel state spillover funds meant for Santa Clara Valley Transportation Agency and San Francisco’s Municipal Railway through the MTC and to the San Mateo County Transportation Authority, or SamTrans, over the next 10 years. The plan would end the ongoing debt the northern and southern counties have to San Mateo County for fronting the money to purchase rights to the railway in 1991.

That year, Southern Pacific sold its rights to the railway on the Peninsula because it did not wish to provide passenger service. The state stepped in and helped the three counties purchase the rights for $220 million. The state paid $120 million and SamTrans paid the remainder. It was the only one of the three county agencies with enough money at the time, said SamTrans spokesman Jonah Weinberg.