Flood Control and Water Conservation District - Regular Meeting

All right. Are we ready, Anthony?

Yeah, we can start whenever you like.

All right. Thank you so much. Good morning and welcome to the Napa County Flood Control and Water Conservation District meeting of July 14th, 2026. May I have the roll call?

Director Alessio? Director Cottrell?

Here.

Director Di Natale?

Here.

Director Doering is excused. Director Gift is excused. Director Manfrey? Here. Director Moeller?

Here.

Director Ramos is excused. Director Coba? Here. Director Washington?

Here.

Vice Chair Gallagher?

Thank you.

Gosh, are you the chair?

Thank you for starting it off. I appreciate that. You know what?

I never can quite tell what year it is.

We work collaboratively, so, you know, mind it all.

Thanks for reminding me, Anthony. That's fine.

I thought you had discussed this. Who else wants to take a turn? So, President Rokal, thank you for that. If I can ask Maureen Tripp to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

We will move right into our consent calendar.

We have three items on consent. Item 4A to 4C.

I have not received any request to pull a consent item. If not, I'll entertain a motion to move the consent calendar.

I'm sorry, do we want a public comment?

Did I skip public comment? Okay. We'll back up. But I have it on my agenda is down below, but We will do. No, public comment for the consent items as opposed to comment for items that are not. Anybody want to comment from the public on our free consent items? Now I'll take Director Moeller's motion to move the consent calendar. And a second.

Second.

Second by Director Di Natale. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thank you very much. Now, some regular general public comment. At this time, anyone may address the board of 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 on the Napa County Flood Control and Water Conservation District as a result of any item presented. Public comment, general public comment. Welcome.

Good morning, members of the board. My name is Randy Wampler. I am a resident of Napa. I live down on Laurel Street near the Napa River. I provided written comments last meeting regarding the phase three of the Napa River Flood Control Project. Hopefully you had a chance to read those comments. This public comment really is more about a request that I'm making. Several of us are organizing members of the neighborhood, the Abajo, Riverside, Tannery Row area, to um for communication purposes on the phase three project which includes the flood wall that runs from the hat building to the amola bridge we'd like to request the napa county flood control water conservation district and board and even possibly the u.s army corps of engineers to work with us to organize a meeting for the neighborhood residents This would allow residents to hear firsthand the current plans for the engineering and design of the flood wall. And our understanding is that 35% planning phase is to be completed by the end of the summer. Although I may have just heard that that has already been reached and that following that no significant changes would be considered for the project. We believe, based on the initial information provided, that this project needs to be greatly scrutinized, with the neighborhood residents and stakeholders more involved in the engineering and design process. We have agreement with the Napa Valley Yacht Club at the end of Riverside Drive to use the facility for a neighborhood meeting, and we would hope that this could be scheduled for a weekday early evening to account for residents' work schedules. I am happy to provide any of you with my contact information for helping to organize this meeting. I do belong to the Yacht Club and have been helping with regards to the communication to the neighborhood group, and so would be happy to be an assistance for that meeting. Thank you.

Thank you, Randy. Anyone else on general public comment? Please come forward.

Hello, my name is Greg Carter. I live down by the river as well. I'm really just concerned that everybody understands that according to the flood board, The height of the wall and the setback from the river are not considered design features. Those are engineering features. They are not up for discussion with the public is what I was told. So we're going to end up possibly with a six-foot wall 40 feet from people's front doors, which is from that white wall to where Amber is sitting. Okay. And it's hard for me to believe that's even being discussed. So I do think that Rick has talked about possibly coming up with some other ideas for doing that. But the last time I had spoken, it was a six foot wall. Well, five foot three to seven foot seven, depending on where you are on the river with essentially four openings. If you're on that wall, you can't get – on the other side of the wall, you can't get out until you get around. So you've got a situation where you've got a graffiti problem, gang graffiti, which we have already, drugs. It's hard to supervise with police because there's lighting that can't get through that way. You'd have to have extra lighting. Police patrols don't walk that anymore. We had a double murder, and they did a bike patrol for – I think about a month or two, and then they quit because they couldn't afford to keep doing it. Um, anyway, uh, what I'm also asking for is somewhat what Randy is saying is a meeting to discuss the design, but also the engineering, because we just don't, we don't believe that a six foot wall, 40 feet from people's front homes, front doors, and, um, the safety concerns that come with it are reasonable for any neighborhood.

I think that's it. Thank you. Thank you, Greg.

Good morning, everyone. My name is Maureen Tripp, and I also live in a Bajo Riverside Drive area. And I think the important thing here is to recognize that the neighbors, the members at the Napa Yacht Club and the Tannery Bend business owners are stakeholders in in a different way than the general community. And there will be a public process where there will be a series of three public meetings. They may be held by Zoom, which is ideal to be showing all of the maps and answering questions, but The neighbors and the business owners have a different stake in the project. And we'd really like to ask for a separate meeting that could be structured with presentation panel moderators and that sort of thing before this goes to the general public. Thank you.

Thank you, Maureen. Anyone else?

Good morning to the Board of Supervisors, Scott Sedgley. I am also a resident in the Abajo neighborhood, and I am requesting that this plan be reviewed. As I understand it, it's over 20 years old. These plans were made and permitted back in the 90s. When Napa was a very different place, and Abajo was a different place, and the town was being utilized in different ways, perhaps 25 years ago, the best science and engineering thought that a six-foot wall while cutting off access to the river the same way you would cut off access to a freeway was a good idea. But I think that we can do better than that, given all the investments downtown, the increased tourism, the number of Airbnbs and people staying in the neighborhood. I watch people walking by on Friday nights, clearly staying somewhere nearby and hoping to walk into town. A six foot wall, as others have said, is a great place to put graffiti. It's also a great place to hide. It's also a great place to go maybe spend the night or move in or dump your trash or leave your mattress. I think we can do better than that. And I hope that the board of supervisors can keep an eye on this and engage the community and that we can make this neighborhood and this project something that's actually adding value to the downtown community rather than something that's meant to take away or destroy or cut off. This is not just a utilitarian object in a warehouse district where no one will see it. It's a place where people live. It's where I like to go walk around with my dogs, look at birds, See the river otters or the herons or the cormorants that are out on the poles and the pier posts. This is a place where I watch the boat parade. This is a place where people are engaged in both good ways and bad, as other people have noticed about the murders. The graffiti, the night activity. As a resident and a homeowner and a business owner here in Napa, I'd really like to see the neighborhood continuing to go in the direction that so many people have been taking it in, which is a safer, happier, better, kinder direction rather than one that's encouraging the worst elements. So thank you for your time. I hope that this can become something that we can collaborate on as a community to continue to improve Napa from all directions rather than something that's meant to just... Continue outmoded thinking that we don't really, other than the convenience of not having to redo anything, which I'm sure would be nice for somebody. I have to work. I understand not wanting to have to do more work. But there are indeed a lot of stakeholders in people's lives and their biggest investments at stake.

Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else on any subject not on the agenda? Thank you for your comments. And the board has received lots of communications on this subject. And I know there's been one-on-one meetings and requests for more meetings. But those, as Maureen Tripp pointed out, we will have those public meetings for an accurate and consistent dialogue and how we move forward with this project. So thank you for your comments.

And chair, I'm going to add something to this down when we get down to the board of directors, future agenda items. I'm going to make a request based on the public comment, just so you know.

Thank you. Thank you.

I won't do it now, but I'll wait for it.

Thank you. We're down to district manager and engineer's report and announcements. Item nine.

Two.

Good morning, Rick Thomas, your district manager. Just have a few comments. I could find my comments, where are they? So this morning you, you would have received notice of a special meeting on August 4th at nine o'clock. So we needed that for an ongoing litigation. So hopefully most board members can attend that. We may or may not need our regular August 18th meeting due to some other contracts we need to get approved for the board approval. So stay tuned on that. So we might actually have two meetings in August if, if that's OK with the board. And the only other comment I have is you may may have already heard, I'm actually retiring. So if we do have our August 18th meeting, that will be my last meeting. And I hope to introduce you to my replacement, who I feel will be a great asset to the district. So hopefully we actually do have that opportunity to have that August 18th meeting. It's actually really good timing for that. But I will still be here or at least one of the, if we have one meeting, I'll be here in August, but I will not be here in September. So stay tuned on that. And I'm going to let Andrew comment if he has any. Do we have to do that? Yeah.

I can see it on the agenda. I don't know. I don't think it's, I don't, you know, you got the agenda.

I don't know. Maybe you could try. Yeah. Yeah, it's a little bittersweet, but I have some other adventures that I want to embark on for a while. But more on that later, I guess.

Congratulations.

Yeah, thank you.

Andrew Butler, District Engineer. I'll give a short update on the construction project. We are looking to pour our first sections of the floodwall footing this week. We've also started our in-water work under the Lincoln Avenue Bridge over the Napa River, installing some additional stabilization for the bridge for post-floodwall projects. I can take any questions on that. Thank you, Andrew. Any questions from the board?

Chair?

Yes, sir.

Thank you. Thanks for letting us know. What part exactly is that going to be and what's the distance? You said underneath the Lincoln Bridge?

Underneath Lincoln Bridge, we're doing some additional stabilization, like installing additional riprap because the velocities down the river are a little higher once the floodwalls are in. So we have to stabilize it a little more. We're doing that work right now. And then the first sections of the floodwall footing goes from River Terrace Inn up to close to Wall Street. And it's about 700 feet of floodwall. We're doing sections of it and then we'll finish the other sections for that piece. And then the wall will be poured.

Okay. And is it similar to what we've heard in public comment that this will be a six-foot cement wall from ground up? Or is it, I don't recall seeing a design on it, so I'm just curious what it's going to look like.

Yeah, the wall varies in height. There's also a waterside trail going in, but it varies in height from about four and a half feet to a little over six feet.

Thank you, Andrew. Any other questions, comments? Anything from the public? Thank you. We will now go to the Board of Directors, reports and announcements. I know Director Alessio had something.

Yeah, thank you, Chair. I have to say that I think it's, you know, the Napa way is really one of collaboration, transparency, and obviously, you know, communication. We always respect and always strive for higher ideals, and then oftentimes we achieve it. We've seen this in the flood project in downtown Napa, and that took community residents that said we can do better we need to do better we can't just settle with and no offense to the engineers and we have engineers here but um and it can't be engineering alone and um because this this area in particular that the bajo area and some other areas frankly um they're they're so important to our community i mean it's a living river um it has you know the wildlife there, the community members, the visitors that all kind of interchange, interact, whether it's directly or indirectly. A Bajo area specifically is a historic area, and I know there's a local historian that also gives a captain's river walk tour that would be impacted on this too, depending on the final results. I think it's really important that we engage with the neighbors in particular in this area. And Zoom is fine, but I also think we need to provide it in person and maybe more than one in-person meeting. We need to get this right because this is going to last a very, very long time. And that is a special neighborhood. It's had a couple, you know, it's had its incidents, you know, with the murders and that was tragic. But most of all, it's people go to the river to enjoy it. It's that body, mind, spirit connection with the river that they're going to lose. If we don't do this in a way that's a little bit more allows for more engagement and connection, and has more design elements. I believe we can do this. Will it take more time? Yeah, it'll take more time. Will it cost more money? It may, but it may also be the best path forward, which I think it probably will be the best path forward. So I'm really interested in getting design, having the community meetings, seeing designs, I don't recall seeing a design and maybe I missed it and it was in the packet for this current stretch. So I'm bad on me, but you know, we need to see designs when they really interact and they, they compete with public interest. So I appreciate that. And I'll be at those meetings at least one.

Thank you. Comments from vice chair Gallagher.

You'll let me talk now. Thank you, Member Alessio. I agree that we should be looking at this group as a little bit different in terms of stakeholders. These are the neighbors, both the businesses and the residents of this neighborhood. And, you know, I'm very interested in this. I'm I'm had a lot of conversations with the neighbors. It's my supervisorial district. It's also the district of council member Narvaez. So I'd like to make sure he gets involved at some point as well. I THINK IT WOULD BE A GREAT IDEA TO HAVE AN IN-PERSON MEETING AND I THINK WE'LL HAVE TO STRUCTURE THAT VERY CAREFULLY BECAUSE OF COURSE WE CAN'T ALL BE THERE. WE HAVE A PUBLIC MEETING, BROWN ACT RULES TO FOLLOW. SO HAVING A COMMUNITY MEETING WITH SOME STAFF PRESENT, WITH THE APPROPRIATE REPRESENTATIVES THERE, BUT BEING CAREFUL THAT WE ARE NOT CREATING A SITUATION THAT'S DIFFICULT FOR OUR ATTORNEY. so that we can actually just have some discussion and talk about the neighborhood and talk about the special needs of that neighborhood and also how this part of the project is different than other parts of the project and potentially talk through what the different options might be given the fact that this was designed and engineered quite a while ago. We do hear from our staff that things get updated as... as they need to be but i think it's good for everybody to take a look at that and understand that and and see kind of how we got to where we are today um so i would like to ask that we do that or if we need to agendize that and talk about it more that we do that so kind of leave that to staff and to our council to determine whether or not we what we need to do to go forward okay thank you director manfred

I'm going to steal your mic. Okay. I just want to pile on, I guess, and say I think a public meeting is a good idea. Thank you for supporting that from a couple of my colleagues. This obviously is a lot of interest and one of the best ways to have that in-depth discussion where people can get their questions answered. in detail is in a format that's different than this one. And so, yeah, so like a workshop type town hall type meeting, I think could go a long way in moving this forward in a way that works for the community. And I guess I'll just add in that there are a lot of new ideas for ways to structure flood and tide management projects in the past 20 years that are now more proven than they were back then, and I know there's not a lot of horizontal space in the reaches we're looking at, but it's worth thinking through. And then I also wanted to just note that our North Bay Watershed Association chair of the past few years has stepped down, so there's going to be a change in leadership there. No news to report yet. It will happen at the next meeting.

Thank you.

Thank you. Yes. For my notes, and I might be a little late on this, the young lady that was speaking, I didn't get your name from my notes so I could keep you on my record. Is it possible I get her name? Last speaker in the back. The young lady in the white, yes.

You need to say your name when you come up to the podium.

Sarah Page. Thank you. And thank you for your comment.

All right. Well, moving forward on our board of directors reports and announcements on this. non-agendized meeting of some of the directors with the neighborhood. I guess I'll leave that to my supervisors that represent that district and possibly our council member, if that's kind of what you're thinking to do, kind of doing a non-agendized meeting. But the risk is inconsistent information. So that's generally like a plan that brings in, as was mentioned, the business owners and tannery and all those other stakeholders. There needs to be a consistent message out there. So just make sure when you have these discussions that we're working with staff so accurate information goes out. Thank you. And that was a future agenda item? Well, kind of, sort of, but not really on the agenda.

Chair, do you think we can bring it back onto agenda for a follow-up? I think that's, I think the director, I remember Gallagher said that. So it's just not out there. At some point, it comes back here. It doesn't have to be date determined, but maybe just a follow-up after the community discussions to learn more.

Well, Rick won't be here, so we'll have to get his successor to arrange that. Yeah. All right.

Anything else from our directors?

This time we'll go into closed session. Can I ask legal counsel to provide the required announcements for closed session?

Thank you. The district board will be going into closed session on the items listed in section 12, subsections A through C. The APNs and parties are listed. These all concern conferences with real property negotiator, conference with legal and legal counsel regarding existing litigation.

Thank you. Adjourned to closed session.

sorry you guys can start the meeting okay um our district board met in closed session on items 12 a through c and there's nothing to report at this time thank you