It is an unfortunate aspect of human nature that it often takes an emergency, a disaster — any sudden or urgent occasion for action — before recognizing that the outcome of such an event could have been prevented.
Valerie Oblath
Such is the case with the 2022 New Year’s Eve storm which our city’s residents experienced. How so?
Quite simply: San Mateo legislative records dating back to 1952 — council minutes, resolutions, ordinances — repeatedly speak to allocating capital funds for the sewage system, lighting, parks, and the like. Yes, there is mention of storm water infrastructure, but significant monies to maintain it? None. Maintenance of citywide culverts and creeks, storm drains and pipe lines, the Marina Lagoon all tin cans the city has repeatedly kicked down the road for well over 70 years. And one mustn’t think that the city staff was alone in its short-sightedness. The City Council similarly turned a blind eye to remedying the problem now called “storm water infrastructure.”
It is time to learn from these mistakes and remedy the situation in which all our citizens, through no fault of our own, find ourselves. Winter is approaching. Make no mistake — there will be storms. And those storms will affect us all. The Dec. 31 storm damage was not limited to District 4 homes and businesses. Flooding from blocked culverts and storm drains brought serious damage west of the railroad tracks as well. Citywide, more than 500 homes incurred damage. Property damage was as high as $10,000 but, in many cases, greater than $100,000.
As the result of pressure exerted by Flood Free San Mateo — a grassroots citizens group — the City Council recently approved $3.1 million allocated to repair and/or perform maintenance over the next three to 18 months to the drainage system, catch basins, creeks, localized lagoon maintenance dredging and all five pump diesel engines. These funds are being monitored carefully by Flood Free San Mateo to ensure they are used for precisely the projects identified by the city.
But these activities are short term and alone will not repair the damage of more than 70 years of disrepair. What is necessary is the means to provide ongoing, long-term funding dedicated to improve the citywide storm water system. Yes, not uniquely one district but citywide. The Flood and Storm Water Protection Initiative does just that. These taxpayer dollars will flow through an enterprise fund and will be identified and utilized only for improvements to our aged storm water system.
Is this the be-all, end-all answer to our problems? Of course not. Additional steps will be needed. For example, working with our federal and state representatives to obtain the significant funds required to dredge the Marina Lagoon. Equally important, San Mateo residents must stay on top of the city’s administration and City Council to ensure they do right by us in the years to come (The next time you see someone wearing the Flood Free San Mateo blue T-shirt, don’t forget to look at his/her back: “Future Ready – San Mateo”).
Support the storm water initiative. Stop the incessant kick of the tin cans.
Valerie Oblath has been a resident of San Mateo for 22 years, is a retired CFO and a member of the Flood Free San Mateo Coalition.
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(8) comments
This coming tax season I will be paying $1,208.72 for the City of San Mateo sewer system. Last year I paid $1,429.68. There is also a small NPDES Storm drain fee of $3.44. What have the stewards of SM been doing with this revenue?
Just for fun I picked a random address in SM to see what the homeowner at 50 West Bellevue paid and it was an astounding $4,612.24.
Unfortunately, Ms. Oblath, what guarantees do we have that taxpayer dollars will be utilized only for improvements? If money in the past that was to be used for infrastructure wasn’t, why would we trust the city with new money. Where’s an accounting of the money that was allocated for this infrastructure? Have you seen the newly adopted San Mateo City budget? There are plenty of Funded Projects we can unfund. Better yet, put up the list of Funded Projects and let’s have a citywide vote to determine which projects we want to unfund, in whole or in part, or remove altogether, to fund this new bailout fee. And let’s see if we’ll be given accounting of where the money goes. The problem with now trusting the city to provide an accounting is that we have to initially supply the money, with no recourse when the money is squandered. We’ve been fooled before.
Enterprise fund. We’ve said that 10xs now. Enterprise monies cannot be diverted to other projects
I’m sure, DCG001, folks would like to review your report on the forensic accounting you performed and the key words you’ve used to define “infrastructure.” If one takes a look at any of the adopted San Mateo city budgets for the past few years, I’m sure we’ll see plenty of money allocated to flood control and infrastructure projects. Also, I’m sure folks would be interested in reviewing documents from this nebulous enterprise fund that you mentioned 10 times now and hopefully many more times until we can trust specifics are accepted and inked. I’d like to see what recourse if any, homeowners have if monies are diverted to other projects. Or will it become a case of quibbling over semantics, where monies are used for, say, roofing projects? After all, roofs are considered infrastructure and a new roof may help with controlling flooding… Again, no thanks. Let's make it easy and have the city make the first move to fund an enterprise fund. Then we’ll see if the city can regain some trust by being fiscally responsible.
Also there’s never been monies dedicated to this infrastructure. We actually did a forensic accounting going back to 1955.
Please put in the DJ who did the forensic accounting and the backgrounds of the people to be chosen for this job? Thank you.
Mr. Terence Y . The best paragraph written above yet. We should all be able to vote on ANY FUNDED PROJECT BEFORE IT IS ENACTED BY THIS CITY COUNCIL. NOT BEFORE THEY ARE GIVEN ANY MONEY TO DO ANYTHING WITH.
Thank you. Bravo.
The 3.14 cents you see on your property tax is a county tax for clean water quality. Zero dollars go back to San Mateo city. You need to message the county. It’s poorly named.
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