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The Transient Occupancy Tax will fund a new website promoting the county, an aggressive grant acquisition program and mini-grants to “fabric-of-the-community” groups. The Board of Supervisors also tacked an additional year onto six current arts and tourism contracts funded by the 10 percent add-on to room rates in El Dorado County. The decisions were based [...]
EDITOR: Alan Day wrote strongly recently about his objections to an EID board action, accepting updates to EID’s agreement with its employees. What he didn’t say is that the updates decrease EID’s costs and did not involve merit raises. He argued that existence of merit raises was a reason to avoid the cost-cutting actions that [...]
EDITOR: Greg Prada is again complaining about an EID budget detail — despite EID having cut the costs in question by $846,000 this year. His citation of $127,133 in salary per employee in the 2013 budget is correct, but he neglects to note the cost savings. Also, EID has held cost-of-living increases to only 2 [...]
EDITOR: Recently a number of the folks who I’m now referring to as “freighter haters” put out a blast of information that’s simply wrong. I’ve now posted a summary page on sierrafoot.org, look for the UPS freighter icon in Hot Topics. That linked page includes links to relevant source documents. The one of current interest [...]
Gadfly Greg Prada of Cameron Park has been criticizing the El Dorado Irrigation District for what he says is profligate spending on employee benefits. “While (General Manager Jim) Abercrombie asserted that without the refinancing rates would need to be even higher, he failed to disclose that the $16 million of deferred debt repayment really is [...]
Contracting authority for the general manager of the El Dorado Irrigation District may double. That was the recommendation of the District Counsel’s Office during the July 23 meeting. No action was taken, but Board Chairman Bill George said, “I think we have a consensus to bring this forward.” The item will be brought back for [...]
EDITOR: EID’s financial metrics in the past decade show a history of rising revenues and rising costs during the tenure of Ane Deister as general manager, which ended on Dec.31, 2007. Following that the history is of dropping revenues and major cost cutting, first by Interim GM Tom Gallier, then on a more comprehensive scope by [...]
Director Alan Day changed from a no vote to a yes vote Monday following a detailed presentation by wastewater engineer Elizabeth Wells. Last month Day, representing El Dorado Hills, voted against renewing the permit to operate the El Dorado Hills Wastewater Treatment Plant. The permit, issued by the State Water Quality Control Board on behalf [...]
With the El Dorado Irrigation District rejiggering its rate structure and adding on rate bumps for the next several years, it seems fashionable for freshman Director Alan Day to just say “no’ to every expenditure. But fashionable can turn into a costly disaster. A case in point in the requirement by the EPA through the [...]
Reporter Mike Roberts characterized the FIXEID Web authors as watchdogs. The analogy is apt: They’re vicious and dangerous to both EID and its customers. I’ve begun a new section on www.sierrafoot.org, titled “What’s wrong with FIXEID.” The main part in terms of size of content is a reference section, slightly over half a gigabyte of reference [...]
The roughly 4,000 recycled water customers in El Dorado Hills will see their rate calculation transform from a simple $0.00873 per cubic foot to a multifactorial equation. Like water rates, recycled rates will increase by 11 percent in 2013 and 2014, then 5 percent in 2015. A new $20 base rate is offset by a [...]
New Division 5 Director Alan Day found his chair a little squeaky after he was sworn in Dec. 12 along with Directors George Osborne and Bill George. At the public forum at the start of Monday’s meeting El Dorado Hills resident Paul Raveling criticized Day for having an “anti-EID Website” and said his “campaign arguments [...]
FOLSOM — The El Dorado County-Folsom Joint Powers Authority held its quarterly meeting Oct. 19 at Folsom City Hall to update the two jurisdictions on the status of projects of mutual interest, primarily the Highway 50-Highway 99 connector and Folsom’s developement plans for south of Highway 50. Folsom Mayor Andy Morin, who serves as chairman [...]
EDITOR: We need to re-elect Harry Norris as our El Dorado Irrigation District Division 5 director unless Alan Day can tell us very specifically what he can do better. Harry Norris’ record continues to demonstrate a focus on reality and responsibility to ratepayers. Elected in November 2003, he joined the EID board in 2004. Then [...]
El Dorado Hills and Cameron Park activists turned out in force at the July 19 El Dorado County Board of Supervisors meeting to ask the supervisors to hold off accepting a tentative redistricting map, and to argue for the creation of a pair of western, “more urban” supervisorial districts. Many left feeling that they’d won [...]
One overriding principle informs the entire process of redistricting — also called reapportionment. All new districts must be equal in population. Every other consideration is very much secondary to the primacy of equality of numbers. El Dorado County supervisors conducted a final public hearing Monday to reduce the number of alternative maps, some configuration of [...]
The redistricting process must adjust the boundaries of El Dorado County’s five supervisorial districts to equalize populations, all the while respecting its ever evolving but loosely defined “communities of interest.” County attorney Ed Knapp, who’s helping oversee the process, contends that two things are certain: It won’t be easy, and someone’s not going to like [...]
EL DORADO HILLS — Waterford residents have recalled their homeowners association board for allowing a dimensional composition roof in the otherwise tile and shake-shingled upscale El Dorado Hills neighborhood. Waterford’s Covenants Conditions and Restrictions were written in 1989 before the current generation of composition roof materials existed, and prohibit all composition roofs. The now-former board [...]
EL DORADO HILLS — Waterford Village Homeowners Association board members face a recall vote following their approval of composition roof in the otherwise tile- and shake-shingled El Dorado Hills neighborhood. Ballots will be counted during a Waterford residents-only meeting at 7 p.m. on Jan. 31 at Fire Station 85 on El Dorado Hills Boulevard. Ballots [...]
By Noel StackMother Lode NewsEL DORADO HILLS The four candidates on the ballot to replace the late Sen. Dave Cox doled out plenty of criticism and fighting words at a debate last Thursday evening,Ted Gaines, R-Roseville; Roger Niello, R-Sacramento; Barbara Alby, R-Folsom; and Ken Cooley, D-Rancho Cordova, met at the Four Seasons community room in [...]