November Special District Roundup
Eden United Church helps needy students and parents of HUSD, HARD is renovating Sulphur Creek, and Falcon Force Inc. wins a bid to tackle BART's pigeon problems.
November Special District Roundup
This is the November installment of the Special District Roundup. Once a month we do a brief overview of some of the different Special Districts that cover the Hayward city limits. They usually have some kind of special purpose, like transit or parks or education. If there’s a Special District we’re not covering that you’d like us to cover, let us know! Check your property taxes to see which ones you’re paying into in your area!
Hayward Unified School District (HUSD)
HUSD is fairly quiet this month because of the Thanksgiving/Thankstaking/Autumn Harvest holiday, but we’ll give you what’s there.
Lights Really Cost That Much?
The new Performing Arts Center at the Mt. Eden High School is going along and the School Board approved the bid for the lighting at the Center to a total of over $317,000. It should be done in February (though if there’s a construction project that’s finished on time in the last few years, we’d love to know about it).
The Performing Arts Center is, ostensibly, supposed to be for use by the general public. We assume that this project is taking its cues from the Castro Valley Performing Arts Center, which is attached to the Castro Valley High School campus. Given the geographic spaciousness of the City, it remains to be seen how much this is going to be used by community groups or non-high school performances, but even if it does, you’re definitely going to have to drive there. Lookit all that parking!
What’s Eden United Church Doing In My School District?
There’s definitely something here that initially raises some red flags, seeing a church having an MOU with the School District, but fear not:
Eden United is pretty great. They seem like a really progressive church and do a lot of great things.
They’re just holding a grant that has to do with students, so no money from the school is going their way.
The program is using money coming from, I assume the County (the MOU mentions District 2), to give money to Unaccompanied Immigrant Youth and Children of Migrant Families so that they can be paid to go to school or do workforce development, depending on whether they’re students or parents. There’s also $500 college scholarships to 4 students and 4 parents/caregivers, so this is really just helping out some of the most vulnerable students and parents, which is great.
There’s also lots of programming and services coordination going on that Eden United will take care of, so it’s hard to get mad at this. The only things that’s depressing is how this isn’t something that’s just… done for everyone who needs it with our tax dollars.
Where’s the Bullying Data??
We would have loved to have known more about the agenda item titled “Bullying Data Prevention, Response, and Student Supports” but there was no presentation saved, and ever since the HUSD Board moved to a different YouTube channel for their recordings, it’s been really difficult to find them and the link they have on their Board page appears to go to a channel that doesn’t exist. So… whoops!
Hayward Area Recreation and Park District (HARD)
New Rules for Parks and Facilities
The HARD Board looked at some new rules for the parks and facilities. According to the Staff report, it was mostly an administrative update and nothing really substantive was changed. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a red-lined version of the ordinances to actually check what was changed to make sure that’s the case. But in the spirit of inquiry, I thought I’d share out some rules that you may or may not have known about:
Inflatable bouncers, jumpers or the like are not permitted on District property except at designated “Jumper Pads” and only by persons in possession of a valid District Jumper Permit to use the Jumper Pad. Permit holders must comply with all rules of Jumper Pad use as outlined on the permit and as posted at Jumper Pad. Generators used for the purpose of these bounces, jumper or the like, and approved under Section 8(e), above, may not be used for any additional purpose other than to inflate the object specified in the permit. Failure to comply with the posted Jumper Pad Rules or rules outlined on the Jumper Permit shall constitute a violation of these Regulations.
Now, I’m not even sure what a “Jumper Pad” is, but the idea that you need a District Jumper Permit to use a bounce house feels ludicrous. I’m sure it’s for insurance reasons, but a Jumper Permit sounds made up.
Also, in case you were ever thinking of climbing any trees at a HARD park, apparently that’s against the rules: “While on District property no person shall… climb any tree, fence or wall, nor stand or sit upon any monument, vase, fountain, railing, train track, fence, or any other property not designated by the District for such purposes” Again, probably for insurance, but this country is full of litigious fun-killers.
And finally, you can’t post any ads in parks either: “No person shall leave or deposit on District Property any handbills, circulars, pamphlets, papers, or advertisements, or post or affix the same to any tree, vehicle, fence or structure on District Property.” Probably for cleanliness, but the parks could make great locations for community notice boards. Maybe something for them to consider in the future.
Palma Ceia Park Bid Awarded
Palma Ceia Park, a People’s Budget awarded project, has gotten a contractor to handle the job. With bids ranging from $824,000 to $1,620,000, HARD settled on (you guessed it) the cheapest one. I don’t doubt that JPB Designs, Inc. is a fine company, but the number of times the lowest bid has delays and cost overruns that cause further delays has really soured me on public agencies always going for the cheapest bid.
Construction is supposed to start in Fall 2023 (so… already?) and finish by Summer of 2024, assuming all goes according to plan. Keep an eye out, if you’re in the area, to see if things finish on time.
Hayward Area Shoreline Planning Agency (HASPA) Gets New Members
If you’re a fan of the Hayward Shoreline, the agency that administers it will be getting two new members (boy, is it a Frankenstein’s monster of other agencies) and likely a bigger budget to go with it. Joining the existing agencies of HARD, the City of Hayward, and the East Bay Regional Park District (EBRPD), the Oro Loma Sanitary District and the Alameda County Mosquito Abatement District will also be joining this Voltron of agencies.
For those interested in what each will be paying into the HASPA, the proposed dues are:
This is mostly an administrative update, but if you’re interested in what happens to the Hayward Shoreline, and I’m sure there are those of you out there who are, these are the folks who will be deciding what happens to it.
Sulphur Creek Renovation
Okay, so this is technically outside of the City limits, but part of the property is inside the lines and it’s right on the border, so… whatever.
HARD is pitching a $678,000 renovation of Sulphur Creek Nature Center for an outdoor classroom, an amphitheater, signage, a kiosk, and seating near the creek. This was, once again, the lowest possible bid (we really need to check if they’re required to take the lowest, like BART is), but the proposed changes look pretty nice.
While we’re not personally familiar with Sulphur Creek, the people of Hayward deserve nice things… even if it’s technically in Fairview.
BART Board of Directors
That’s A Lotta Birds!
If you’ve ever ridden BART, you know there’s a lot of birds and bird droppings. So, of course, there’s a plan to keep the birds away. And, according to the latest BART Board agenda, it’ll cost $2,685,000 over 5 years to deal with the problem! Here’s the reasoning: “In order to maintain our commitment to our integrated pest management program, this is a cost effective and environmentally-friendly solution to biologically control the bird/pigeon populations throughout the District.”
From the euphemistic language, I’m guessing there’s going to be a lot of birds of prey roaming around eating some pigeons at specific BART stations over the next 5 years. Keep your eyes out for that.
Also, we’re not going to lie to you, part of the reason for this write-up is because the company which got the bid is called Falcon Force, Inc. and apparently there were 110 small businesses that exist to deal with these kinds of bird issues? No joke, 110 “certified Small Businesses” and 10 “firms” answered the call for this bid. Which feels like there’s a whole world of bird management out there that I know nothing about, and that’s an amazing thing.
Where’s the Budget Revise?
There’s an item on the agenda that is discussing the FY 23 Year-End Budget Revision, but the links don’t work on the PDF agenda, and the whole item is gone from the main site. Not sure what’s going on here, but I’m going to assume, for the moment, that it was pushed off. We’ll see.
Performance Report
There was also a HUGE performance evaluation report for the whole system. The presentation is massive and has a lot of graphs and data in it. A few takeaways that we noticed:
Ridership is recovering, very slowly; Trains are also increasingly on-time. Neither is where BART wants yet, but they’re getting better and that’s good news.
Most delays are caused by “Police and Security”, but the number of delays every month is going down a lot.. though there was a big spike due to heat in the summer so… we’ll see how next summer goes.
There’s only 197 Legacy cars left in the fleet (compared to 596 new ones), so keep an eye out for these increasingly rare specimens while you can.
Customer Satisfaction is hovering at around 75% with most of the complaints being about Service, then Police are next.
Bike thefts are way down, Auto Thefts and Burglaries are down (a bit), and although BART Police Presence is way up (almost 90% increase), Crimes Against Persons is also up.
Finally, there was a slide on their “Progressive Policing” which should, in all honesty, not be a Police thing at all:
Over 4,000 wellness checks. That’s a LOT of people needing non-policing activity that have to call on the Police. Just saying… maybe cops ain’t the need here.
AC Transit
Let’s Get Some New Buses!
AC Transit is getting 50 new buses and, even better, they don’t have to pay very much for them! They’re getting the 50 buses from Gillig (once of Hayward, now of Livermore), for $35,000,000. But luckily, $32,000,000 is coming from the Federal Transit Administration and Bridge Toll revenue, so 50 buses for $3,000,000 sounds like a good deal to me.
The main reason is because they’ll be more fuel (and emissions) efficient and work toward their Zero Emission Bus Transition Plan. And although you may be thinking that you may as well go all the way there, presumably AC Transit retires buses pretty regularly as they wear out and would have to replace them anyway since they get so much use. Seems like a good deal, even though I’d rather a direct transition to emission-free transit (do you hear that train whistle?).
Ward Elections Madness
New wards are coming to AC Transit this next election cycle. And no matter what, with the new districting boundaries, Hayward is going to be in Ward 6. And, no matter what, we’re going to vote on a new Director for Ward 6 in 2024. That’s the important bit.
We’re also going to be Ward Buddies with Newark, an uninhabited portion of Fremont to make us connect with Newark, and Fairview. I was under the impression that we might be with Cherryland, but unless they goofed the maps this time around, that’s not the case.
So, be prepared to vote for a new AC Transit Director for our brand new Ward 6 in 2024!