Flood Control and Water Conservation District - Regular Meeting

Chair, you can proceed whenever you're ready. Thank you so much. Well, welcome everyone to our June 9th board meeting for the Flood Control and Water Conservation District of Napa County. We apologize we're a little bit late. My clerk advised me a long time ago that we can start late, we can just never start early. But I do apologize for our little late start, but we're ready to go. So if we could have roll call, please. Director Alessio?

Present. Director Cottrell? Here. Director Di Natale? Here. Director Doran? Here. Director Gift?

Present.

Director Manfrey?

Here.

Director Moeller? Here. Director Ramos? Here. Director Washington? Here. Vice Chair Gallagher? Here. Chair Sedgley?

Here. Thank you. And if I could ask Maureen Tripp to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance this morning. Thank you, Maureen. On our agenda, you will see we're going to move right along. We don't have any presentations. We don't have a consent calendar. And we will move right into public comment. So this time for anyone may address the board, the Napa County Flood Control and Water Conservation District regarding any subject not on today's agenda. over which the board has jurisdiction. Individuals will be limited to three minutes presentation. No action will be taken by the board at this meeting as a result of any items that are presented. So public comment. I don't know if we have speaker cards or we can just come up to the podium. General public comment. You can have that one.

The other podium. Good morning. My name is Lisa Poppin, and I'm speaking here today as a resident of the 500 block of Brown Street in the Napa Abajo neighborhood. It's within the district footprint of the south extension of this project, and I'm here to ask this board to pause and think carefully about what you're building and what could permanently destroy the neighborhood. Napa Abajo is a designated historic district, one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city. The Victorian mansions along Riverside Drive, Brown Street, and surrounding areas were built in the 19th century steamboat captains who lived beside this river by choice. farmhouses bungalows and family apartments have joined them over this 175 years on any given morning residents walk to the end of the block and look out at the water children and adults fish at great fishing spots along the river and neighbors chat along as they walk their dogs the river is not scenery for us it is the reason the neighborhood exists I reviewed the engineering drawings from the south extension, the preliminary drawings. They show a continuous sheet pile wall, a hard industrial steel barrier running the entire length of Riverside Drive and beyond. The homes behind this five to six foot wall are cut off completely from the water, blocking views, inviting blight, and changing the fabric of the neighborhood. When I raised these concerns with the district, I was told that the 1998 General Design Memorandum governs the design, implying the decision has already been made. I want to address that directly. The GDM established general parameters. It was not a neighborhood-specific design that voters approved. Measure A was a mandate for flood protection, not for this specific wall on this specific street. And critically, the GDM also governed the downtown reach, where the Army Corps originally proposed high flood walls. That design was changed because the community demanded something better. The Living River approach that made this project nationally famous was the departure from the GDM. The district cannot cite both the GDM as the ceiling for the Abajo while taking credit for overriding it downtown. Those two positions cannot both be true. I'm not asking you to stop flood protection. I'm asking for three things. A dedicated community meeting for Abajo residents with time to impact design. a review of alternative designs that protect homes without walling off the river, and a binding commitment to genuine public river access built concurrently with any wall. The river made that neighborhood. Please do not let this project unmake it. Thank you.

Thank you, Lisa. Next speaker.

I'm relatively new to the neighborhood. My name's Linda Scheibel, and I live at 565 Brown Street.

Did you get a little closer to the microphone? OK.

My name's Linda Scheibel. I live at 565 Brown Street, right on the corner of Division. We look out on this Halcyon River with beautiful fowl. And as she said, lovely, in her wonderful speech, we watch neighbors and dogs and how much people enjoy that part of the river. I'm just going to read what I have down here because I haven't done that kind of extensive investigation yet. What I want to say is I support flood protection, but I'm very concerned about a permanent six-foot wall, as per the previous speaker, along the riverfront. Has the county demonstrated that this wall is still necessary given the flood control improvements already made upstream at the Oxbow and along the creek? That's a big concern. Has it been revisited? Were residents aware when they voted on this measure that it could result in a six-foot wall blocking river views and limiting access, really limiting access? Our view would be completely blocked. We would be looking at a wall, which would gravely impact the value of our property, I'm afraid. What alternatives were considered that would provide flood protection with less impact on views, access, and neighborhood character? Has the county evaluated the impact on property values, quality of life, and public enjoyment of the riverfront? That's a huge one, I think. What options are available to residents who want this project paused for further review? Is there a petition process? How many signatures would be required to accomplish this? Can this project be reconsidered or put to a public vote, a re-vote before a final decision is made? We're asking for transparency, supporting data, and meaningful public input before a permanent decision is made. Thank you.

Thank you, Linda. Anyone else? Well, thank you. I'll just respond in saying that there's a lot more to come on this phase of the flood project. Pretty much our efforts now for staff and the board are north of Oxbow. That's under construction now. And of course, the next phase will be looked at just as critically and negotiated just as heavily as all the phases have been. So thank you for your comments, but there's no permanent design decision that I know of yet. So more to follow on that. Thank you. All right, so our next item on the agenda is a administrative item, an update on progress of what I just mentioned, the north phase.

Good morning. Rick Thomasser, district manager.

Andrew Butler, district engineer. We'll do a short update on the flood walls north of the bypass construction effort, and then also a brief update on the design progress of the Imola to Hatt flood walls. We can go to the next slide. So not too much happening on the site quite yet. We have cleared where the flood wall is going to be built on the south of Lincoln alignment. Next slide. We also have done some reconstruction of storm drains that go under or penetrate the flood wall. We actually had to rebuild those and then slurry encase them so that they won't be a conduit for water underneath the walls. Next slide. This is actually the trench that they're digging now for the flood wall foundation. And there's also a trench to inspect the subgrade there. Next slide. We are finding quite a lot of debris while we're digging here, a lot of old concrete rubble. Also, it looks like an old water heater there. If anyone's missing one of those, you can come see me after. But we're taking care of that as we move along. I also wanted to share a couple of renderings that we had done for this wall. This is a reach behind Imperial Way, one of the properties that abuts the wall. So it's a little hard to see, but you can see a hint of what the flood wall could look like over there. Next slide. And then this is actually the frontage along Lincoln Avenue with our floodgate at the Ace and Vine business. And the flood wall has a little more detail on the frontage there. And then a quick update on our, I'm all at a hot flood walls. We are going to be at 35% design in August. We are planning our first public design review meeting. It's probably late August or early September to reintroduce the approved project. The basis of design of that project is the 1998 guidelines that we came to a partnership with the community, the core and the flood district on. But as we do our detailed design, we're of course looking for ways to improve the project and mitigate any concerns in the community. That's all I have.

Thank you so much. Public comment on that report? Bring it back to the board. This is just an administrative update. No action required. Any comments from Board Member Alessio?

Thank you. I think for this presentation, I think this is the first time we've actually seen renderings of the flood wall. It's been basically what our imagination has been assuming this entire time. And so on that note and following public comment, I think that's what the public is concerned about in the Baja neighborhood, having a six foot high cement wall. Is that what I'm seeing there? It looks like about six feet high and it's a cement wall.

That's the north wall. The southern wall will look a little different. It is planned to be made out of sheet pile, although we are looking at aesthetic treatments that we can put onto that wall. So it looks a little different in the south due to the construction method, but we are planning to do renderings for the southern area as well when we get to a good point in the design to share those with the community.

I would just ask that we strive to see if there's another alternative, one that allows nature to come in and for people to connect with nature, being the river and all things connected to the river. It really has become a beautiful river. I understand we're here to prevent a natural disaster. for folks, too. But if we can, again, we're so good here about thinking outside the box and pushing ourselves to the next level. I'd really like to see an attempt at that.

The one thing that I do want to, one, the wall is not a uniform six feet everywhere. So it varies. It's a uniform elevation or it actually isn't uniform. It's based on a hydraulic model. addressing a few of the comments we received this morning. It definitely is an updated model. It will include all the improvements that we've done to date. We actually did get some good news that the wall will be slightly The required heights will be slightly lower than the original GDM design, so the wall was always part of the design because that's the way you achieve flood control. There will be access. The riverbank itself is not going to be changed. The floodwall is set back from the riverbank, so all the fishing that goes on, for example, can continue to go on. there will be access points throughout the whole reach so it won't definitely be a walled off river that you you can't access a public trail will go alongside the entire river frontage the aesthetic is the challenge we acknowledge that so it's you know we're we're not blind to the fact that it's going to be different than no wall. But the wall is actually what contains the water. So from a very simple standpoint, if you don't want the water to overtop the bank, you need a device to stop it. But we are going to be looking at alternatives to whether or not that height can be attained only during flood periods. So there's a variety of things we're actually looking at. And the reason I want to emphasize what the chair said, that the design is nowhere near done. It's still preliminary. We will have a public meeting at 35% before we advance the design to detail. And what we hope to show the community at that point is the fruits of our investigation of these various alternatives with explanations of why things have to be what they have to be, right? So hopefully that kind of gets at some of those concerns. Yeah, I think so.

Okay. Well, I appreciate your thoroughness and thoughtfulness. Right. And I do want to acknowledge that this northern section of the flood wall is the backyards for most of those properties versus the Abajo regional front yard. So there's a little bit of a difference there. So at least it's on the backyard and I think a lot of those properties are a little bit higher than maybe the flood wall will be. So maybe not quite the impact, but, you know, always looking at, you know, safety factors, but there's also quality of life, right, and property value. So thank you for that.

Yeah. We definitely are trying to protect life and property is the reason we have a flood control project. That was the impetus to do it. But the Living River guidelines were clear, and this was part of the negotiated Living River project. There was always going to be a wall. The downtown reach had its urban reach wall, the riverfront that we all enjoy today. This section had a flood wall. The opposite side of the river has the widening and the terracing. But in Riverside Drive, the challenge is we're dealing with a very constrained space. We have to have a road. We're already looking at the road becoming a one-way road. So we're squeezing in. We're doing the best we can with the limited space. But I just, again, want to emphasize we're going to do everything we can to deal with that. As an example, the one I'm rendering, I don't know if we could put it back up, Anthony, the PowerPoint with the Ace and Vine, the frontage along Lincoln for the work we're doing now. Back to the other one. Yeah. If you notice, it's a little hard to see, but near the gates, we've actually lowered the wall. The purpose of that was actually as cars come in and out of the gate area for them to see, to make it safe for them to enter the roadway. but also just an aesthetic. So during a flood, we'll have to add sections of wall stop logs in between those pilasters to bring the wall to the full height. So we can look at things like that in various sections. And we have a whole team of architects, engineers working on the – design aesthetic that, you know, so as we advance the design, we'll get better and better. So more to come.

I think Vice Chair Gallagher.

Um, thank you. I also just wanted to know, um, you know, obviously I'm not an engineer and I don't know anything about how 1 section of the project affects the other. But I am curious that now that you have northern sections built, and then you have others in construction. Have you modeled what that will do in terms of flooding for the Riverside Drive area and if that impact changes the way that you would potentially build that portion of the project?

Well, absolutely. It's all the entire project is we consider it one project, even though we're building it in. in phases, but there's a hydraulic model that we continuously keep updated and it gets updated with required, you know, Corps of Engineers guidance updates and things like that. Any new hydraulic information, as I mentioned, We just received a memo from our hydraulic engineer indicating that the required heights to achieve the regulatory levels were a few inches lower in this reach compared to the GDM design. So the flood wall alignment and the basic, you know, location of the wall and the basic height of the wall are basically the same since 1998. We've probably added more openings than were ever considered in 1998. I've been here for 20 years, and I know that the policy of the district used to be little opening in the wall as possible because every opening has to be filled during a flood somehow with a limited staff and things like that so we we always were opposed to too many openings but we're this reach because of the nature of it we realized that that wasn't going to be reasonable you know we were going to have to have multiple openings basically at every intersection for the public to access the river and things like that but but yeah the the

don't know if there's anything more you want and that's a continued focus um during design we continuously update the model to make sure we've got those flood wall heights as low as we can get them so yeah we'll be continuing to look at that okay thanks i really look forward to what the alternatives might be to you know assure the community feels comfortable with what what is there because it's this is a bit of a tough one definitely

So, absolutely, you know, this needs to be something that works for the whole community. I also want to just check in about the level of flood risk and also related to sea level rise because this is a tidally influenced reach. And just invite you to share any thoughts you have on The the type of risk this, you know, this neighborhood faces, if it doesn't have flood walls, or if they're not adequate, or if they fail, because there's they're not sound. Because there's so many access points that are difficult to get to, like you said, with limited staff, because. i don't want our focus to be completely on aesthetics this is a real problem this community has and um as as nice as it is to have the view it also really sucks when your whole neighborhood floods and you have to you know deal with all that and it's been a long time since we've had floods like that because we have this wonderful flood project uh also the types of storms it's possible to get are worse than storms that we have had in our lifetimes And so I just invite you to speak on that if you have anything to say.

Well, one thing, too, not only are the storms worse than we've had in our lifetime, there are worse storms and floods than we're even designing for. So the standard for regulatory compliance and to meet the FEMA flood insurance rate program guidelines is a 100-year storm statistically. There can be a 1,000-year storm. So the wall has to withstand. What we don't want is to build something that's going to have a catastrophic loss, like what happened in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina is a good example. Those flood walls that were built to withstand, say, the 100-year event, but they had, I don't know what it was, a 500-year event or something like that, and the walls completely collapsed, and then the whole city was lost. So we do... And important that I think the community needs to understand is there are these regulatory requirements that the federal government issues, and it's tied to the funding. So if we want to use federal funding, which we are using significant amounts of it, we have to build a compliant project. And there are limits of things to be creative that they'll allow. You many people understand how? Communities like in the Sacramento area had there were levees that were all decertified and then people found themselves in the floodplain like Natomas is a Typical example there were levees But they couldn't be certified because the geotechnical data wasn't available how they were constructed this and that and they couldn't be certified so we have that same situation in Napa at the Lake Park subdivision is an example. There was a big levy there. It's functioned. It's been there for years. It's never been overtopped. It never collapsed, but it couldn't be certified by FEMA. So we had to do something to it and modify it. So, um, that doesn't, again, that doesn't mean that we're going to just blindly say, we don't care. You know, it has to be a six foot wall there. That's what we're getting. We're obviously not going to go there because Our staff and I know the board is quite proud of the improvements we've already made. I think every single thing that the flood project has done has been success it all functions very very well the bypasses from a hydraulic model standpoint you couldn't get any better we know exactly two inches how the river is going to function and when we need to close those gates and things like that so we hope to do more excellent work like that for this reach as well thank you great discussion

Thank you. Thank you staff for that and the update. Thank you for our interested neighborhood and community members and the press for covering this. We will move along on our agenda. We have next item eight on our agenda is a public hearing. So first we'll hear a report from city staff that can include some interaction with the board on clarifying questions. Then next members of the public will have an opportunity to provide comments. And then we will open public comment and then close and we'll deliberate. So we will start with our staff report.

Okay.

Good morning. Again, Rick Thomas, our district engineer, and I'm here with Sarah Geis, our analyst. And Sarah's going to refresh our memory on the proposed budget for this coming fiscal year.

Good morning. Okay, so I will refresh your memory with the divisions, appropriations per division. Division 8005, it's the watershed projects, $4,853,121. Division 80010, Flood Control Projects, $38,021,954. Division 80011, Napa Flood Control Project Measure A, $37,269,232. Division 80012, Flood Project Maintenance Measure A, $752,722. Division 80015, water supply contracts, $12,854,600. And Division 80100, Oakville to Oak Knoll CFD, $118,750. Total appropriations, $93,870,379. And if you have any questions, I'm happy to answer them.

Thank you so much. Generally, under public hearings, we do disclose any information that board members may have learned outside of this public hearing. So I'll just go down the line. Any disclosures on the budget topic? Nobody? No disclosures? Thank you very much. So is there anyone here wishing to address the board on the budget item? We will open the public testimony, please. You can come forward to the podium.

I live at the corner of Brown and Laurel. And it was related to the flood control. So my question just was trying to understand the interplay between the insurance that I pay, having taken the risk for living down there, and FEMA's floodplain map. And I realize I'm capped at $250,000, but I've spoken to the contractor on many occasions about what would happen if my whole bottom floor were flooded and what would it cost. And it's still not $250,000. So they changed the floodplain. There is an option for property owners to pay insurance down there. Insurance is set by a marketplace. Those people know... They've thought a lot about what the risk of my neighborhood flooding is. My rate hasn't gone up, but a fraction in the 10 years I've lived there, the people at Lloyd's don't think it's going to flood down there. anytime soon. Now obviously, the rates are going to go way up once it does flood. But right now, the concern about the flood can be mitigated to a great extent by people buying insurance. So we're creating a project that I understand we want to stop based upon a floodplain that I'm hoping is being updated. And it's not based on 30 years ago. But I would just be curious to understand how many people in the flood area actually have insurance and how much risk we're actually mitigating. Because it seems to me the insurance company understands how much risk is to be mitigated and is adjusting people's rates accordingly. That's all I wanted to say about it.

Well, thank you. I allowed you to present your comments. But this topic, this agenda item is on our budget. But I understand you were here for the earlier piece of our discussion. But thank you for the comments. And I don't know that we're in this position to answer your question. Anyone else on public comment? on the budget. Yes.

Thank you. When you present that budget, is that budget set? Does that money, for example, that you quoted on the project, the flood project, is that alterably for a flood project in other words do you have to do something with that money to mitigate what what is determined to be a flood risk in the next hundred years or can that money be moved to another project how does that work Sorry for my ignorance.

No, that's fine. My understanding is that money was approved by voters and by the Army Corps for this project. I'll let the manager clarify that.

What we're doing with this budget is just the entire flood control district's budget. It includes the flood control project. It's just one of our many things we do, but we have a watershed program. We We actually buy all the water that comes to the municipalities from the state, and that's part of the budget, too. So you heard the various divisions of the budget. To answer the specific question, Measure A funds, which is part of the revenue we're using, was approved by voters, so it can only be used for the Napa Flood Control Project as designed. There can be design changes, but it has to basically be that flood project. That money is, that sales tax is no longer in existence. We have a fund balance of possibly about $40 million or so that we'll be spending down, and it's being combined with federal funds through the Army Corps of Engineers to build both the section we have under construction, which is a big part of that large $38 or so million, is the construction we're actually doing ongoing right now, and then also the design of the Imola to Hatt flood walls. But it does – the money by no means is locked into – particular exact design it is the project it will include some type of flood protection along Riverside Drive and that's what the purpose of the funding is but it doesn't say the wall has to be sheet pile or six feet high or in any particular location so it's just it gives us it gives staff the funding needed and the consultants we need to do it the funding to do the design

Thank you. Oh, we have a question. If there's no other public comment, we'll interrupt with a question from Board Member Anne Cottrell.

Thank you. Thank you for the budget presentation. And just to, and I think this just kind of keys off of what we are just learning. And I wanted to go, I'm looking at the budget summary. Our appropriations are at 93 million and revenues at 78. And so we're using fund balances in various funds here. And so specifically for the, Um, 80011, um, the 14Million. Dollars coming out of that existing fund balance and and that, um, I think, Rick, that what you're saying is that's drawing down from that 3840Million. That we've currently got so my question is just kind of do we have a rough estimate.

of next year and the year after like are we going to be able to make that um remaining fund balance work through the next yes um yeah the quick answer is yes so so far so good um we're we're very pleased that the construction that we're undertaking right now came the low bid the the awarded contract was actually slightly below the engineer's estimate, and so our planning includes things like engineer's estimates and contingency. So, yes, our financial – Sarah assures us we'll have enough money to get through this, right, Sarah?

Yes, I've been keeping track of –

If we don't, it's all Sarah's fault. No. Okay, not fair. No, we're looking pretty good. We'll bring probably Andrew and Sarah will be in front of you in the coming months with an update on that once we start seeing what the Riverside Drive section of the project will be costing. We have an estimate on that. And we're using that. But to answer your question, yes, we still, once we have both of these projects beyond us and completed, we still should have some funding left. And we do have, you know, we need funding because there's other parts of the project we would like to build, like the Oxbow flood walls and things like that.

Thank you. And then just an attached question. In terms of maintenance, we're not looking at maintenance being funded through this pot of money.

The maintenance, there's a special maintenance fund that is separate.

That's the 80012 is the maintenance. Oh, got it. Right there. Thank you. There's about $14 million in that subdivision.

Okay, great. And so that's a separate item. Thank you.

Before I ask for a motion to close the public hearing, is there anyone else in the audience that wishes to speak on the budget? If not, I'll entertain a motion to close the public hearing. Move by Board Member Alessio. Second. Second by Cottrell. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Thank you so much. So now we're back to action on our budget item. So any further questions, discussion, or a motion? Vice Chair Gallagher moved the item. Second by Board Member Manfrey. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thank you so much. Congratulations. It's all on you now. Item 9, any updates from the district manager?

Just note that we've got still our, you haven't heard updates in a while on the couple of eminent domain cases we still have ongoing. We do expect in July and August some movement on those, and we'll need some closed sessions, so just be aware that those are coming.

um most for sure in july and possibly in august so more on that to come thank you how about directors any announcements or comments from any board member everybody quiet ready to get on with our tuesdays all right uh no closed session this afternoon so at this time we will adjourn thank you all