Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Flood Control Legs Missing

What else is missing, beside what is mentioned here, is any work towards actually providing serious flood control infrastructure to reach the gold standard protection level of 500 years, and that would be the lack of any funds to develop dams, particularly the Auburn Dam.

An excerpt.

Peter Schrag: Prop. 1E: California's one-legged flood control stool
By Peter Schrag - Bee ColumnistPublished 12:00 am PDT Wednesday, September 27, 2006


As our political culture goes these days, Proposition 1E, the proposed $4.1 billion flood prevention bond on California's November ballot, is just another piece of ordinary business.

It promises enough in levee repairs and other flood control structures to make it look as if the governor and the Legislature are really doing something. It will be repaid from the general fund and doesn't seem to call on anyone to pay higher taxes.

And it doesn't ask anything in the way of additional responsibility or costs from developers or property owners in the sinking floodplains of the Central Valley.

What a deal.

A package of bills in the Legislature in the summer would have imposed some additional checks on the rampant development in flood-prone areas. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland, bowing to the building industry, quietly mugged them. The next day the builders kicked in a half-million dollars to a Perata-controlled campaign committee