** The federal share of the study’s cost was dropped from the president’s 2007 budget.
By Marion Softky
Almanac Staff Writer
Any person, agency, business, or organization that cares about getting federal help to solve problems of flooding of San Francisquito Creek should write representatives in Congress and tell them why it’s important to fund the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ planning project. This was the message that came out of a special meeting of the San Francisquito Creek Joint Powers Authority in Menlo Park February 23.
“We need not just government types; we need citizen types,” said Menlo Park Councilwoman Lee Duboc, vice chair of the agency established to prevent a recurrence of the flooding that caused more than $30 million in damage when the creek topped its banks eight years ago. “Everybody who’s affected by flooding in the watershed should write a letter.”
Just three months ago, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers signed a contract to study solutions to flooding of San Francisquito Creek. So it came as a disappointment, if not a surprise, to local officials that the federal share of the study’s cost disappeared from the president’s 2007 budget.
“The corps’ budget did not have our project or any planning project in it,” said Cynthia D’Agosta, executive director of the JPA, which represents five agencies affected by the creek.
The president’s budget is just the beginning of the budget struggle. There are still nine months while the budget is being debated in Congress to try to restore some or all of the $450,000 request.
Meanwhile, the study has already started with $225,000 appropriated for 2006. “Every year we go through this process,” Ms. D’Agosta said.
At issue is funding for the second phase of the federal project undertaken by the corps in 2002, already four years after the creek topped its banks in the El Nino flood of 1998. That flood caused major flooding in Palo Alto, and a close call for East Palo Alto, which was threatened by Katrina-type flooding when the creek came within inches of the levee tops.
The contract for the $7.5 million feasibility study calls for splitting the costs 50-50 between the corps and the five agencies making up the JPA — Palo Alto, Menlo Park, East Palo Alto, the Santa Clara Valley Water District, and the San Mateo County Flood Control District.
But it will still be a long time before anything actually gets done. The feasibility study is expected to take four to five years to identify ways of protecting creekside communities from future floods. That would be followed by a design and engineering phase, and environmental review of proposed projects, before actual construction can begin.
Campaign
Negotiating and campaigning for funds could take most of the rest of this year. East Palo Alto councilman and JPA member Ruben Abrica has already been back to Washington to lobby. He will be followed by other members of the JPA over the next months.
In a letter to the JPA, Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Atherton, warned that record deficits have increased competition for scarce federal dollars. “There’s a very real possibility that the House Appropriations Committee will not fund local projects at all,” she wrote. She requests letters of support by March 15.
Ms. D’Agosta remains hopeful. “I’m pretty confident some funds will reappear in this year’s budget,” she said. “What will help most is support letters.”
INFORMATION
For information, call the JPA at 330-6765, or go to cityofpaloalto.org/jpa, which has background reports, suggested letters, and congressional addresses.
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