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HomeMy WebLinkAboutColma Creek Advisory Minutes 03-08-16 - 1 - San Mateo County Flood Control District Colma Creek Flood Control Zone Citizen’s Advisory Committee Meeting Minutes Tuesday, March 8, 2016 I. CALL TO ORDER Brian McMinn called to order the regular meeting of the Colma Creek Flood Control Zone Citizen’s Advisory Committee at 3:04 p.m. on Tuesday, March 8, 2016, in the City of South San Francisco – Corporation Yard Conference Room, 550 North Canal Street, South San Francisco. II. ROLL CALL Present: Judith Christensen – City of Daly City Mike Futrell – City of South San Francisco Ed Bortoli, Member at Large – City of South San Francisco Gail DeFries, Member at Large – City of Daly City Richard Irli, Member at Large – City of South San Francisco Sam Bonanno, Member at Large – City of South San Francisco Sue Digre – City of Pacifica Absent: Helen Fisicaro, Chair – Town of Colma Irene O’Connell – City of San Bruno Staff in Attendance: Ann Stillman – County of San Mateo/San Mateo County Flood Control District Mark Chow – County of San Mateo/San Mateo County Flood Control District John Fuller – City of Daly City Heather Ruiz – City of South San Francisco Brian McMinn – City of South San Francisco Brad Donohue – Town of Colma Staff Absent: Jim Porter – County of San Mateo (Director of PW/San Mateo County Flood Control District) Robert Hahn – City of South San Francisco III. APPROVAL OF MINUTES Minutes of the December 8, 2015 meeting were approved. IV. PUBLIC COMMENT None. - 2 - V. DISTRICT PROJECTS, ETC.: SUMMARIZED IN A HANDOUT AND OPEN FOR ADDITIONAL DISCUSSION 1. El Camino Box Culvert and Mission Road Diversion Structure Ann advised that there are no updates on this section of the channel to report. 2. BART Co-op Project Ann advised that as it was reported at the December 8. 2015 meeting, BART has provided a permit document to the City of S. San Francisco (City) and the Town of Colma (Town) for access on BART owned property to perform maintenance work (trash clean up, weed abatement and graffiti removal tasks for the District on a cost reimbursement basis) within the portion of Colma Creek built by BART. City and Town staff have reviewed the permit document and believe that significant revisions to the terms of the draft agreement must be made before they are comfortable of signing. Town of Colma provided an update to the negotiations between BART and the cities (Colma and S. San Francisco) and believes that the attorneys are close to finalizing the terms of the agreements. 3. Colma Creek Improvements between Spruce and San Mateo Avenues Ann advised that there are no updates on this section of the channel to report except that the District will continue to monitor this section of the channel regularly for wall movement or settlement at a segment of the south wall immediately downstream of the San Mateo Avenue Bridge. 4. Mitigation Sites downstream of Utah Avenue Ann advised that the District staff and Sheriff Work Program (SWP) participants continue to perform planting, weeding, and trash pick-ups at Mitigation Sites (2a, 2b, 2c, 3 and 4). The next SWP cleanup date was scheduled for March 5, 2016 but cancelled due to the storm. District’s contractor, Ecological Concerns, Inc. (ECI), has been providing occasional watering of plants at the mitigation sites to help increase the survival rate of the planted plants. ECI is also providing other maintenance services, including plant procurement, habitat restoration, non-native plant removal, planting, weeding, and trash/sediment/debris removal at the existing mitigation sites. ECI performed the quarterly maintenance of the sites in January 2016. Additional maintenance activities will be performed in March and June 2016, once District receives permission from the USFWS as work during these periods (nesting season) could potentially impact California Clapper Rail habitats. The following table summarizes the amount of trash removed from the Mitigation Sites since 2005 and the trash pick-up dates from 2014 thru 2016. An additional 11.47 CY of trash have been removed from the Mitigation Sites since the last Advisory Committee meeting. - 3 - Year Amount of Trash Removed (Cubic Yard) Event Dates * 2016 10.37 1/2, 1/23, 2/13, 2/27 2015 38.98 1/10, 1/24, 2/7, 2/21, 3/7, 3/21, 4/4, 4/18, 5/2, 5/16, 6/20, 7/18, 8/15, 9/13, 9/19, 10/17, 11/14, 12/12 (18 times) 2014 26.34 1/25, 2/22, 4/26, 5/14, 5/17, 6/7, 6/28, 7/12, 7/19, 9/13, 9/20, 10/4, 10/25, 11/22, 12/13 (15 times) 2005 – 2013 476.76 12-19 times per year Total 552.45 * Number of event dates increased per mitigation required for Channel Wall Repair Upstream of Spruce Avenue. 5. Maintenance of Existing Channel Ann advised that the District performed a quarterly inspection of the Colma Creek Flood Control Channel on February 11, 2016 (See Maintenance Matrix Binder). Representatives from the City of South San Francisco accompanied District staff during the inspection. Issues requiring enforcement by the City or the Town of Colma have been forwarded to the respective entity. The District continues to monitor the north channel walls immediately upstream and downstream of the Produce Avenue Bridge. In December 2015 and in anticipation of the El Nino storms, District installed steel plates at 3 of the 4 locations with the most severe separations to prevent further erosion of soils behind the sheetpile walls. The steel plates sealed the gaps created by the separations of the sheetpile panels and the bridge abutment (see photos in Maintenance Matrix Binder). A project (Project #3 on the draft Capital Improvement Program presented to the Committee at the March 10, 2015 meeting) to investigate the cause of the wall movements and evaluate repair has been budgeted for FY 2015-16. District staff will work to obtain proposals from the consultants that currently have on-call agreements with the County to perform this study. The permit applications for the long-term maintenance permit were submitted to the regulatory agencies on December 29, 2015. On February 10, 2016, District staff attended an inter-agency meeting setup by Horizon Water and Environment (Horizon) to follow-up with the agencies on the long-term maintenance permit. A copy of the presentation prepared for the meeting is attached. Agency representatives from the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), San Francisco Bay Commission (BCDC) were in attendance. The Public Notice dated February 4, 2016 was issued by the USACE for public comments which will close on March 4, 2016. The next step is for the USACE to complete the environmental review and initiate consultation with National Marine Fisheries Services (NMFS) and US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). Based on the discussions at the meeting, we do not anticipate major issues with NMFS and USFWS. 6. Utah Avenue to Bay Ann advised that as previously reported, the Colma Creek Flood Control Zone Flood Wall Project Report (Utah Avenue to Navigable Slough) has been completed by WRECO. The report concludes that for the extreme condition of 100-year tide condition with Sea Level Rise (SLR) projection of 3.0 elevation increase, the wall height needs to be constructed to an elevation of 15.0 feet. WRECO recommends that fiberglass - 4 - composite sheet piles be used for construction of the right bank and left bank (looking downstream) or additional earthen embankment on top of the existing levee for construction of the left bank. A hand-out summarizing the alternatives and recommendations presented in the report were provided at the meeting for discussion. The report has been forwarded to the TAC members and discussed at the January 12, 2016 TAC meeting as noted below. The District submitted a Notice of Interest (NOI) to the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (CalOES) in response to the recently announced FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP) on January 29, 2016 for consideration of partially funding this project. CalOES notified the District on February 10, 2016 that our NOI was determined to represent an eligible HMGP activity and extended a formal invitation to the District to develop and submit a full application for HMGP funding. Applications are due to CalOES by June 16, 2016. The application requires a benefit-cost evaluation be conducted. Projects where benefits exceed costs are generally considered cost-effective. FEMA will fund cost effective hazard mitigation projects that include sea level rise estimates. For the Colma Creek project, including the SLR design requirements in the benefit-cost analysis means that the flood walls will need to be constructed to the elevation of 16 feet and provide the 3’ minimum freeboard (FEMA requirements) on both banks over a 900’ section of the channel. The NOI estimated the total cost of the project would be $2,000,000 and requested grant funds of $1,500,000. The HMGP requires a minimum local match 25% ($500,000) which would be from the Colma Creek Zone fund. 7. Clean Water Action “ReThink Disposable” (Formerly known as “Taking Out the Trash” Pilot Project) Ann advised that there are no updates to report. 8. Tracking California’s Trash Project Ann advised that there are no updates to report. 9. Sea Level Rise Preparedness Ann advised that as reported previously, WRECO also reviewed the SLR projections listed in the San Bruno Creek/Colma Creek Resiliency Study Draft Report prepared by Moffatt & Nichol. The Colma Creek Flood Control Zone Flood Wall Project Report (Utah Avenue to Navigable Slough) confirmed that the relative SLR projection of 3.0 feet rise in elevation of the Moffatt & Nichol report corresponds to the number WRECO used to run the models for SLR for the project. Also see discussion under Utah Avenue to Bay section regarding potential grant funds to include design elements to include SLR mitigation in the construction of the project. 10. Colma Creek Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) Meetings Ann advised that the TAC met on January 12, 2016 to continue the discussion on collaboration between the District and SSF, Daly City, and Colma for maintenance type activities. The TAC completed its final review of the draft maintenance agreement for work that could be performed by SSF and Colma including trash removal, graffiti - 5 - abatement, fence repair, and weed/vegetation management. The draft agreement was forwarded to the legal counsels of SSF, Colma and County for their review. It is anticipated that legal review of the draft agreement would be completed in March 2016. As mentioned above, the TAC also discussed the Colma Creek Flood Control Zone Flood Wall Project Report (Utah Avenue to Navigable Slough) prepared by WRECO. The TAC is concerned that incorporating the SLR conditions into this project would not provide the necessary protection for the surrounding properties without a regional plan to also construct levees or barriers along the entire shoreline of the San Francisco Bay tributary creeks and streams that addresses SLR. Therefore, the recommendation at the conclusion of the meeting was to design the project for the 50-year storm event and 100-year tide without SLR protection. Note that the TAC discussion occurred prior to the District submitting the NOI for HMGP funding. VI. DISCUSSION ITEMS • Colma Creek Financial Summary: Ann distributed the updated Financial Summary showing revenue for FY 15-16 thus far along with expenditures. • Design Standard for Colma Creek Flood Control Zone Flood Wall Project (Utah Avenue to Navigable Slough) District has adopted the policy of constructing facilities for the 50-year event with 2 ft. of freeboard. In comparison, FEMA’s requirement for certified levees is a minimum of 100-year event with freeboard of 3 ft. The hydraulic analysis performed for the project report completed by WRECO used the District’s Colma Creek Flood Control Zone design standard. • Colma Creek Flood Control Channel Maintenance: Ann walked the Committee through the presentation prepared for the Interagency Meeting held on February 10, 2016, a copy of which was distributed to the Committee with the agenda as an attachment. • Colma Creek CIP Project List: Ann updated the Committee with the status of the current CIP projects. VII. ACTION ITEMS • Recommendation of Design Standard for Colma Creek Flood Control Zone Flood Wall Project (Utah Avenue to Navigable Slough): The County will prepare a grant application with the recommended design standard of 100-year event, 100-year tide, 3 ft. of freeboard, and the projected mean 3 ft. SLR for the project. Richard Irli, Member at Large, motioned to move forward with the grant application with any necessary requirements. Ed Bortoli, Member at Large, seconded the motion. ADJOURNMENT Brian McMinn adjourned the meeting at 4:47 p.m. Next meeting: Tuesday, June 14, 2016 at 3:00 p.m. City of South San Francisco - 6 - Corporation Yard Conference Room 550 North Canal Street South San Francisco, CA 94080 Minutes submitted by: Heather Ruiz, City of South San Francisco