The Burlingame Voice

RHNA: How state law will mess up the County

The Daily Journal did a good job of summarizing the latest turn of the crank on "Regional Housing Needs Allocations" (Rhna) so let's just reiterate the numbers for future reference:

At the heart of state housing laws is the Regional Housing Needs Allocation, or RHNA, which assigns housing growth to jurisdictions in eight-year cycles. While the law is nothing new, the upcoming cycle’s numbers (the sixth cycle in the law’s history) are larger than ever before and nearly three times those for the county’s current cycle.

Cities in San Mateo County will need to plan for a combined 44,800 new homes to be built over the next eight years.  With roughly 269,000 units of housing in the county and 2.8 people per home on average, the new housing could usher in upwards of 131,000 people, more growth than the county’s seen over the last 35 years. Combined with unincorporated land, the county’s total allocation for new homes is more than 47,000.

(Michael Lane, a state policy director with nonprofit public policy organization SPUR) said the big jump is "because of recent state legislation requiring new allocations be based on a more stringent look at housing affordability, job growth and vacancy rates.

“If they do fall behind, SB 35 will kick in. Hopefully that will speed up housing growth and bring some of those cities into compliance,” said Dylan Casey, executive director of the California Renters Legal Advocacy and Education Fund, or CaRLA.  Senate Bill 35, a law that became enforceable at the beginning of the year, removed cities’ abilities to deny projects that contain below-market-rate units if goals are not being met.

So there you have it.  "If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail."  If all you look at is "housing affordability, job growth and vacancy rates" then you come up with these ridiculous demands, backed by multiple state laws, that will further mess up the County.

And in other news today in the SF Chronicle titled "Feds’ Central Valley Project expects to send no water to most California farms this year, little to cities" we are reminded yet again that

After an extraordinarily dry start to the year, the federal government announced Wednesday that most farms in California will likely receive no water from the state’s biggest reservoirs in 2022, the latest fallout from drought and a blow to an agricultural industry already crippled by tight supplies. Cities and towns, meanwhile, will get just a fraction of the water they requested.

Municipal agencies that receive federal water, which include suppliers in the Bay Area, are projected to get just 25% of what they asked for in 2022. This includes Contra Costa Water District and Santa Clara Valley Water District, which serves the city of San Jose. Last year, most urban customers got about half of what they wanted.

While San Mateo County isn't as reliant on the Feds for our water, the steady downward drip from 50% to 25% to whatever in Silicon Valley is completely predictable across the state.  "If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail."  If you are stuck in a big hole, stop digging.

Selling water rights - What could go wrong?

Once in a while another city's council shenanigans merit mention here at the Voice.  This time it's Palo Alto giving us a head-scratcher moment.  Check this out from the Daily Post:

Palo Alto City Council is considering selling 1 million gallons of its daily water allocation, but environmental advocate Peter Drekmeier fears the water rights will be sold to Brisbane so a developer can build offices — worsening the region’s issues with too many jobs and not enough housing.  The idea of selling some of Palo Alto’s water rights to another city was presented in a memo by Councilwoman Alison Cormack and Mayor Pat Burt.  Council will discuss the idea, and whether to have a city planner spend three weeks exploring it, on Monday, Jan. 31.

Palo Alto has used between 8 and 10 million gallons per day for the past seven years, yet has the rights to up to 16 million gallons per day.  Selling 1 million gallons per day in water rights could bring in tens of millions of dollars for city projects, Burt and Cormack said.

Drekmeier — a former council member, mayor and now policy director for the Tuolumne River Trust — said Palo Alto shouldn’t sell water to a project that doesn’t help the Bay Area. He pointed to Brisbane, where developer Universal Paragon Corp. is looking for 2 million gallons per day to move forward with a massive project on the shore just south of San Francisco. 

That proposal drew an impassioned and informed letter to the editor from a Palo Alto resident that hit on a several points:

Did they (Burt and Comack) forget about the two new housing bills linking jobs to housing?  Did they forget the Bay Area already has to accommodate almost 1 million more people, all of whom use water?  Unbelievable at a time when Palo Alto residents are told to conserve water, are threatened with $500 fines if we use too much, have already been overcharged by the city utilities department every year to fund the General Fund and are now paying to appeal the judge's ruling in the case?

Remind me why we need another massive office complex.  Where's the fiscal responsibility and common sense?

Answer:  Missing and in short supply respectively.  Let's go a bit deeper into the shallow end of water politics and recall this.  A city's "water rights" are more of a suggestion than a contract these days.  And when the wells run dry you can bet the SFPUC, emphasis on the SF, and the new director, Dennis Herrera, will look out for their own as the SF Chronicle posited back in November:

Demanding better water conservation from neighbors while partnering on sustainable projects will be a tough needle to thread. Thankfully, Herrera has signaled that he’s up to the challenge. San Francisco residents need him to mean it.

Smart city councils would be looking to buy water rights, not to sell them!

Planning for a Rollicking Rollins Rd.

I’m very excited by the impending housing growth in North Burlingame that will end up bringing “thousands of new homes” to the Rollins Rd. industrial section of town.  The amount of planning that went into this decision by state and county officials, the City Council, the Planning Commission and city staff is impressive.  Here are the details:

Water:   I know the decision makers have a grasp on our dire water situation because they said so back in May  calling it “alarming”.  They also know the SFPUC cannot be trusted to keep the Peninsula’s water interests front-of-mind regardless of whatever “contract” we have with them, so the negotiations with the state to gain access to Bayfront land for our new desalinization plant (instead of a park) are to be complemented.  Desalinized drinking water is about ten times as expensive as water agencies buy now due to the energy costs.  Then there is the cost of getting rid of the brine, but the free land access will help the economics.  The new water tank on Rollins will ensure reliable water for the new neighborhood.

Outflow:  In the spirit of “what goes in, must come out”, the city study on sewage treatment capacity at the Bayfront plant will probably find a need for additional capacity, but we can be sure that raising the sewer rates to pay for it will be easy as we just saw this year.  Burlingame is a welcoming community, so higher rates will be fine with the public.

Power:  The decision makers’ extensive negotiations with PG&E to get it to strengthen the Burlingame grid are to be complemented.  Not only will the grid improvements supply the new desalinization plant’s load, but it will also ensure grid stability for the rest of the city.  Generous state and federal funding for new solar panels on the new construction and some existing Rollins Rd. buildings will help; as will a brand new grid-based battery facility.  Whoever got that big grant should get a promotion.  The natural gas pipes should be fine since there won’t be any natural gas allowed.

Schools:  Given the thousands of new homes coming, it was prescient of the city council to snap up a large parcel on Rollins Rd. and sign a long-term, low-cost lease with the Burlingame School District.  This will enable BSD to build a new school serving North Burlingame Eastside students.  The parcel may be large enough to also build a BIS Annex to cut down on car traffic to BIS.  I expect that the next school bond measure to pay for it all will pass easily as Burlingame is a welcoming community.

Traffic:  As we consider the extensive traffic study conducted as part of the General Plan update, it is gratifying to see that the Broadway grade separation project is now fully funded and we are ready to start The Big B'game Dig in 2022.  As today's SF Comicle notes:

The intersection of Caltrain and Broadway in Burlingame has the ignominious distinction of being the street-level train crossing most in need of fixing in the state, based on a calculation that factors in number of accidents, disruptions to local traffic and other overall safety concerns.  The busy crossing serves demand from trains, vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists, a hectic mix that has resulted in 11 car-train collisions in the past five years, a number of near misses and some fatal accidents. It has also caused considerable traffic backups: The crossing gate is currently down about an hour per day, and the city estimates that will rise to nearly three hours per day by 2040.

The project should go fast as most of them do; and be completed in time to help ease the load on Millbrae Ave. and Rollins Rd. for the new North Burlingame residents.  Luckily, the city’s negotiations with Caltrain were also successful in getting the Broadway station to reopen.  That will make a big difference for local traffic through the B'way intersection over the next 10 years.

Of course, Rollins Rd. isn't the only part of town with strong growth so all of these impending improvements will benefit the whole town.  That's why Burlingame is a welcoming community.

I admit I was initially skeptical about a huge new residential section at the north end of town.  It seemed like many of the growing pains would be intractable problems, but with a lot of diligent work everything appears to be on track.  Many people are to be complemented.

Salt Water Taffy for Politicians

Sea Level Rise is a cynical, ladder-climbing politician's perfect issue.  It is notoriously hard to measure.  It's even harder to predict.  And if anything noticeable happens IRL, the politician will be long out-of-office and probably off the planet.  But they can appear to Care and to Be Doing Something About It.  It's perfect.  There might even be some federal money in it.  The insurance companies love it too since it allows them to raise the risk factor which raises the rates and everybody says "yup".  I just reread Steven Koonin's chapter about it in Unsettled?.  Let me try to "boil it down" for you from his Chapter 8:

The sea level has been rising and falling, and rising and falling, and rising and falling for all of determinable time--more than 400,000 years. 

"Slow cycles--variations in the earth's orbit and the tilt of its axis over tens of thousands of years--change the amount of sunlight absorbed by the Northern and Southern Hemispheres...(this) cases the ice sheets covering the continents to grow or melt, putting more or less water in the oceans....So the question is not whether the sea level is rising--it's been doing that for the past 20,000 years.

Climate scientists use the concept of Global Mean Sea Level (GMSL), which is inferred from measurements over the whole globe; even though "water seeks it's own level," there are variations that are important given the fraction-of-a-millimeter precision required--the GSML is rising today at a rate of only a few millimeters per year.

And it varies all over the globe for a dozen reasons: differences in the earth's gravity from place to place, ocean currents, temperature and salinity of parts of the ocean, air pressure, local land sinking (think pumping ground water) and the vagaries of instruments like the satellites circling at 600 km (370 miles above the earth) detecting fractions of a millimeter in ocean height.  Given all of that, the rise in more recent decades is higher than the average for the 20th century, but similar to the rise from 1920-1950--a period before carbon intensive development.  On May 26, 1927, Henry Ford watched the 15 millionth Model T Ford roll off the assembly line at his factory in Highland Park, Michigan.  There are 289.5 million cars in the US right now.

In fact, the rate of rise between 1925 and 1940--a period almost as long as eighteen-year satellite record now available--was almost the same as the recent satellite value, about 3 mm (0.12 inches) per year.

If the B'game city council wants to put new Bayfront buildings on stilts and build levees because the sea might rise a foot in the next 30 years (333% more than it may have risen over the last 30 years)  and "up to six feet over the next century", go for it.  But boy do I wish they were as worried about having too little fresh water as much as they are worried about facing too much salt water.

March 1 update:  Here is the Greenland chart that is referenced in the comment section.

 

Planting Trees: Official and Guerilla-style

The SF Comicle actually provided some value yesterday with a lengthy piece about a guerilla-style oak tree advocate in Oakland.  Here are a couple of good excerpts

Not long after a storm, Tim Vendlinski can be found in parks or small patches of grass around Oakland with a shovel and a few dozen acorns or oak seedlings in hand. He grabs his gardening tools from the trunk of his car, and with the swiftness of someone who has planted thousands of oaks in his life, he gets to work.  “How can you have a city named Oakland that doesn’t have any freaking oaks in it?” Vendlinski said.  His efforts represent a vigilante approach to urban forestry — a form of guerrilla gardening that is often at odds with the policies and standards of the city of Oakland’s tree supervisors. Both recognize the value of oaks, but they don’t always agree on where the oaks should go or how they should be maintained.

Oak trees are particularly important features of both urban and rural landscapes for several reasons, said Angela Moskow, an information network manager with California Oaks, a California Wildlife Foundation project focused on preserving the state’s oak trees.  Oaks foster enormous biodiversity — perhaps more than any other tree variety in California, sustaining more than 100 species of mammals, 170 species of birds and 4,000 species of insects, according to California Oaks.  Oaks are particularly good at sequestering carbon, both from the air and the ground.

I know the coastal live oak in my front yard has grown from 4' tall to 40' in the last 30 years and feeds a LOT of squirrels.

Oakland’s master street tree list, the list of trees approved to be planted on city sidewalks and medians, includes 59 tree species. Of those, eight are oaks. Only four of the trees on the list are native to Oakland, Vendlinski said, calling the list “horrific.”

Which leads me to back to B'game.  The city newsletter noted that

The Parks Division is in the process of planting 162 City trees throughout Burlingame in planter strip areas, tree lawns, and parks. The species of trees being planted will include red maples, eucalyptus Citriodoras, Chinese flame trees, crepe myrtles (Tuscarora), magnolia (Little Gem and Samuel Sommers), elms (Pioneer and Accolade), sycamores, Chinese pistaches, and Trident maples. This is the last of three plantings that will happen this year.

We got four of the 162 newbies on my street this week and I love them.  If you are interested in the "politics of trees" click through and read the whole article about what should go where, how it should or should not be watered, etc.  We live in a designated City of Trees regardless of whether SF wants to strangle our water supply or not. 

Water: One Man's Spigot is Another Man's.....Cesspool

There are days when I think the clowns at the San Francisco Comicle should pay me to read their fish wrap.  Once in a while the thought lasts a week.  This is one of those weeks.  The "editorial board" published a piece titled "S.F.'s spigot won't run forever".  That was in last Sunday's print edition.  The online version I just linked to was titled "Don’t let a few ‘monster’ storms fool you, S.F.’s water supply is unsustainable".  You think hey, maybe the public opinion polls, La Nina, the water measurements, the grotesque over-development or the warnings from Newsom might have sunk in?  Nope.  Didn't happen.  Here's what they said

On Oct. 20, state environmental officials sent an ominous letter to the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, which supplies drinking water to the city and nearly 2 million other Bay Area residents. It read in part:  “Proposed voluntary actions by water agencies on the San Joaquin River tributaries have fallen short of needed flow and habitat improvements, and viable proposals are not being offered at this time.”

What does that mean in layman’s terms?  It means Bay Area water users are unsustainably and likely unlawfully draining the sources of our supply — and killing the habitats and wildlife that rely on those sources. And we don’t have a workable plan to fix it.

For decades, San Francisco and the Bay Area have enjoyed one of the cleanest and most reliable water supplies in the country, 85% of which comes from Hetch Hetchy. But we’ve taken that resource for granted. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is decades behind other California water agencies in building alternative and sustainable new water infrastructure.

You have to love the unsubstantiated use of "unlawfully".  But what to do about this impending disaster that the Comicle has just discovered?  Well?  Let's get the new SFPUC general manager--a long-time EssEff insider, Dennis Herrera-- to force the Peninsula under its thumb.  How?  Let's start with Green Envy

San Franciscans are known for being sparing with our own water usage. But many of the nearly 2 million other Bay Area residents that use Hetch Hetchy water to are not nearly as parsimonious in their usage as we are.  San Francisco should not be complicit in the extinction of several aquatic species so that Peninsula homeowners can keep their lawns green.

The same fishwrap that whines about how many Sequoias were burned in the wildfires thinks we mere Peninsulans should let our lawns die--not realizing the trees live on the lawns and drink the same irrigation.  I know, it's complicated for someone who spends their day stepping over discarded hypodermic needles and broken glass.  But wait, there's more.  The "toilet to tap" trope rolls out with a new twist.  We get to be the City's septic tank:

Water recycling for potable use presents technical and legal challenges. It generally demands pumping treated sewage into the ground, pulling it out and treating it again before delivering it to customers. The Peninsula has storage capacity for this that San Francisco largely lacks.  Demanding better water conservation from neighbors while partnering on sustainable projects will be a tough needle to thread. Thankfully, Herrera has signaled that he’s up to the challenge. San Francisco residents need him to mean it.

I love that "neighbors" part.  With neighbors like EssEff we should all be getting Dobermans and an extra lock.  With what else they are exporting we should all be getting an extra lock anyway.  SF can build luxury senior living penthouses that rent for $324,000 a year with rooftop pools, but the poop should be filtered on the Peninsula.  You should read the rest of the EssEff BeeEss in the editorial--I don't have the heart to quote all of the "outflow".

 

 

 

The CA exodus is real, so why do we need SB 10?

There are plenty of people who foolishly believe we can build our way out of the so-called "housing crisis".  Dense development hasn't caused lower housing costs anywhere in the world--in fact, many of the densest locations are also the costliest.  And when the other quality of life components and job prospects are as good as the Bay Area, one would have to be extra foolish to try to out-build the demand and further diminish the quality of life.  But Sacramento has foisted SB 9 and SB 10 on us anyway.  Most of them couldn't get through Econ 101, but that is where we are at.

The Burlingame City Council will discuss what to do about SB 10 tomorrow night.  The Staff Report is super thin on SB 10:

SB 10. California Senate Bill (SB) 10 allows (but does not require) local agencies to adopt an ordinance to allow up to 10 dwelling units on any parcel if the parcel is within a transit-rich area or urban infill site. (Ed:  pretty much all of B'game).

The General Plan Update has already provided a range of multiunit residential and mixed use land use districts with a wide range of residential densities, and the Zoning Ordinance Update underway will provide refined development standards for the corresponding zoning districts.

Staff requests direction from the City Council on whether to pursue zoning allowed by SB 10.  Whereas SB 9-compliant zoning is required, municipalities may choose to adopt (or not adopt) SB 10-compliant zoning.

And the report claims that neither SB 9 or SB 10 will have any fiscal impact!  It might be time to double-check the thinking on that since residential property taxes never cover the cost of providing city services--never mind the costs to the school district that is pretty much out of real estate.

But let's look a little deeper courtesy of last Sunday's Mercury News piece with the sub-head "In an area noted for its booming economy, stunning weather and natural beauty, a majority feel their quality of life is in decline".  The Silicon Valley Leadership Group and the Bay Area News Group commissioned a survey by Embold Research to dig into this and it's not pretty.

In a foreboding breakthrough, for the first time since the poll began posing the question in 2018 a solid majority -- 56% -- said they expect to leave the Bay Area in the next few years...a similar majority said the region is headed in the wrong direction.  In the survey of 1,610 registered voters, 71% said the Bay Area's quality of life has declined in the last five years.

Two problems topped the list of increased concern being "serious or very serious"?  Drought (+41%) and Water Supply (+32%).  I'm glad to know I'm not alone on this.  The cost of housing was still the highest overall at 92% but only up 6%.  What if even half of the half of people that are considering leaving do so?  Even if it is only 10% that would be significant.   B'game has a huge amount of new housing already approved, in design and "in-the-dirt".  Maybe we should see how that all plays out?  I hope the council's direction to staff on SB 10 is a brisk, clear "forgetaboutit" so they can get back to ensuring our public safety, water supply, small business vitality, economic health and quality of life.

Sewer Rates: Running Uphill

There are very few city services as important to keep functioning as our sewer system.  The city has just sent out the proposed new rates that will cover about $22 million of improvements at the Treatment Facility and $12 million of improvements to pipes and pumps.  The proposed rates are stratified by type of user and "based on a 3-year average of water use from bills between January - April."   The theory being that what-comes-in-must-go-out except for irrigation and that is minimized in the winter months.  The Single Family Residences & Duplexes rates per 1,000 gallons of water used are:

Current Rate                    2022 Proposed                    2023 Proposed                2024 Proposed

$12.25                                $13.58                                $14.91                            $16.25

Thus the increases off of today's baseline are:

                                            10.9%                                21.7%                              32.7% 

The city notice uses an example of a typical single-family home using 8,200 gallons every two months (that's the billing cycle).  Doing the math, that means an increase of $196.80 per year by 2024.  That is an average--your mileage may vary, but it appears to be a fait accompli since the means of protesting it are by writing to the city and seeing if "a majority of parcels" do the same.  Not gonna happen.  I'll bet a majority of the property owners didn't even open the mailer.  Keep all of this in mind as you do the laundry, shower and do whatever between January and April.

 

Turf vs. Grass: More to it than meets the eye

Millbrae is leading the way in examining whether or not artificial turf is a good residential lawn -- or not -- according to the DJ

Artificial turf may soon be illegal to install in Millbrae, at least for a period of time, with the City Council citing environmental concerns and the need to establish permanent rules surrounding the landscaping material often seen as a low maintenance and low water use alternative to real grass.

The move comes amid a worsening drought in the state leading many residents to seek alternate yard treatments that require less water. But according to experts, the environmental drawbacks of artificial turf likely outweigh the upsides. The city is now seeking a moratorium on the installation of the plastic material until permanent guidelines on its use can be researched and established.  Among concerns are increased heat, reduced water absorption and toxic runoff from disintegrating plastic — problems that could exacerbate climate issues often linked with drought. 

“You have in the case of a field … baked, sealed, compressed dirt that is completely dead underneath,” said Diana Conway, president of Safe Healthy Playing Fields, a volunteer organization that advocates against artificial turf. “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.

There is more here concerning whether or not the turf is really recyclable as claimed and whether or not Millbrae cracking down on people paving their yards will use artificial turf to try to avoid the lot paving coverage limits.  No mention of how bad it is for any trees that are nearby and thus  do not get watered properly.  As usual, the Law of Unintended Consequences kicks in.  Kudos to Millbrae for taking a look.  B'game, what say you?  Perhaps we can copy something smart?

Water Security: Nothing to Worry About?

The city council took up the 2020 Urban Water Management Plan last week with the hope of approving this latest five-year update.  We described the stated concerns about shortages that came up during the study session last May here.  Words like "alarming" and "worry" were in vogue back in May, but curiously absent last week as the UWMP was approved 5-0.  I had sent several comments to the council based on my reading of the draft plan where I thought some more work was wise.  We may get to all of them over time, but right now I just want to focus on the main question.  When droughts inevitably come, do we have enough water?  Apparently the various agencies involved think we do as seen in this Table 7-6 from the plan that covers the next 20 years.

These numbers are the SFPUC Regional Water System (RWS) estimates of our city's water availability if the "Save the Fish" maneuver called the Bay Delta Plan doesn't happen.  The "Save the Fish" plan is tied up in court and negotiations, so this looks like great news!  Over the next five years, if we have a dry year our availability drops 19.7% and then stays exactly the same even if the next four years are dry.  Over the long run, things look even better.  20 years from now, if we have a dry year, our availability only drops 12.6% and thankfully stays exactly the same for the next four continuously dry years.  I guess I have been worrying for no reason.  Let's move on.  The day after the council meeting, Wally from Dilbert explained why I feel better.