Posted on 05/10/2006 8:57:40 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
Last year - on Sept. 16, to be precise - the state Reclamation Board, a relatively obscure state agency that oversees flood protection levees, approved a potentially far-reaching policy to intercede when local governments and developers propose residential subdivisions behind levees designed to protect farmland.
Spurred by the devastation of New Orleans when levees failed during Hurricane Katrina and an appellate court decision declaring the state liable for damages from levee failures in California, the board activated powers that it had long held under state law, but rarely exercised, to review developments behind levees for flood safety.
"I believe if you're going to urbanize the land, you've got to urbanize the levees," said one board member, former Sacramento City Manager Bill Edgar. "That's the bottom line." The decree didn't sit well with development-hungry local governments and developers who had subdivision plans pending, especially those in the vast Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Ten days later, before the new policy could be finally adopted, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger fired the entire board and replaced it with seven new appointees, most of whom had strong ties to land developers. Ever since, skeptics of building homes behind agricultural levees - including deposed members of the Reclamation Board - have wondered aloud whether the new board would be more favorably disposed toward development interests.
The issue was settled, it would seem, late last month, when the Reclamation Board voted to allow the developer of an immense subdivision on a Delta island south of Stockton to begin widening the existing levee and - ignoring warnings from the board's attorney that it was violating state open-meeting laws - expanded the developer's permit to indirectly allow construction of luxury, riverview homes atop the widened levee.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
Article shows shameless Bugs and Bunny tilt!
What else is new? ;-)
I'm trying to dig up the FR threads from that time frame when the Gub effectively fired the board that was just completing a study with recommendations for levee repairs and such..
Not the one Im looking for , this was a few days before board was thumped.
[CA] Levee monitoring sinks in Legislature
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1481903/posts
Sacramento Bee ^ | 9/10/5 | Matt Weiser
Posted on 09/10/2005 1:07:04 PM PDT by SmithL
A bill that some called a "baby steps" effort to deal with California's colossal flood risks did not pass out of the Legislature this week, prompting concern that there is little appetite to deal with the messy, expensive problem of neglected levees.
Images of a submerged New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina helped revive the bill from a months-long slumber. But those pictures of death and despair did not prompt enough votes in the state Senate to bring the bill forward as an urgency measure before the session closed Thursday night.
CA: Legislature ignores what should be a wake-up call on levee failure ^
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1475695/posts
Posted by NormsRevenge
On News/Activism ^ 09/02/2005 9:59:10 AM PDT · 16 replies · 319+ views
Sac Bee ^ | 9/2/05 | Dan Walters
The horrific flooding of New Orleans this week, as levees collapsed under pressure from Hurricane Katrina, should be a wake-up call for California. As the Legislature churns toward adjournment next week, however, it is ignoring even the most rudimentary steps to shore up the deteriorating levees that protect hundreds of thousands of Californians from floodwaters. California may not be in the Atlantic-Caribbean hurricane belt, but we occasionally feel the impact of hurricanelike Pacific storms, and when we do - especially when they are tropical storms that suddenly melt mountain snowpacks - those who live in low-lying flood plains are utterly...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1492907/posts
CA: Schwarzenegger Fires Flood Control Panel
LA Times ^ | 9/27/05 | Nancy Vogel
Posted on 09/28/2005 8:57:20 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
I pretty much nailed it on that thread, except Perata's bonds turned into Arnie's bonds-on-steroids. Note also that the mandatory insurance mentioned in the article seems to be currently experiencing a slow death in the legislature.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1492907/posts?page=5#5
Those fired were getting tough on new building without strengthening levees. I guess they'll just build build build now and then can push for Perata's new bonds. That way we can all pay more taxes for the levees while developers and landowners reap their profits (from otherwise unsafe land).
The entity that approves the building should be liable for the damage. County government is a subdivision of state government.
What the state lacks is the balls to say NO to the construction or to tax the land sufficiently to build the levees. Looks like the gang's new board members are members of the former ... and the latter. A win-win situation for the county tax collectors and the developers and a loose-loose situation for new home owners and taxpayers far removed from the personal, foolishness and government greed.
When in doubt; elect an Austrian liberal. He'll screw you every time and still keep smiling.
Thanks,, I was looking for that thread...
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