Month: November 2019

  • Staffing Up Locally for the U.S. Census

    After a recent conversation with an old B'game friend of mine, I got a real kick out of this Wall Street Journal article titled "Who Will Be the First American Counted in the Census":

    TOKSOOK BAY, ALASKA — In this tiny coastal village, five leaders of the Nunakauyarmiut tribe huddled around a table one recent evening to make a decision: Who will be the first person counted in America for the 2020 census?  They wanted to pick the oldest resident of this 659-person fishing outpost. Two of them, Alois Lincoln and Lizzie Chimiugak, both seemed to be 89 years old—but the records aren’t exactly clear on their birthdates. 

    In the coming decennial count, the government will ask most Americans to respond online for the first time, starting shortly before Census Day on April 1. The count really kicks off in January, however, in remote parts of Alaska—where internet is spotty and some homes lack addresses. There, census takers must count every household by hand.

    Alaska starts early because residents are more likely to be home during winter’s peak, and frozen terrain is easier to cross than the mushy ground of spring. On Jan. 21, specially trained enumerators with paper and pencils (because ink can freeze) will start knocking on tens of thousands of doors.

    Those conditions make helping out with the 2020 Census in San Mateo County look like a piece of cake.  My friend, Pat Belding, is also a recent retiree in search of ways to contribute and has taken a position as a Recruiter Assistant with the local census organization.  So I'm helping him out with some free advertising–the only kind we do here at the Voice.  There are several types of jobs available locally including clerks ($24/hr), enumerators like those described in the Alaska article ($30/hr) who verify addresses and help people fill out the forms and some supervisor jobs ($33/hr).  Paid training is included both on-line and two Saturday sessions conducted locally.

    If you know someone who is over 18, a citizen with no criminal record who wants flexible work of between 25 and 40 hours per week for eight weeks at a time (renewable) and likes to get out in the neighborhoods, this is a great way to help out the Federal government.  It takes them awhile to process applications, so don't wait because you think the census is a long ways in the future.  In government time, February to June 2020 is just around the corner.  Apply on-line at 2020census.gov/jobs.

    Kudos to Pat for taking on this important recruiting role in an economy with 2.3% unemployment!

  • B’game (and H’borough) Are #9 in Real Estate Value

    Remember the days when a healthy and growing real estate market was viewed as a good thing?  Before the envy merchants started hogging the headlines?  Me too.  So let's just note that 94010 is healthy and growing.  The Chronicle piece on Bay Area median prices puts our burg and the one "up the hill" that we share 94010 with at #9 in the Bay Area and #19 in the nation.  The median price thus far in 2019 was $2.63 million and the article notes we get a boost from the H'borough prices, but from what I've seen many sections of B'game are on par with sections of H'borough as people appreciate the walkability and bikeability of being close in.  But somethings don't just go up all the time though.

    Although the Bay Area continues to dominate the PropertyShark rankings, it hasn’t been immune to a slowdown in housing prices. Of the 46 Bay Area ZIP codes that were on its list both this year and last, 25 went down in price, 19 went up and two were unchanged, according to a Chronicle analysis.  In a separate report issued Monday, the California Association of Realtors noted that the Bay Area has posted year-over-year price declines for nine consecutive months and 10 of the last 11.

    Linking two rankings together we can also look to the San Francisco magazine annual Top 100 realtor rankings by sales where B'game is well-represented:

    1            Stanley Lo        $304M

    8            Phil Chen            $169M

    30            Raziel Ungar        $100M

    38            Jim Arbeed        $93M

    39            Sandy Camaroto    $93M

    67            Mike Bohnert        $72M

    There is no telling what 2020 will bring, but with interest rates staying quite low, but not dropping from here and demand up, up, up the real question remains "Where will the water come from to supply all the new construction?"

     

  • SFO Noise: Will Development Make It Worse?

    I attended my first Airport Roundtable Ground Based Noise subcommittee meeting today.  The group is composed of council members representing B'game, Millbrae and H'borough along with SFO employees, consultants, a County of San Mateo facilitator, a staff member from Supe Dave Pine's office and the ex-United pilot who is advising Jackie Speier on the problems we are having with horrid SFO take-off noise.  Things move slowly in government and this subcommittee is no exception–and when (if) they come up with any recommendations those will still need to slog through the full Airport Roundtable and eventually to some conclusion directed to SFO.

    The discussion wended its way through the various noise measurements that are already recorded and how to add analysis of the low-frequency rumbling take-off noise that is keeping people awake starting at 10:30 pm and extending to 3 am on some nights.  Let's be clear–this is a community health threat that is much more immediate than much of what passes for environmental concerns in politics today.  I was encouraged by our rep, councilman Ricardo Ortiz, who has heard from locals that are clearly impacted.  And by Millbrae council woman Ann Schneider who is hearing back-blast noise in her kitchen which looks out directly on the new SFO hotel.  This latest addition to the SFO monolith may be a contributing factor to our discomfort.

    SFO consultants HMMH have been tasked with assessing the recorded noise history from April 2013 and April and September 2014 since those are key dates when runways were reconfigured–another possible contributing factor to our discomfort.  The firm is also using a noise profiling application called SoundPLAN to try to figure out the give and take–the inputs and outputs– of the noise that is degrading our quality of life in the mid-Peninsula.  It involves profiling the jet engine back blast, the terrain in our towns, the buildings that may be reflecting the noise and even the possibility that groves of trees might attenuate the noise.  Councilwoman Schneider provided a laundry list of the future construction in Millbrae around the BART station and that is when the light-bulb when on for councilman Al Royse from Hillsborough.  I'm paraphrasing, but Al's fresh insight was essentially "you mean to say that all of these new, high-rise, transit-oriented-development buildings might actually increase the diffusion of runway noise in our communities?"  Bingo.  Al gets today's prize for putting 2 and 2 together and coming up with 4.

    What we really need is a greater sense of urgency from everyone involved.  As I type this at 11:35 pm the low-frequency back blast noise is bad.  I could pull out the thesaurus and find a stronger synonym, but I'm sticking with "bad".  Here is today's subcommittee meeting.

    IMG_9149
     

  • High-Cost Rail – Part 149 Diesel or Electric?

    Our last chapter in the high-cost rail saga involved delays costing tons of money and painted a glum picture of waste here.  The SacBee is reporting on an Assembly Transportation Committee meeting in Fresno yesterday where several assembly members posed overly-logical questions and offered alternative approaches to the Gavinor's Merced to Bakersfield all-electric white elephant.  That needs another $4.8 billion–likely much more. Here are two different views of where to spend more money.

    Assembly Member Laura Friedman, D-Burbank, gave voice to rumblings among legislators that some of that money may be better spent on improvements that will ultimately be needed for high-speed rail in other parts of the state.  She discounted what rail authority CEO Brian Kelly and others described as the value of completing Merced-Bakersfield as a fully electrified high-speed line to demonstrate that it can be done.  Instead, she said it is more important to invest in segments in more populated areas that can demonstrate value by increasing ridership significantly over existing levels.

    She's talking about LA-Anaheim-San Diego or even the LA-Vegas route that is being discussed.  The other change of direction idea involves sticking with diesel!

    Daniel Curtin, a member of the Rail Authority board since 2015 and a Sacramento resident, advocated for a different way of thinking among his board colleagues that includes acceptance of incremental improvements in train service through the Valley with 125-mph diesel trains running on the new line now under construction, rather than spending billions more on electrification and new trains.

    “The question not being addressed is simply this: is it better to ride a 170-mph train from Bakersfield to Merced and then have to get off and wait for a different train … if your destination is San Jose or Sacramento?” Curtin said. “Or is it better to have a one-seat ride through the Central Valley from Bakersfield to Merced then on to San Jose or Sacramento on a 125-mph train? … The one-seat ride is always the answer, always.“

    The bottom line is the same–we've burned through billions of dollars, taken a lot of private property, there is no plan to get to the population centers either technically or financially and no business plan to ever make back what has been spent.  But plunge ahead we must according to the governor.

  • The Other Burlingame….Kansas

    I got a great trip report from local B'gamer Linda Yelnick about her recent visit to Burlingame, Kansas.  The other town named for Anson is about 28 miles southwest of Topeka.  Linda prepped for her visit by contacting the Burlingame (KS) Historical Preservation Society and letting them know she would be visiting so that when she arrived she got the classic friendly mid-western reception.  Linda and her son discovered a number of interesting things about this little town of 934 people from Carolyn Strohm of the BHPS.

    The other Burlingame was originally a coal mining town named Council City and is one of the oldest communities in Kansas being founded in 1854 before Kansas was a state.  Anson Burlingame passed through four years later in 1858 and gave an anti-slavery speech that impressed the folks enough to rename the town after him.  Anson never lived in either town named for him.  B'game, KS is known as the place where "rail meets trail" as the Santa Fe rail and Santa Fe trail cross there.

    Linda was impressed by the small-town feel where the main street is about two blocks long and everything is closed on Sundays unless the restaurant owner decides to open and make a meal for a visitor as he did for Linda and her son.  The street is quite wide so that the ox caravans of old could make a U-turn downtown.  As Carolyn Strohm told Linda "everybody knows everybody and we feel safe and secure".  Old timers in 94010 remember something similar.  The old Lincoln school building that dates from 1902 has been re-purposed into a impressive historical museum.  Oddly enough, the school mascot is the Burlingame Bearcat!  San Mateans cannot be happy about that.

    The other Burlingame also has a prominent citizen named Jerry Hill who is most famous for award-winning kettle corn.  The two Jerry's have been in touch and kettle corn was exchanged.  The next time I see our Jerry I will ask him what he sent out to their Jerry.  Check out the entry sign to Burlingame, KS 66413.  Plenty of room to grow there.

    Bgame KS sign

  • BHS Student Brings it Home

    With the election in the rear view mirror, we can get back to regular issues.  The Daily Journal has a nice write-up on BHS student Jeffery Chen

    The Burlingame High School senior won first place in the Breakthrough Junior Challenge, receiving a $250,000 college scholarship, $50,000 for his science teacher and $100,000 science lab for his school.  Chen, 17, won the international competition Sunday, Nov. 3, with a three-minute educational video he created about neutrino astronomy, which tracks cosmic events through the capture of galactic particles.

    And with the new science learning space to be built at his school, Chen said he is hopeful to inspire other Burlingame High School students to push the boundaries of their imaginations too.

    This is a welcome antidote to the recent disappointing news about graffiti at BHS and the subsequent arrest of a local young man.  Kudos to Chen.  You can click through to his video here and while you are there check out all of the local B'game background – the Bayfront, the BHS lawn, and the train station at sunset. 

  • Beach and Colson are victorious

    After 30 years in the forecasting business (albeit in tech, not politics) I was pleased to see that my pre-election prediction was pretty much on the nose.  I believed that the top 2 would be razor close and the differential for third position would be 1,000 votes.  I only have a few witnesses to my call, but who cares?  Here are the 9:30 pm results from this year's city council election which are virtually identical to the 8:05 pm results.  I expect very little change when the last few votes are counted.  UPDATE:  Nov. 19 Semi-official results added below:

                                                Election Night                    Nov. 19 Semi-Official

    Emily Beach          3,165        38.64%                4.045        38.28%

    Donna Colson        3,042        37.13%                3,830        36.24%

    Mike Dunham         1,985        24.23%                2,693        25.48%

    As I noted here when I endorsed Colson and Beach after interviewing all three candidates, having an election is a very important community event.  Letting incumbents walk in for another term unopposed without engaging the community is not healthy.  So Mike Dunham gets another tip of the hat for taking on the challenge.  He did fairly well all considered; riding his team's community activism, the usual undercurrent of "throw the bums out" and a decent amount of fundraising.  He raised $22K and spent $15K which begs the question of what else might have added to his total aside from walking neighborhoods and making phone calls?  As of two weeks ago Colson had spent $21.7K and Beach spent $26K and there were no last minute pushes so this really (really!) was not about the money.

    Texting with Mike tonight for his thoughts on the race, here is what he had to add

    From a policy point of view, one thing that was very apparent talking to voters is that almost no one is happy about the new Facebook campus coming to Burlingame, and I suspect that the full consequences of the Council's dramatic upzoning of the Bayfront for purely commercial development are going to be similarly unpopular. The Burlingame Point project was able to get its approvals during the wake of a recession, but will the next several large office projects bringing thousands of jobs and zero homes to the city sail through as easily? In my mind, what happens to the Bayfront in the next 5-10 years is by far the most important set of decisions for the future of Burlingame and whether we can hold onto any of our rapidly disappearing middle class.

    In the end, Beach and Colson had track records, organizations and deep community roots that are the cornerstones of successful local campaigns.  Kudos to both and we will see if the challenger's sentiments weave their way into the discussions in City Hall.

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