Residents of several streets in Piedmont have received notice from PG&E that their electrical service will be off on Thursday, June 6, some locations from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. others from 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

When it happens on your block, PG&E recommends:

• Unplug computers and other electronic equipment prior to the announced outage start time.
• Remove your vehicle(s) from your garage prior to the announced outage start time (unless your garage door can be operated manually).
• Keep refrigerator and freezer doors closed during the outage for food safety.
• Have battery powered flashlights with fresh batteries
• Remember that cordless phones will not operate during the outage
• If you have a family member who relies on life support devices, you may need to install an Uninterruptible Power Supply or relocate to a location not in the outage area.
• If you rely on a generator during power outages, be aware that the law requires that customers with a permanently installed or portable generator do not connect it to another power source, such as PG&E’s power lines. If you own and operate a generator, you are responsible for making sure that electricity from your unit cannot “backfeed,” or flow into PG&E’s power lines. For safety’s sake, be sure to use your generator correctly. If you do not, you risk damaging your property and endangering your life and the lives of PG&E line workers who may be working on power lines some distance from your home.

Questions–contact PG&E 1-800-743-5000

In the fall of 2012, Wall Street Journal’s Julia Angwin reported on license plate-tracking technologies (license plate readers /LPRs), the use of the information gathered, and how long it stays in various databases.  One of the people she interviewed was Mike Katz-Lacabe in San Leandro, California.   “In 2010, Mr. Katz-Lacabe filed a California Public Records Act request for his data from the local police. He received a report containing 112 images of his vehicles dating to 2008.”

Angwin also interviewed San Leandro Police Chief Sandra Spagnoli, who told her the department plans to retain the photos indefinitely.  And in some rare circumstances at least, police have  used their LPRs illegitimately.  In 1998, according to surveyofone.com, a Washington, D.C. police lieutenant plead guilty to extortion after looking up the plates of vehicles near a gay bar and blackmailing the vehicle owners.

Origins of LPRs

But it was not police departments that first used the technology over wide regions.  It was repo guys, the automobile repossession agents who locate and tow cars that are being repossessed for non-payment of car loans.  Repossession agents have used their LPRs to photograph vehicles in cities and areas that still don’t have any public entity LPRs .  Solutions Today Final Notice & Recovery LLC tows an average 15 vehicles most nights covering the Maryland and Washington, D.C. region.

Most repossession agents’ upload their LPR photos to one of the national private databases. Vigilant Solutions has more than 700 million vehicle photos, license plates with location, time, and date in its national private LPR data base.  On its website it explains, “The National Vehicle Location Service (NVLS) is Vigilant’s National LPR Data Repository.  NVLS aggregates ANPR / ALPR data from various sources – law enforcement agencies, private systems for asset recovery and access control, and others.”

In the 1960’s LPRs began being used by police.  To photograph drivers violating red lights, cameras were installed at some intersections.  Using the resulting photos, the police issued tickets to the car’s owner and collected significant fines.  More recently, LPRs have been effective at locating and towing abandoned stolen cars and booting cars with multiple unpaid parking tickets.

Piedmonters have been assured by Police Chief Rikki Goede in public meetings presenting the LPR program that vehicle photos and data will only be retained for one year and that it will only be available to law enforcement agencies.

Important Council Meeting June 3, 7:30 p.m. in the Council Chambers. 

The City Council will hold the first of two public hearings on the FY 2013-14 Budget at its Monday meeting.  The Council’s Budget Advisory and Financial Planning Committee (BAFPC) has been meeting for weeks,  examining the proposed annual budget, five-year projections, and the City’s overall financial health.  The Committee’s detailed report  with specific recommendations will be presented at the meeting.  

The Budget, along with fee proposals, the levy of the Municipal Services Tax and the Sewer Tax are all part of the Public Hearing. Staff Report.  Budget.

License Plate Readers in Piedmont have made Bay Area news and are supported by a number of Piedmonters.  Increasingly aggressive crimes led Police Chief Rikki Goede to recommend placing cameras at fifteen entrances to Piedmont.  Although controversial to some, the Piedmont Public Safety Committee, CIP Review Committee, and the BAFPC have recommended the City Council approve $678,613 from the CIP fund to cover the cost of the cameras for use in the project.  Staff Report.

Eagle Scout candidate, Cole Becker, has proposed overseeing and fund raising for a footbridge in Dracena Park.  The footbridge will replace a bridge demolished over 50 years ago.   The location connects a path near Park Way to a path used by dog walkers crossing over the path through the redwood canyon.  The Park Commission has recommended approving the footbridge, conditioned upon certain requirements.   Staff Report.

As an outgrowth of BAFPC recommendations, the City Council will discuss an ongoing  plan  to project future needs and to allocate funds for facilities maintenance.

For more information, call the City Clerk’s office at (510) 420-3040.

A 20-page, close-up view of Piedmont’s fiscal health will be presented to the City Council on Monday, June 3, by its Budget Advisory and Financial Planning Committee (BAFPC).

The five-member committee, made up of Piedmont residents with diverse fiscal expertise, focused its analysis on the City’s financial outlook for the next five years, potential financial risks regarding employee healthcare and retirement costs, the Sewer Fund, and some specific steps the Council can take to save money and reduce risks.

Here are a few of the report’s highlights.

First the good news: “Overall, the City looks to be in improving financial shape,” the report states,  “recovering as expected from the recent recession, and appears able financially to continue to provide exceptional basic public services.  However,” it warns, “there are still risks facing the city in retirement costs as well as sewer replacement and operating costs that need to be addressed.”

City Employee Retirement Costs  

In an effort to reduce “uncontrollable retirement benefit costs,” the Committee recommends: 1) the Council refinance the CalPERS pension side fund and negotiate a lower corresponding cap from City employees; 2) compensate employees in ways that do not contribute to their retirement costs, such as giving bonuses instead of salary increases; 3) continue to bargain for caps and sharing on pension retirement costs with new and current employees; 4) reduce current and retiree healthcare cost coverage to 75% of costs or lower, down from 100%, extend vesting of retiree healthcare benefits to 20 years instead of current 5 years;  and investigate putting more burden on “Tier 1 retirement employees” (current, long-time employees), if possible.

The report notes the importance of controlling these costs in light of the fact that, “The City faces the likelihood of substantial turnover in the next 5-10 years, as 23 employees have over 20 years of service and an additional 28 have over 10 years of service. We estimate that approximately 40 of the City employees are likely to retire over the next 10 years, with a significant portion in the next 5 years.”

Aquatics

The Committee notes that in FY12/13, expenses of the City-owned pool exceeded revenues by $158,000.  Based on the FY13/14 aquatics budget, the Committee projects pool expenses will cost Piedmont taxpayers $200,000 per year in the next 5 years.  The Committee also points out that the School District currently does not pay for pool use, and the private Piedmont Swim Team pays a below-market rate for pool use of about $17,000 per year.  The Committee “recommends that, regardless of the policy with respect to the School District, proper accounting should reflect the capital/operational costs per user which includes the School District usage as a footnote to the budget.”

Sewer Fund

The Committee recommends the City restart phased sewer replacement of the remaining 93,000 feet of Piedmont’s mainline sewer in order to save substantial costs over the currently planned small-scale, emergency repair/replacement strategy. Committee members unanimously recommend obtaining a low-interest State loan to restart the phased rehab and investigate potential funding sources — either through a temporary sewer surcharge measure or borrowing from the City’s General Fund — in order to address the projected temporary shortfall in the Sewer Fund beginning in 2016-17.

The Committee believes that the total cost to the City of a “logically phased rehabilitation program” would be lower than making incremental repairs because of 1) lower cost per lineal foot of larger-scale projects;  2) low interest State loans, currently at 1% interest; 3) lower risk of costs escalating if the rehab is done sooner rather than over decades; and 4) less risk of not meeting EPA regulatory requirements.

Conclusion

The report concludes that the City is in a “relatively strong financial position compared to the recent past.  However, the risks to the city still exist and Council must stay vigilant to find ways to adequately compensate employees in a controllable way and continue to work to improve the stability of the City’s finances.”

BAFPC REPORT

At the May 31, 2013, Piedmont City Council meeting the report from the Budget Advisory and Financial Projections Committee (“BAFPC”), will be considered.   In a letter to the City Council a resident emphasizes parts of the report.

The BAFPC committee has done excellent work as demonstrated in the Report before you.  The financial professionals on the BAFPC did a remarkable job.

I. SEWER FUND

Page 11 references the ongoing transfer of a significant portion of the Sewer Fund to the General Fund: “This transfer has grown in response to regulatory mandates, going from $600k–$700k in years prior to 2006 to $900k for the current fiscal year, about 40% of the sewer revenue. Staff time attributed to the sewer systems is estimated rather than tracked directly.”  Were this $900k not so substantial, the already penciled in November 2014 additional Sewer Tax would be absurd.  Council should implement a time sheet and/or accounting system to replace the current “estimated” system.

Further the Report notes: “Long‐range projections undertaken by this committee and staff found, however, that as debt service is retired, revenues are projected to exceed expenditures beginning in FY23‐24 and the fund balance to turn positive by FY29‐30, even with no additional source of revenue. Thus, the fund balance problem is temporary.” At page 6 the Report notes the large number of Teir I employees retiring in the next 10 years which “should provide a downward trajectory for CalPERS benefit costs.” If Council continues to control compensation packages, the financial picture remains  increasingly positive. Various forces are at play that insure that any decline in the Sewer Fund is temporary and that the General Fund subsidy from the Sewer Fund can likely be reduced. No additional taxes are required of the already heavily taxed Piedmont electorate. Current residents should not have to bear the entire cost of a 100 year system.

The city continues to comply with the EPA directives utilizing $340,000 for sewer projects plus $300,000 additional for emergency repairs. The Report notes emergency repairs costs at $352,000 average annually, well within current revenues. Since the Measure A Sewer Tax failed in Feb. 2012, the total mainline rehabilitation has gone from 60% to 64%.  Regardless of City Hall characterization that only emergency work is being done, the mainline is being replaced/rehabilitated at a rate acceptable to the  EPA. Evidently all work is labeled “emergency” as the most deteriorated parts of the mainline are logically given priority.

II. PENSION SIDE FUND

At p19 the reports states: “If the Side Fund were refinanced, the CalPERS rate would drop for the upcoming year to 28% and thus would be below the sharing cap. As a result, the City would be obligated for Side Fund payments and the employees would not provide any payment towards the CalPERS pension. As a result, without a contract change in the mechanics of the cap, the refinancing of the Side Fund would save the employees substantial money but actually cost the City more money.” Council should undertake the BAFPC Private Placement recommendation to refinance the Pension SideFund and commensurately renegotiate employee Caps downward . Refinancing the fund so only Tier I employees benefit on top of already lucrative packages makes no sense; refinancing the Pension Side Fund requires downward Pension cap negotiation.

Respectfully,

Rick Schiller, Piedmont Resident

Editors’ Note:  The opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of the Piedmont Civic Association.

“The Crowd and the Mob: Opportunities and Cautions for Constant Video Surveillance“

An opinion by Camille Crittenden, Deputy Director of Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) at U. C. Berkeley appeared on the Berkeley Blog:

“In addition to facilitating the “wisdom of crowds,” technology grows more sophisticated for automated surveillance, including face recognition and gait analysis. In the last decade, many cities have accelerated implementation of surveillance systems, capitalizing on advances in computer technology and funds available from the Department of Homeland Security and other public sources. Yet whether considering fixed cameras or citizen footage, the effectiveness of surveillance for crime prevention is mixed.”

Read the complete opinion.

Editors’ Note: The opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of the Piedmont Civic Association. 

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As Police Departments Shrink, New Software Seems to Aid Crime Prevention

Tight budgets have forced many California cities to reduce the size of Police Departments.  At the same time crime rates are rising. To offset the loss of police officers some cities are turning to Predictive Policing (PredPol), a predictive analytics technology tool developed in California and named one of the “Best Inventions” of 2011 by Time magazine. Using the crime date, time and address data already recorded by police departments the software analyzes it and forecasts the time and location for the same crime in the future.

Small and medium cities using PredPol —  including Alhambra, Campbell, Los Gatos, Morgan Hill, Salinas and Santa Cruz—are reporting reduced burglaries. The Santa Cruz police personnel decreased by 20% in 2011 while crime increased by 30%.  After the first year using PredPol printouts of predicted hotspots at the start of each shift, Santa Cruz Police reported a 19% reduction in burglaries and added predictions of bike thefts, battery, assault and prowling in late 2012.

Putting visible police patrols in the locales at times when burglaries are most likely is thought to be the reason burglaries are prevented.  Predictive Policing is applied to the most frequent crimes in each community and is dependent on the specific crime patterns of each city.  The goal is to make the best use of available police officers.  According to Co.Exist Fast Company, “Predictive Policing is charging cities based on population, with costs ranging from $25,000 to $250,000 per year for the largest cities.”

The Alhambra Police Department explains their decision:

“Developed over a period of six years by cops, mathematicians, criminologists and anthropologists, PredPol is a predictive policing program that looks at burglaries and car thefts and other crimes in a similar manner as predicting aftershocks from an earthquake.  Agencies that have deployed the PredPol tool have seen marked reductions in targeted crimes.  PredPol gives medium sized cities like Alhambra access to complex, large analytic capabilities normally only available to big cities or massive corporations.  The inputs are straightforward: previous crime reports, which include the time and location of a crime.  The software is informed by sociological studies of criminal behavior, which include the insight that burglars often ply the same area.”

Los Angeles experimented with Predictive Policing in just one precinct—Foothill—for six months.  At the end of the trial, the Police Department reported that burglaries in the Foothill precinct decreased 36 percent while crime rose across Los Angeles over the same period. 

Read “Don’t Just Map Crime, Predict it”

Mountain View Cemetery is currently draining their ponds in order to provide irrigation water on their grounds. This is an annual late-Spring /early Summer occurrence, always shocking to witness.

December 27, 2012

May 27, 2013

The  photographs show west-looking views of Reservoir #2. The first picture was taken on December 27, 2012, when the pond was full. The second picture was taken on May 27, 2013, as the volume of the pond has been depleted to less than 10% of its full volume.

When the last drop of available water has been sucked from the ponds, the Cemetery switches over to buying water from EBMUD. Thus, the equation is to trade a full pond for perhaps 3 or 4 weeks worth of irrigation water. The result is a loss of habitat for wildlife that resides or visits the ponds. The devastation of animal life in the ponds (amphibians, fish, turtles) goes beyond the injury associated just with the loss of water volume. The water life that survives the initial shock of water depletion, is further picked off by visiting herons, who can easily hunt the shallow water.  

The Cemetery might believe that it’s free to do whatever it wants with this water resource to which it happens to have access, and the Cemetery also understandably places a high priority on the business of being a cemetery. However, at a certain point, a broader public policy question is also apparent regarding massive consumption of water for the cosmetic purpose of having green lawns at the expense of the health of the watershed as a whole, and the impact of industrial style water management on wildlife habitat.

One wonders whether the Cemetery management gives any thought at all to being a good steward of the water-based habitat and the water traversing their grounds. One wonders how responsible and transparent the Cemetery’s handling of water is. Cemeteries are exempt from some of the California State Regulations regarding water resources, but not all. For example, Cemeteries are required to maintain a “Water Efficient Worksheet”, and are subject to Water Audits that attend to preventing water wastage, by way of leaking pipes, for example.

One may also wonder about the Cemetery’s general plans for the ponds and particularly, the eastern-most wetland area that abuts against Coaches Field, an area that has already been ravaged by Cemetery practices.

People interested in the status of the Cemetery Ponds should go by, and have a look.

David Cohen, PhD

Mountain View Cemetery site http://www.mountainview-cemetery.com/

Editors’ Note:  The opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of the Piedmont Civic Association.