LAKE COUNTY >> Why would a Lake County resident vote against the opportunity to save the lake at the small price Measure S requests of its constituents? On its face, the notion seems unbelievable, considering the high importance Clear Lake”s well-being holds for the county.
But the answer is more complex. Some residents” concern over perceptions of the county”s past management of resources and assets raises a question. Given the flexibility provided by a measure that promises long dreamed of solutions for the lake, can the county be trusted to spend $2.4 million a year of the people”s money and effectively save the lake?
For some, it”s a question that drives them to print and post signs reading “No on S. It hurts working families. A big tax we can”t afford.” Some, like fisherman Sieg Taylor, are fearful the county will shut down the lake from recreational access to avoid a Quagga mussel infestation. Others are driven to ensure the county is merely held accountable, like Betsy Cawn, a decade-long scholar of acts, policies and departments affecting Clear Lake.
At the Essential Public Information Center in Upper Lake, Cawn sits on a wealth of information about Clear Lake; in the past 10 years, she has curated an impressive collection of state mandates, county ordinances, meeting minutes, grant provisions, incomplete studies and topographical maps.
But after her intensive study and involvement in the county”s management of Clear Lake, Cawn describes herself as deeply conflicted on the sales tax and her no vote on the measure represents a vote of no confidence in the authorities intended to administer the tax funds.
The Lake County Watershed Protection District (WPD) Board of Directors, which will hold fiscal control over the tax”s revenues and manage and administer the programs revenues are used for, and the Board of Supervisors, which will oversee the measure”s implementation and elect the oversight committee for the measure, are one in the same. During BOS meetings, the county”s five supervisors adjourn from being the BOS and reconvene as the WPD Board of Directors.
It”s not uncommon for the BOS to serve as members of other, dependent district boards. And yet, Measure S”s language appears to critics at least somewhat deceptive here, including provisions that the “Watershed Protection District shall recommend to the Lake County Board of Supervisors a replacement project” when a project becomes infeasible over time or is completed and that the “Watershed Protection District shall offer to the oversight committee and to the Board of Supervisors technical advice concerning program objectives and procedures, use of tax revenues and project planning relating to the allocation of tax monies to projects within its purview.”
District 3 Supervisor and WPD board member Denise Rushing said the measure was written with distinction between the BOS and WPD members in case the WPD ever becomes its own, independent district in the future, (though that option is not currently being considered, according to Rushing), and to include the WPD”s staff in the responsibilities listed in the measure.
Despite the best intentions for Clear Lake”s health, the question of accountability and transparency stems from the heavy responsibility that the measure places on the five members of the BOS and the WPD board and through the WPD”s past. Since the WPD was formed in 2005 by Senate Bill 1136 and entrusted with implementing the National Pollution Discharge System (NPDS) stormwater permit, the WPD has not produced a single, independent audit of its revenues and expenditures, although the district”s revenues were stated to be almost $2.2 million in the county”s 2012-13 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report.
Some of the revenues can be attributed to property taxes, and according to Cawn”s research of an Auditor/Controller”s report, property taxes make up more than $500,000 of the WPD”s revenues. As for the remainder, the public is left to guess where that money comes from and what it goes toward.
While Rushing argues the county”s single-page of its comprehensive annual financial report on the WPD are audit enough for the district, Cawn disagrees.
“They call that an audit, I don”t,” Cawn said.
Meanwhile, Cawn has been unable to get a hold of information that would otherwise be included in an independent audit.
“Try finding out what the assets and liabilities, obligations and discretions, authorities and constraints, policies and procedures, productivity/loss and return on investment are for the Lake County Watershed Protection District,” Cawn offered. “You can”t.”
Moreover, the WPD has never defined its scope of responsibilities or defined in a local enabling ordinance its full authorities, required competencies or regulatory mandates, according to Cawn.
Additionally, the Lake Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFco) began writing its first municipal service review (MSR) of the WPD late year, which has yet to be finalized by the commission. Although an MSR is not required to include an audit of a district, it is a standard requirement of all independent special districts funded by public revenues and suggested by the state in its definition of an MSR; the district”s MSR draft published in May only includes a budget for the district”s expenses in 2012-13.
Another deep area of concern for Cawn, as well as Taylor, is the measure”s lack of detailed plans and the county”s openness to suggestions for how the tax monies should be spent as it”s held presentations about the measure.
Mike Dunlap, who has also been involved in researching the WPD”s service capacities, believes the lack of specific plans violates the state”s Revenue and Taxation Code Section 7285.5, which requires an ordinance levying a tax to include an expenditure plan describing the specific projects for which the revenues from the tax may be expended.
Though the proposed ordinance provides a break down of how it suggests the revenue be spent over the next two years, specifically the allocation of $1 million to the Aquatic Invasive Species Prevention Program lacks anything resembling a specific plan.
“After seven years of ”effort” to come up with real prevention capability, and several years of ”effort” to get voter approval for this sales tax, we still have no lake management maps, no court-enforceable ordinance and no means of keeping vessels out of the water” Cawn stated.
“There”s a lot of interpretations people can take with this measure; everybody that looks at it read it a different way and the underlying problem its its vagueness,” Taylor said.
Rushing contends that the county does have a plan, it”s just that it needs the money from the sales tax to add the details and that no company will agree to bid on a project, such as building ramp controls, until funding can be promised.
“We have a plan, which is that a million dollars will be spent on invasive species prevention in the best way possible,” Rushing said. “We”ve reviewed the alternatives and we think that”s enough to make whatever is chosen as the best option work.”
Finally, the lack of responsibilities entrusted to the oversight committee of the tax is disconcerting for Cawn.
The measure describes the committee, composed of no more than 15 members chosen by the BOS, as being responsible for reviewing the annual proposed expenditure plan, analyzing actual expenditures and making recommendations to the BOS on needed expenditure adjustments.
In comparison, the Napa County Flood Protection and Watershed Improvement Authority, which levied a tax to restore the Napa River after 11 years of effort, defines its financial oversight committee in high detail. The committee”s responsibilities include providing the public with information regarding the manner in which expenditures of the tax have occurred and reviewing the financial impact of all projects approved by the authority and advising the public whether such projects are consistent with the purpose, spirit, intent and language of the tax”s measure, according to the Napa County website.
In the end, Cawn said she doesn”t necessarily want residents to vote against the measure as much as she wants the separate legal entity of the WPD that will spend those tax revenues to be productive and succeed in organizing to protect the entire watershed.
