Faced with a decision that everyone seemed to think was a no-brainer, the Cabrillo Unified School District made no decision on whether to put its new middle school at Cunha.

Thursday night, the board faced a vote on a resolution to "direct the Superintendent to proceed with planning for new construction and reconstruction of existing buildings to create a new middle school campus on the Cunha site."

This resolution was a result of a presentation by the superintendent’s committee of experts that demonstrated that Cunha could be built twice as fast at half the cost as any other solution. This wasn’t good enough for three members of the board.  Shock and dismay were leavened with sleepy resignation as the meeting dragged on past its legal end time of 10pm.

The one member of the audience who had reason to be pleased was CCWD board member and Wavecrest stalwart Jim Larimer, who at the beginning of the meeting had urged the board to delay making a decision. This suggestion was greeted with laughter by the audience, who were no longer laughing by the end of the evening.

John Moseley and Dwight Wilson had clearly made up their mind that Cunha was the right decision and Thursday was the right time to make it. Wilson declared, "Time is our worst enemy" and said it was time to deliver a school to the community.

But three members of the board found the experts’ testimony lacking.

Jolanda Schreurs read a rambling statement that focused on the fact that the even the Cunha site would cost $5 million more than the district has in its building fund. She then pulled out a plan that no one had heard of before, which proposed turning Farallone View in Montara into a K-8 school to lower the enrollment at Cunha. This might have been an interesting plan to submit to the committee of experts.

Roy Salume struck a theme he would hammer repeatedly that evening: The District needed to buy the four parcels next to Cunha, and until they had made a decision about this, he couldn’t vote for the resolution. Salume was concerned that if a commitment to buy the lots weren’t part of the initial decision that they would not get bought.

Charles Gardner started by saying that "Cunha is a no-brainer". But he then continued that there’s a word in the construction business for a project with insufficient funding: "Not a project". Gardner would stick to this theme for the discussion that followed: He couldn’t commit money to a project if they didn’t have enough money to actually do it.

While each had his own reasons for not wanting to make a decision, collectively they were unmoved.

The greatest insight of the meeting came from Half Moon Bay High School student body representative on the board Sarah Sampson, who asked whether the resolution actually committed the district to building the school Cunha. It didn’t. But no one addressed this crucial question.

Half Moon Bay Mayor Jim Grady had spoken at the beginning of the meeting about the City Council’s desire to expedite construction, citing the rebuilding of Cunha’s Market as an example of what can be done. As the impasse emerged, he seat-hopped from the back to the front of the room, trying to get the board’s attention. Eventually, he was able to get the floor again and pleaded with the board to pass the resolution so that he could take it to the City Council meeting on Tuesday and the city could expedite the construction.

This was followed by numerous pleas from the increasingly incredulous members of the public who implored the board not to waste this opportunity to mend fences with the community. Marina Stariha, former CUSD board member who supported Wavecrest as recently as last week in a letter and article in the Review, urged the board to vote for the resolution, saying, "We need to get the community to pull together for the children".  Sarah Sampson, once again the voice of reason on the board, told the board that they risked the good will that could be gained by a vote to move forward with Cunha.

Before the board tabled the resolution, John Moseley tried gamely to get them to at least vote on it, but it was not to be. The board will take up the resolution at its next regular meeting, on Thursday, Nov 3.

Gardner gets the last word. Toward the end of the meeting, he patiently explained to Sarah, and the public, "Sometimes you have to make a hard decision."  But Thursday night was apparently not that time.

The County Times has a good description of the Highway 92/Main Street project, which has just been fully funded.  The city expects to break ground in April for the following changes. This list is updated and more accurate than the one in the County Times story:

• Highway 92 will be expanded to six lanes in both directions to Highway 1, with a center lane, right-turn, and left-turn lane in both the east- and west-bound directions at the Main Street intersection.
• A lane will be added to South Main Street at Highway 92.
• A second left-turn lane will be added to southbound Highway 1 onto Highway 92.
• North Main Street will be improved, and a bicycle lane will be added.
• A bicycle and pedestrian path will be added alongside Highway 92 from Highway 1 to Spanishtown.
• Utilities will be undergrounded.

The Cabrillo Unified School District is taking a close look at buying three lots on Kelly Stratas part of its imminent decision Thursday to renovate the current middle school.

Thursday’s meeting includes a closed session where the board will consider buying lots located at 500, 510, 514, and 520 Kelly Avenue, at the corner of Kelly and Highway 1 [Google satellite photo].  Members of the board raised the need to acquire these properties, which would give the school a much more rectangular site, almost as soon as it became clear that the Cunha site was the clear winner among the four site options evaluated.

The most prominent of building on these lots is the Victorian building at 520 Kelly Avenue that houses the Half Moon Bay Coastside Chamber of Commerce, which the Chamber describes on its website: "Our offices are located in the historic Alves House (originally known as the Ben Cunha House), built in 1908. This prominent Half Moon Bay landmark is an elegant house that was built in very late Eastlake style architecture - note the scalloped shingles and the polygonal tower."

The agenda for Thursday’s meeting of the Cabrillo Unified School District includes a vote on a resolution to go ahead and renovate Cunha for the district’s middle school. The resolution includes an admission that Measure K does not require them to build on new site, reversing what has been an article of faith for some or all members of the board pretty much since the measure was adopted nine years ago. You can download the entire resolution from Coastsider [MSWord file], but the key clauses are here:

WHEREAS, the Board evaluated its options in light of the Committee’s findings and determined that the Cunha site represents the most cost-effective and timely solution for meeting the District’s educational need for housing the District’s middle school students;

WHEREAS, the Board finds that proceeds of the general obligation bonds issued on behalf of the District pursuant to Measure K, the bond authorization received from the voters on June 4, 1996, may be expended for new construction and modernization of existing facilities at the Cunha site;

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Board directs the Superintendent to proceed with planning for new construction and reconstruction of existing buildings to create a new middle school campus on the Cunha site.

This summer while camping on our family’s coastal land, I thought it would be a good idea to get a fire pit to help keep our campfires contained.  It seemed like a good idea at the time. Who could object?  I was trying to help keep our fires safe, reduce the damage to the land by having only one "mom approved" place for a fire.

I had heard both the good and bad stories about the coastal commission: the need to get a permit to put up a fence, move your gate, repair your porch, etc.  This lead me to the question, do I need a permit to install my fire pit?

According to the local Planning and Building department, I would need what is called a "CDP" or coastal development permit.  Ok, I said what will that cost me?  About $1,000 was the nice planners answer. Agast, I asked how long will it take?  Typically CDPs take about a year (so much for the 2005 season).  Still game but disbelieving, I asked what do I need to do to get one of these CDP’s?

Here is the list I was given:

Geotechnical Survey cost about $5,000
Botanical Survey cost about $3,000
Wetland Survey cost about $3,000
Archeological Survey cost about $2,500
Permit Cost about $1,000

To help keep my property safe and my neighbors safe from fire, I would need to spend about $15,000, wait one year, hire an attorney to argue my need for a firepit, and then just maybe, I’ll get a permit to go BUY a fire pit for $149.00.

Oh, I almost forgot. The planner also said that most coastal properties are subject to attacks for prescriptive rights trails to the ocean (you cannot get to the ocean from my property).  So, I could spend $15,000, loose my property rights, and all to help do what I think is right: buy a fire pit to help keep our lands safe from fire.

I’ve gone from supporting the coastal commision believing they do good work, to well, believing they are out of control and creating problems for the average person who is just trying to do a good thing.

I think that if we as Californian’s want to protect our coastline, we should.  If a property is important enough to have then California should buy it.

How would you lay out a new middle school at Cunha? The full report of the middle school site expert committee contains an interesting diagram of what a new middle school at Cunha might look like.  It’s clearly only a conceptual diagram, but it gives you an idea of the possibilities of the site and how a new middle school would relate to the community. Of course, the CUSD board still has not voted on the site. Cunha’s not a done deal until then.

Cabrillo Unified School District

The San Mateo County Transportation Authority board voted unanimously Thursday to advance $3.8 million to Half Moon Bay for its Main Street/Highway 92 project. This is a tremendous relief for a city that has been struggling for years to fix a traffic bottleneck.

This advance fills the gap created earlier this year when the state "reprogrammed" the money for the project until 2007.  The project is now fully funded and bids can be solicited.  Acquisition of additional rights-of-way by eminent domain is already in progress.

The funding is also a huge political win for the current city council. Getting funding for the on-again, off-again highway project before the election gives incumbents Jim Grady and Mike Ferreira bragging rights.  For a while, it looked as if the decision would be delayed until after the election. Mayor Grady worked with county supervisor Rich Gordon to keep the decision on schedule and deliver the goods before the election.

The vote followed the recommendation of the SMCTA staff and the unanimous recommendation of its Citizen’s Advisory Committee. Mayor Jim Grady, Councilmember Mike Ferreira, City Manager Debra Ryan, Public Works Director Paul Nagengast, and property owner Keet Nerhan attended the meeting.  Grady and Nerhan addressed the board prior to the vote and urged adoption.

Board Members voting yes were Supervisors Mark Church and Rich Gordon, and Councilmembers Joe Galligan of Burlingame, John Lee of San Mateo, Lee Panza of Brisbane and Roseanne Foust of Redwood City.

This is the first time that the SMCTA has advanced money to cover the shortfall of another agency. Earlier in the year, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission awarded $2.4 million in additional funding to the Main Street/Highway 92 project to cover cost escalations.

A middle school can be built in half the time and at half the cost at the current location of Cunha Middle School, compared to using either alternative site.  That’s the finding of the Cabrillo Unified School District’s Site Professional Advice Committee.

The committee considered three greenfield scenarios in addition to building at the current site of Cunha Middle School: building at Wavecrest in cooperation with Wavecrest Village LLC, building independently at Wavecrest, and the so-called Podesta site located between Half Moon Bay High School and Highway 1.

The committee consisted of a dozen construction, legal, architecture, and real estate professionals.

The board will vote on the alternatives at its regular monthly meeting next Thursday, October 13. According to Superintendent John Bayless, the committee didn’t make any recommendations because that decision was the responsibility of the CUSD board. It should be an easy decision.

Cunha could be completed before construction on the other sites could even begin.

The committee concluded that all three greenfield sites would take more than six years, until 2012, to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act before the project could even be put out to bid.  CEQA processes for Cunha would take a little more than one year, and the project could be put out to bid at the beginning of 2007.  Cunha could be completed in time for the beginning of the 2009-10 school year. The greenfield sites would be completed for the beginning of the 2014-15 school year.

The committee found four reasons why the greenfield sites would cost a lot more than Cunha.  Acquisition of the new sites would cost $2.3 to $4.8 million. Environmental costs at the new sites would exceed those at Cunha by $0.3 to $1.0 million. Construction would cost an additional $8 to $9 million. And inflation would add $13 to $15 million to the construction cost over the cost of building a school at the Cunha site.

The logistics could be handled by building the new facilities first and then moving the students into the new buildings while the original Cunha building is renovated.

The committee also addressed the claim that Wavecrest is a better site because it provides students with more space for activities. According to Thang Do of AEDIS Architecture & Planning, the usable acreage at Wavecrest is 18 acres, versus a little over 17 acres at Cunha. Dr. Bayless and the attorneys on the committee also told the board that the language of Measure K, the middle school bond measure, didn’t require that the school be built on a new site.

The executive summary of the committee’s report can be downloaded from Coastsider. Superintendent Bayless promised that two copies of the full report would be made available at the Half Moon Bay Public Library. You can buy the report from the District office for about $30.

The Coastside is going to change a lot in the next 20 years. If we don’t have a shared vision of our community, we’re going shift strategies and make incremental decisions until we have a random collection of houses and strip malls connected only by roads.

A recent survey of downtown merchants helped me understand the issues that they confront every day. And it made me realize how fragile downtown is. Everyone says they love downtown Half Moon Bay, but we haven’t really discussed what we want it to look like.  It’s important for all of us, and it’s a matter and life and death for the merchants who have invested in it.

The researchers were the downtown merchants themselves. And, although the survey was a little rough in spots, 96 of 108 surveys were returned.

Nearly half (48%) of the merchants who responded to the survey said they had been struggling to some degree over the last three years. Three-quarters depend on their spouses, savings, or even loans, to keep going. A quarter said that their business was taking a toll on their health.

It’s challenging to set up shop in Half Moon Bay. About a third say that rent is one of their biggest challenges and another 20% feel it’s hard to find the right help on the Coastside.

With Highway 92 often jammed to capacity on weekends and the price of gas steadily increasing, downtown Half Moon Bay and Coastsiders need one another more than ever.

For some reason many Coastsiders prefer the shopping centers, like Linda Mar in Pacifica and Strawflower Village. And two-thirds of downtown merchants are certain that the unfinished Harbor Village in Princeton will cost them even more customers. I’m just grateful that no more retail space is planned for Wavecrest.

Despite these obstacles, about half (46%) the downtown merchants feel that the key to their success is bringing more Coastsiders downtown. Whenever you ask people what will bring Coastsiders to downtown Half Moon Bay, you hear answers like shoes, clothing, or underwear. These items showed up in the survey, as well. That seems like an improbable solution.

Downtown Half Moon Bay is already the heart of the Coastside community.  We need to emphasize that link. For many of us who live outside of Half Moon Bay, our main connection is through Cunha or the high school.

Parents and kids spend time downtown before and after school. I became a regular member of the downtown scene when I started dropping my daughter off at Cunha. Cunha kids walk to the high school and vice versa.  If the middle school is replaced with an elementary school that serves families who already live near downtown, it could be devastating.

The kinds of activities that bring people downtown are entertainment, recreation, meeting friends, and sharing meals. Our new park, within walking distance of downtown, is critical to downtown’s success.

We need a movie theater, but we don’t need big concrete box surrounded by a parking lot in what used to be an empty field. That’s not going to bring anyone downtown. It could keep them away.  We need an old-fashioned movie theatre that opens on the Main Street sidewalk.

We have already made some mistakes, mainly in our support of cars downtown. The Bank of America Building intimidates pedestrians by turning the sidewalk into a busy intersection for their parking lot. The CCWD building is a block-long blank wall leading to another parking lot intersection. Half Moon Bay’s post office is designed to work like a freeway interchange. We can do better.

We should be thinking about people and not cars. A downtown designed for smooth traffic flow will keep us all off the sidewalk. More than half the merchants seemed to think parking downtown was inadequate.  But you can usually find a space within a couple of blocks of your destination and everyone who gets out of their car and walks a couple of blocks adds to activity on the sidewalk in a positive way.

A downtown designed for entertainment and walking will keep Baysiders in town after dark, instead of sending them home at the first whiff of fog.

Special events, like the Halloween and Fourth of July parades, Wine Walk, Pumpkin Festival, and Night of Lights should be part of our strategy for reorienting the community to downtown. But many of the merchants are alienated from them, saying they don’t generate enough foot traffic or sales. These events should be planned with downtown merchants in mind. After all, the merchants are what makes downtown a desirable place to hold these events.

The only other alternative is to become like Carmel, filled with art galleries that don’t even pay sales tax because they ship out of state. The locals in Carmel have lost their downtown. They shop in the strip malls on the edge.

Please think about what you want downtown to look like. Let’s keep it friendly to pedestrians, welcoming to locals, and open to our children. Let’s meet our friends and celebrate our successes in local restaurants. Let’s fill it with special events and remember that the downtown merchants are our hosts, and not simply a backdrop for our parties.  Buy your meat, fish, bread, and vegetables for dinner in downtown shops. And focus on keeping downtown at the heart of our community.

What’s your vision of downtown Half Moon Bay? Or downtown Montara, Moss Beach or El Granada for that matter. Please share your responses and ideas by clicking on the comment link below the headline.

Don’t tell the CCWD, but a water connection from a condemned building in Bolinas is up for auction and the price is expected to top $500,000. That’s just the hookup, not the land. There has been a moratorium on water connections in Bolinas since 1971.  The hookup is owned by an affordable housing group.