storm damage repairs

Posted by Pamela Arnsberger on Mar 02, 2017
 
Announcements and reminders
 
Michelle reminded us of the need for silent auction items for our annual fundraiser for Leo’s Haven. The roast of supervisor Zach Friend will be on May 5th at the clubhouse. Sponsorships are also needed as well as bottles of wine for the wine cart. 
 
Doug reminded us that the area speech contest will be March 16th. Winners of the club speech contests will compete in the large room. If you signed up to volunteer remember to come a bit early that day. The contest will begin promptly at 12:15.
 
John Fisher gave Kelly the Rotary International District 5170 award as Grand Donor for the Rotary Foundation. He also said a new program has been started. During the month of March our district is asking every Rotarian to write a check for $30 to the foundation for Polio Plus. The Bill Gates foundation will match our area’s contributions.
 
Our speaker today was John Presleigh, Director of the county's Department of Public Works (see photo). He spoke to us about the recovery effort and road damage from the recent storms.
 
 

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The very personable Mr. Presleigh said estimates are currently nearing $40 million for repairs, but we have come a long ways since the 63 roads that were closed two weeks ago.  He said it has been an extraordinary year. Crews have been working 24 hours straight to keep the roads open. There is also a recovery unit set up in public works that will be working on storm damage.

Funding for road repairs should partially come from CAL/OES which works with FEMA.  They should fund half the costs of road damage repairs for the major arteries including critical roads such as Glenwood Dr., Valencia Rd., Soquel Old San Jose Rd., Soquel Dr. and Bear Creek  Rd. (Valencia alone is a $3 million fix). A permanent replacement will take one to two years if they force us to take that route instead of a temporary fix. 

There were many questions from club members about the costs for and length of time for repairs.  Mr. Presleigh stressed that we have to come up with a 20% match to get federal/state funds for repairs.  Measure D funds may be tapped for these monies. Only certain roads can be fixed quickly; others will have to wait up to two years.  He said we do not have the authority on a local level to make these decisions.

Many questions were asked about who is responsible for private roads. He said they are a bigger problem. They are talking about creating County Service Areas to allow people to get loans to repair the roads.  CAL/OES will then help to finance these massive repairs with these loans.

Mr. Presleigh stressed that even without the storms, the department is hard pressed to find funds to maintain roads. He pointed out that they are working hard to raise gas taxes and that SB1 And AB1 are the two bills that would do this and will be under consideration in April.

 

For more information call (831) 454-2160 or see the website.