The Burlingame Voice

Baywood: Chronicle "skirts" the truth

There are a number of reasons why I call the SF Chronicle the "Comicle".  I might have plagiarized it from Herb Caen decades ago.  There is so much slanted "news" some days that it seems like the whole edition is a comic strip.  Last Thursday, some "reporter" named J.K. Dineen provided the latest example when he/she waded into the San Mateo Baywood happenings around getting historic district certification.  The headline screamed "Effort could skirt state housing laws".  Um, no.  The law (SB9) includes exceptions for historic districts and resources.  You aren't "skirting" a law by complying with what it says.

Dineen kicks the piece off with "A stealth effort to have the state legislature designate one of San Mateo's wealthiest neighborhoods as a historic district could create a playbook for other Bay Area enclaves looking to avoid complying".....blah, blah, blah.  It's only a "stealth effort" if one hasn't been paying attention to our local news.  The DJ must have run a dozen articles on the effort and published a couple of dozen LTTEs.  If one's world view generally stops around McLaren Park then it's "stealth".

Note the coded language--"wealthiest neighborhood" and an "enclave" and "genteel subdivision".  Can "leafy suburb" be far behind?  For some reason, searching the Comicle site for a link does not bring up the piece, but here is the front page.  Can B'game be next?  How will they ratchet up the angst when it's H'borough's turn?

94010: H'borough/B'game #22 in the country

The Merc did a better job of writing up the recent PropertyShark national rankings of median home prices than the Comicle did, so I will link to it here.  It notes

The Bay Area maintains its status as the most expensive metropolitan area in the U.S.  Bay Area ZIP codes made up 37 of the top 100 most expensive ZIP codes in the country, according to a new 2023 ranking by real estate data firm PropertyShark that looked at median sales prices.

In a quantification of the Doom Loop in EssEff, it notes

San Francisco only had three ZIP codes in the top 100 in 2023, a drop from the 13 it recorded in 2019.

Overall the realtor data shows

Across the nine-county Bay Area, median home prices are up 6.6% from last year, reaching $1.3 million in September, according to data from the California Association of Realtors.

Using median sales prices can be deceiving especially when there is the wider spread of prices from our combined zip code with H'borough than some others like Atherton.  And rising interest rates have locked some people into homes that they would otherwise have sold to move.  Nonetheless, numbers are numbers and ours are:

22   94010   Hillsborough/Burlingame   San Mateo County   CA     $3,200,000

Our neighbor to the south was down the list aways:

62    94402    San Mateo        San Mateo County    CA        $2,203,000

The most interesting real estate development in years happened in court a couple of weeks ago when:

A federal jury ruled on Tuesday that the powerful National Association of Realtors and several large brokerages had conspired to artificially inflate the commissions paid to real estate agents, a decision that could radically alter the home-buying process in the United States.

The realtors’ group and brokerages were ordered to pay damages of nearly $1.8 billion. The verdict allows the court to issue treble damages, which means they could swell to more than $5 billion.

It’s a decision that has the potential to rewrite the entire structure of the real estate industry in the United States, lowering the cost of moving homes by reducing commissions. Under a N.A.R. rule, a home seller is required to pay commissions to the agent representing the buyer, which sellers claimed forced them to pay excessive fees to the agents. The home sellers said the brokerages collaborated with N.A.R. to enforce what is called the “cooperative compensation rule.”

But under the verdict, the sellers would no longer be required to pay their buyers’ agents, and agents would be free to set their own commission rates, which could be slashed in half or less.

For the record, 6% of our median $3.2M sales price is a cool $192,000.  Now that is likely to change over the next few years and after the heavy realtor support for Proposition 19 (the "Death Tax") a lot of people will not be the least upset when it does.  

Fake Grass: Millbrae issues a ban worth following

I don't like artificial turf--fake grass.  Never have.  I don't like how it looks or how it wears.  I don't like how hot it gets in direct sunlight when it can burn a dog's paws.  None of that really matters much, BUT gather evidence that it is bad for the environment and political gears start to turn.  Two years ago Millbrae began assessing the damages from fake grass as we noted here.  Back in 2021, some of the stated concerns were:

increased heat, reduced water absorption and toxic runoff from disintegrating plastic.  “That means not only is there no worm or bee activity, you have no runoff capacity, you have no water infiltration capacity, you have no carbon sink that you would have with grass.”  Additionally, artificial turf is 30% to 60% hotter than ambient temperatures on a warm sunny day, Conway said.

Recycling fake turf is probably about as effective as recycling most everything else these days which is to say not very effective as we noted here two and a half years ago.  Now the Millbrae city council has unanimously taken the plunge as reported in the DJ

Millbrae City Council passed an ordinance that bans the installment of artificial turf and synthetic grass and mandates proper maintenance of existing turf if it was installed legally.  “We’re concerned about the health and safety of synthetic materials. There’s plastics, nylon, different kinds of materials in there,” said Community Development Director Andy Mogensen. “And we are concerned with its impact on our stormwater, aquatic life and things of that nature,” he said.

County Supervisor candidate Ann Schneider weighed in with the broader picture

“I strongly believe that there will be legislation coming down federally and state wise that holds cities accountable for microplastics entering waterways, because it's entering into our food system. And then these highly carcinogenic — full of PFAS, or forever chemicals — are getting into our food supply, so it’s a ticking time bomb,” said Mayor Ann Schneider.

I await B'game making the same move.  Millbrae wanted to give people five years to replace it but relented due to homeowner costs.  It doesn't really matter since a lot of it will wear out by then and need to be replaced anyway.  Let's join Millbrae in being responsible!

1912 Historic Sidewalk

The city's sidewalk replacement project to fix uneven panels has rolled around to my neighborhood.  There must be 100+ panels in Burlingame Park that will get replaced.  My house (seen here) actually predates my sidewalk by a couple of years.  We were once like H'borough ("No sidewalks here"), but my block got sidewalks in 1912.  I know because they imprinted the year in the concrete and it's still there.

This is a "they don't make them like they used to" post.  The 1912 panel is not marked for replacement, but the newer one right next to is marked.  I hope the historic panel is safe and will be watching the jackhammer.  At least the contractor (R & S Contruction) is imprinting "2023" on the new sections so we can track how well they hold up.  I'm betting it won't be 111 years.

Update:  Nov 6th.  An intrepid Voice reader has one-upped my sidewalk by a year.  This imprint on Cortez at Broadway is one of a number of 1911s along Drake and Cortez.  My 1912 pane survived the sidewalk upgrade project!

Supervisor Jackie...Again?

I know well the exact sentiment of working a job I love but having to deal with the need to be on the East Coast 10, 15 times a year.  2500 miles out, 2500 miles back, rinse and repeat.  SFO-JFK..gag me with a plastic United Airlines spoon.  U.S. Reps must do that 30+ times a year-- or more.  So the Mark Simon bombshell column in today's DJ struck me differently than most people.  Here's the nub from the column:

Sources close to former U.S. Rep. Jackie Speier confirm she is on the brink of entering the race for San Mateo County Supervisor in District 1.

That would be our district where the Papan-Beach catfight has barely started.

Close associates of Speier, who agreed to speak about her plans if they remained unidentified, said she has decided she will enter the race. This comes less than three scant years after she announced she was leaving Congress, opting out of certain reelection to an eighth term representing the bulk of San Mateo County in Congress.

Speier has been urged to run by longtime friends and allies, who have become alarmed by the seemingly leftward direction of the Board of Supervisors and a loss of civility and decorum among the supervisors, particularly Supervisor David Canepa, according to sources.

How left is too left has to be the question of the year?  If you were paying attention at the time, this bit from Simon's column was not news, but it bears repeating

In the same ICE debate (that is linked above), Canepa also sharply criticized ABC-7 investigative reporter Stephanie Sierra, who had conducted interviews with Canepa in which he seemed under-informed on the issue. Sierra is Speier’s daughter.

The drive down to Redwood City takes about as long as clearing TSA at SFO.  Let's see wait one minute to see if Mark Simon's sources are pseudo-authorized, but the political theater demands a ticket.

Update: Sept. 21   Rather than start a new post or just put this in the comments, I'll add it here.  It's important.  Speier has joined the race and effectively ended the race since Papan and Beach have dropped out.  Mark Simon at the DJ has a column today noting this about Supe collegiality:

Speier clearly was referencing a board debate in April over county cooperation with ICE and an outburst by Supervisor David Canepa in which he attacked Supervisor Ray Mueller as racist. She declined to single out a board member. “We don’t move forward if we start pointing fingers. I worry that’s diminishing,” Speier said.

Speier also said if Mueller were to reintroduce his amendment to the ICE ordinance, which prompted the Canepa comments and which was defeated 4-1, she would support it, and seek to add additional amendments allowing the county to cooperate further with ICE.

And, asked if she thought the board was shifting too far to the left, Speier said, “If I’m basing it on that one decision, I’d say yes. When you’re more left than San Francisco, you’re too left. I think we’ve just got to use a little more common sense.”

Bingo.  I wish I had heard that from either Beach or Papan.  I did not.  If I missed it let me know.  I would rather not wait a year for movement on this, but at least there is hope. 

State home insurance slipping down the slope

While the retreat by home insurance companies in California hasn't been top of mind for Bgamers, I watch it also as a Tahoe homeowner where it is very much top of mind.  The retreat is real--the public statements from insurance companies match my anecdotal evidence from Tahoe.  The local retreat might start in Hillsborough since the fire danger is greatest there.  With the Legislative session ending tomorrow for the year, the ball is back in Insurance Commissioner Richard Lara's court.  He has to navigate the insurance industry and the "consumer watchdog" industry.  Good luck with that.  The Merc has more details:

“I have always been clear, legislation is one of many options that we have been pursuing,” Lara said. “We also are moving forward with a package of regulatory solutions that will streamline the department’s rate review process, opening it equitably to public input — not just the entrenched interests that have benefited materially from the status quo. We will continue moving forward. Together, we can create a sustainable and resilient insurance market to protect Californians, our communities and our environment.”

While consumer advocates cheered the collapse of a “half-baked bailout” of insurance companies, no deal means no relief yet for consumers, especially those living in wildfire-prone regions who either can’t find an insurer or can’t afford escalating rates. Participation in the state-sponsored, last-resort FAIR plan, intended to provide temporary basic coverage in areas insurers deemed too risky for standard policies, has doubled.

Do you care to guess who is covering the liabilities stemming from FAIR claims?

Millbrae mayhem or County disdain?

“Information is power and I understand the emotion around it, I expected it, but I want people to understand housing the homeless is the responsibility of everyone,”

                    San Mateo County manager Mike Callagy

That is a quote from the Daily Journal's article titled Mayhem in Millbrae about the proposed purchase by the County of La Quinta Inn to convert it to a homeless project.  One has to wonder where these people in positions of authority come up with these look-down-their-noses ideas of what is and isn't someone else's responsibility.  The statement just oozes with disdain and a strong sniff of elitism.  "I understand, but...."

And then there are the financial consequences as laid out by the Millbrae city manager:

City Manager Tom Williams said the city is on track to receive around $540,000 in TOT from the La Quinta Inn in this year and taking on the inn’s potential residents will cost the city around $168,000 a year in services.

“The hotel market is becoming healthy and it’s a productive hotel,” Williams said Monday. “Every penny counts for this city. I am just worried we are taking three steps forward and four back.”

The county will reimburse the city for one year of TOT, and at the same time either supply it with a sheriff deputy and a mental health clinician, which the city said it needs, for 2 1/2 years or the cash equivalent, Callagy said Tuesday.

Permanent revenue losses and permanent additional costs, but short-term reimbursements.  What could go wrong?  This mindset seems to be pervasive at the County as more free money flows at every opportunity.  This letter writer to the DJ this week hit the nail on the head regarding the Jackie Speier plan to partially fund more welfare--50/50 with her foundation and County taxpayer monies:

Not to sound cold, but the new program announced by county officials doesn’t make sense. The pilot plan will give $300 a month to 200 families with children ages 0-3 who meet income requirements.

I see a couple of problems with this. First, a number of families who would qualify for this program are probably already on at least one form of assistance. Second, does this not further preach a lack of self accountability this country is sorely lacking? If you can’t afford to raise a child due to financial or time restraints, it should not be up to local taxpayers to fill the gap. Furthermore, as we’ve seen with the current welfare system over the last few generations, there will be plenty of people who will take advantage of assistance provided and use it as a lifestyle.

Joe Guttenbeil

Redwood City

I think he understates the number of programs that make up the free money flow.  They are everywhere at the federal, state and county level.  Food, health care, bus tickets, childcare, tuition, electricity, tax "credits" without paying any taxes--you name it there is a subsidy for it.  All the while more housing is shoved down our throats making it more expensive for everyone else to live here.  That's the real mayhem hidden behind the curtain.

"Western White House" goes up for sale

Every Friday the Wall Street Journal has a separate section about high-end real estate around the world.  As soon as I turned to page M2 and saw the photo I knew we were looking at the Western White House in H'borough.  It has just been listed at $38.9 million.  Here are some fun aspects about the house

Newspaper heir George R. Hearst never held public office. But around 1930, the oldest son of William Randolph Hearst commissioned architect Julia Morgan to convert his Hillsborough, Calif., home into a replica of the White House.

Morgan, who designed Hearst Castle in San Simeon, added columns, wings, Palladian windows and a circular driveway, according to the book “Julia Morgan, Architect.” The resulting structure contains replicas of the Oval Office, East Room and White House Rose Garden.

The house was originally built around 1878 for businessman William H. Howard, who later sold it to railroad scion Charles Frederick Crocker, according to the San Mateo County Historical Association. The original design was a four-story Swiss chalet with 36 rooms, according to the book “Here Today: San Francisco’s Architectural Heritage.” In the 1900s, a local contractor jacked up the house and moved it with horse-drawn rollers about a half mile across San Mateo Creek to its current location, the book said.

My local historical sources, which are quite good, tell me that the horse-drawn move was featured in Popular Mechanics magazine back in the day.

Shortly after its arrival, however, the chalet caught fire and two of its four stories were destroyed. Hearst acquired the property around 1927, according to the historical association. 

(The current owners did extensive renovations and) said they tried not to deviate from Morgan’s vision. An oval-shaped library has the same dimensions as the Oval Office, he said. They even sourced period-specific furniture, he said, but didn’t end up buying it because they decided not to move in.

I've left out a lot of the owners' information, but if you are a prospective buyer Alex Buljan of Compass has the listing!

San Mateo High: Averting violence

A reader posted this comment on three different SMUSHD posts all of which are lengthy so you would have to scroll and scroll and scroll to read it.  I'm reposting it here for easier reading and commenting.

Regarding the recent stabbing incident at San Mateo High School: I’d be interested to know if the students involved had any prior history or reports of violence and threats in their student records? The news reported there were knives and a gun on campus. This reminds me of the pregnant teacher who spoke at the board meeting last year, begging the Superintendent to remove violent students from her class. What are we waiting for? Are my kids going to be the next victims? The Administration needs to do a better job of protecting our students. What are we waiting for? Are my kids next?

I'm guessing no public disclosure of any students' records will happen, but the SMUSHD Board and/or Superintendent should certainly take that into account and issue some statement about their position--past and future.

P.S.  People can use the editor email link on the right frame to ask for something to get an original post.  No guarantees, but we will likely be agreeable.

Memorial Day Parade 2023

The chilly marine layer we have been shivering through for the last week cleared just in time for the Hillsborough Memorial Day parade to be a bright, sunny affair.  I love the small town feel of this short little parade populated by kids' activity clubs, a few vets and antique cars along with fire trucks and convertibles with politicians sitting on the back decks.  We had all of the electeds at the state and federal level, except for DiFi...including the other Diane (misspelled Papen on the sign), Kevin Mullin and Josh Becker; plus all five H'borough council members.

But the highlights were the San Mateo High and B'game High marching bands.  San Mateo looked noticeably sharper in the marching category, but B'game held its own and played more songs along the route--always a plus regardless of how much you like the drummers' street beats.

I noticed many neighbors had made the effort to put out their American flags and one can only hope all of us will take some time to remember those who gave all.  I don't think of it as "Happy Memorial Day" but rather reflective Memorial Day7.  Here is a fully equipped US Marine Corps jeep that spurs reflection and the B'game band.