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Street Fighters Unite!
I appreciate that the more you travel the less acceptable you will find the condition of our local streets. Petaluma has failed to adequately maintain its city streets for a number of years and this is impacting our daily lives. At present and in the foreseeable future, the city of Petaluma does not have the reserves necessary to pay for urgently needed Capital Improvement Projects (CIP). Last year, the previous City Council budgeted only $267,000 for its annual street maintenance program while claiming the budget as being "balanced".
I feel that the current City Council needs to show leadership on this matter and avoid accruing more CIP "credit card debt." The City Council must demonstrate annually that we have the capacity to maintain our streets. To commit to this level of funding will require the City Council to make tough decisions and significant budget cuts in other areas.
We have budgeted approximately $325,000 this year for the pothole patrol. We have also budgeted $1.5 Million in capital funds for a few street resurfacing projects. While better than nothing, this falls far short of our city staff's recommendation for $8.1 Million in annual maintenance and $164 Million in Capital Improvement requirements. Recently, I had made a motion to use an additional $6.6 million of available redevelopment funds to boost our road improvement efforts but did not receive sufficient Council support.
The city needs to limit other expenditures and invest more in its roads. We also need to find additional funding sources including state and federal funding grants and local funding alternatives. To this end, I have been working with the Chamber Economic Development Committee that has asked the City to fund a voter survey to determine the willingness of the local taxpayers to contribute to a general assessment, special assessment or Benefit Assessment District to improve roads.
I have recently solicited a voter street and park funding survey proposal from Godbe Research, which is the same firm that helped Novato in its successful $15 Million road improvement bond measure. The proposed survey has been funded and supported by the City Council. I anticipate that the survey will support a small ($10 per month) annual contribution to road improvements if we can clearly identify where the funds will be used. While not a huge amount of money, this is an important incremental step and a key part of the long-term solution to this mammoth problem.
We could really use your help. There needs to be a Grassroots effort to take ownership of the survey results, draft the actual initiative and launch a full scale campaign. And while the Chamber has pledged support for the effort it would be politically inappropriate for them to lead the effort. This needs to come from the residents of Petaluma. We need a large support group representing a cross-section of our community. Would you consider supporting the effort? Please email me so I can add you to the list of supporters.