Yuba seeks levee funding
Marysville Appeal Democrat - 10/31/03
By Harold Kruger, staff writer

Developers in the Plumas Lake Specific Plan area must come up with $2 million in the next two months to pay for preliminary levee improvement work in the area.

Yuba County supervisors Tuesday night will consider the financing agreement with builders who control about 3,700 acres south of Olivehurst.

"What we need is $2 million in order to get the train rolling," said Randy Margo, Yuba County's assistant administrator.

Earlier this year, county officials learned that levees protecting the Plumas Lake area, where about 12,000 homes are to be built, may not meet federal standards for sufficient freeboard, the distance between the high water surface and the top of the levee.

The county wants to complete repairs on the levees before the Federal Emergency Management Agency releases revised flood plain maps of the area.

The Yuba County Water Agency gave $535,000 to Reclamation District 784 to pay for an initial problem identification study.

Engineering work is estimated to cost another $1.5 million. The actual construction work is projected to cost from $5 million to $15 million.

At this point, county officials want to complete the engineering study as quickly as possible.

They want the developers to reimburse the Water Agency the $535,000, plus pay the $1.5 million for the engineering work.

Under the proposed agreement, the developers will have until Dec. 1 to repay the Water Agency and until Jan. 5 to provide the $1.5 million.

The funding formula calls for each developer or landowner - 24 in all - in the Plumas Lake area to pay $532 per acre to cover the $2 million.

"We won't proceed with the engineering and design work until the money is in place," Margo said.

The initial $2 million, plus whatever construction eventually costs, will be financed through a Mello-Roos bond to be repaid by Plumas Lake developers, a charge eventually passed on to the new homeowners.

County officials are banking on development to pay for new positions in the Community Development and Public Works department.

Tuesday night, supervisors will be asked to add a total of 22 positions to those departments in this fiscal year and in 2004-05.

In a memo to supervisors, Public Works Director Kevin Mallen and Peter Calarco, assistant director of Community Development, said the Planning Division's staffing level is on par with what it was in the 1980s, while Public Works staffing is at a 40-year low.

"Nearly 75 percent of our county roads are in poor or below average condition as a result of this inadequate revenue for capital investment and maintenance," they wrote.

The proposal calls for adding 13 positions - seven in Community Development and six in Public Works - now and nine - two in Public Works and seven in Community Development - in 2004-05.

"The additional staffing being requested is not intended to provide a level of customer service beyond historical levels, but simply to meet the current and anticipated workloads with an acceptable level of customer service," Mallen and Calarco wrote