Featured - page 24

A Redwood City man will serve no more than five years in state prison after pleading no contest to a drunken driving collision that killed a 50-year-old woman on U.S. Highway 101 in San Mateo on Jan. 19, according to the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office.

Ramon Hernandez, 32, pleaded no contest to multiple charges including felony drunk driving causing injury and having a blood alcohol level over .15 percent in connection with the collision that took the life of 50-year-old Ivania Torres, according to prosecutors.

The incident occurred at 1:45 a.m. Sunday morning after a crash occurred between a Dodge Charger occupied by Torres and a Toyota Yaris in the southbound lanes on 101 south of the Third Avenue exit in San Mateo. The crash rendered the Charger disabled in the center median and caused debris to be strewn across the freeway, prompting oncoming traffic to slow or stop, prosecutors said. Occupants of the Charger including Torres exited the vehicle and were standing outside the vehicle when Hernandez “came speeding down the freeway at 70 mph in the fast lane,” prosecutors said.

Hernandez’s vehicle collided with the disabled Charger, killing Torres. His girlfriend was also hospitalized in the collision.

Hernandez had reportedly been drinking in San Francisco prior to the crash. He remains in custody on $100,000 bail and his case was continued to Aug. 20 for sentencing.

Phase 2 of the upgrade and expansion of a wastewater treatment plant on Detroit Drive in San Mateo has begun and will reportedly include eight-and-a-half months of pile driving to secure the expanded facility at its location near Seal Point in the Shoreview neighborhood, according to the city.

The pile driving will occur during the daytime only in two stages about five months apart, the city said. Noise reductions and control measures will be in place, it added.

The five-year-long plant upgrade is the largest component of the $1 billion, decade-long Clean Water Program, which will replace the aging wastewater collection and treatment system with advanced infrastructure that serves San Mateo, Foster City, and parts of Hillsborough, Belmont, Crystal Springs County Sanitation District and the county. The new system aims to achieve compliance with strict regional regulations for wastewater collection and treatment. During heavy rains, the existing system is overwhelmed, which can lead to sanitary sewer overflows and the partial treatment of wastewater at the plant and poses health concerns for the community and environment.

On Thursday, June 11 from 6-8 p.m., a Virtual Community Meeting will take place so members of the community can hear details and ask project planners questions.

“We encourage the residents of San Mateo to follow the progress being made on these much-needed improvements for our city,” said Brad Underwood, San Mateo’s Public Works director. “Maintaining this infrastructure and ensuring that the system continues to meet current and future operating requirements are essential to the health and well-being of our community.”

San Mateo County reopened more of its parks, parking lots and restrooms today in conjunction with the second phase of easing of COVID-19 restrictions. Devil’s Slide Trail and Flood Park, and parking lots at San Pedro Valley Park in Pacifica and San Bruno Mountain Park in Brisbane, are among the newly reopened parks. A list of open county parks, trails and parking lots can be viewed here. Parks are open from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Playgrounds, picnic areas and visitor centers remain closed and all events remain canceled, the county said.

In a statement, San Mateo County Parks Director Nicholas Calderon said staff is cleaning restrooms more often, monitoring trail use and shifting nature programming online. Calderon encouraged visitors to maintain six feet of social distancing and carry face covering.

“Because there are more visitors than usual on trails in all parks, we encourage you to plan your visit and have an alternate location if you discover a full parking lot when you arrive,” Calderon said. “We also suggest that you visit parks early in the day or a few hours before closing at 7 p.m.— these are great times to see deer, lizards, birds and other wildlife.”

San Pedro Valley Park/Photo credit: San Mateo County Parks

A GoFundMe account has been set up to help Redwood City businesses—already struggling under the COVID-19 shutdown—recover the substantial cost of battening down the hatches before the recent protest downtown.

As if preparing for a hurricane, business owners scrambled to find contractors to board up windows in advance of the June 2 demonstration, which turned out to be largely peaceful. But the cost for individual owners, most of whom have seen revenues dry up because of the coronavirus, ranged from a few hundred dollars to five-figure sums.

Brett Weber, a long-time commercial real estate executive with many clients in and around downtown, was pained by the impact on stressed restaurants and other small businesses unprepared for yet another financial blow.

“When these people are getting ready to open up and have outdoor seating, were they really expecting to get another $2,000 or $3,000 or $4,000 bill?” Weber asked. “And setting them back two or three days and losing more business?”

Together with some business associates and friends, Weber hurriedly established a GoFundMe account with a goal of raising $250,000 to reimburse owners and tenants for the cost of boarding up. “Our goal is to help these people out,” he said. “I love this town. I live downtown.”

As of Saturday morning, the Redwood City Small Business Relief Fund had raised $8,500 toward the ambitious goal.

“We don’t know how much we’re going to raise,” Weber said. “We just started and we have a long way to go. We need to scale up to help these people, and I’m telling you, these businesses really need it.”

Word about the planned demonstration started to go out to businesses late Sunday, May 31, with the request that they take precautions such as removing outdoor furniture and boarding up windows.

Weber said when he went downtown the next day, as he saw businesses boarding up, he started contacting clients. Many hadn’t gotten the word yet and had to quickly find a contractor.

Szymon Dziadzia, the owner of Olive Construction in San Francisco, got called in to protect the Fox Theatre, the Little Fox and the Fox Forum. Three other owners hired his nine-member crew to cover their storefronts.

“We worked from the (Monday) morning till 1 a.m. and we got three hours’ sleep and we were back at 6 a.m.,” he said. “It was crazy.” He had to turn down business. “We just handled what we could, and we finished 20 minutes before the demonstration started. I was just so happy to see the next day how peaceful it was and that there was no damages.”

A Polish immigrant, Dziadzia says he got referrals from businesses looking for contractors through Polam Federal Credit Union CEO Mark Chrzanowski. (He is also helping Weber with the GoFundMe effort.) Dziadzia said lumber stores were sold out and he had to bring wood in from San Francisco and Brisbane.

The cost of covering the three Fox buildings was about $7,000, including $3,000 for lumber.

“It was a very difficult decision to board up,” said Fox General Manager Ernie Schmidt. “Nobody wants to board up their business. … I don’t have any revenue coming in, and I’m sure downtown businesses don’t have revenue coming in either.”

Though the windows could be replaced, he added, “if somebody breaks my windows and enters the Fox Theatre and damages all the beautiful history in there, I can’t replace that.”

Fearing possible vandalism, Anupam Bhatia also decided to board up his Broadway Masala restaurant after receiving the warning from the city. Boarding up and removal ran to $1,500, not counting loss of business.

Fera Hashemi, who with her husband owns Arya Steakhouse, said they were contacted by the owner of the center where the restaurant is located, asking individual tenants whether they wanted plywood protection. She hasn’t received the bill yet.

“We didn’t know. Do, not do it?” Hashemi said. “And it was better to be safe than sorry.” She’s grateful that the demonstration turned out to be peaceful.  “At this point, we’re just trying to get our businesses to run. We just want to do whatever it takes to protect it and to be able to open and get back to normal.”

The businesses also have to pay to get the plywood removed and decide what to do with it. Schmidt is undecided about the wall of wood in front of his theaters, which became a canvas for graphics and slogans and could even be preserved. But Schmidt put out the word on NextDoor that other establishments could use some help taking down the boards.

Weber says donations to the GoFundMe account in any amount are welcome. It was set up on the fly, with the idea that disbursements could be administered by the Downtown Business Group. Whatever mechanism emerges as the best, he just wants to make sure the money goes where it’s intended.

“I don’t do fundraisers,” Weber said. “This is something from my heart.” For information, visit gofundme.com.

Photos by Jim Kirkland

Redwood City is set to host a virtual town hall on community policing that will allow residents to ask questions of Police Chief Dan Mulholland on Wednesday, June 10.

The meeting from run from 7-8 p.m. via Zoom (meeting ID 971 2570 7141 or by phone at (669) 900-6833).

“We have received many inquiries about our policies around training and use of force by our Police Department,” Mayor Diane Howard and Chief Mulholland said in a join statement.

The mayor and chief expressed gratitude to the community for the efforts to hold a peaceful demonstration on June 2. The protest was one of many across the nation calling for justice for George Floyd, who was killed after a Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes on May 25.

The public is invited to send your questions in advance to social@redwoodcity.org.

The mayor and chief expressed gratitude to the community for the efforts to hold a peaceful demonstration on June 2.  They said the city has been striving to maintain a community policing system that builds relationships between the community and police officers, examines bias and requires all officers to train in de-escalation tactics, among other strategies. City policy, according to this city statement, bans chokeholds and strangleholds, requires de-escalation and tactical communication training for all police officers, and requires officers to intervene to stop excessive force by other officers.

The councils in Redwood City and San Carlos are next week scheduled to review proposals to close stretches of their downtowns to vehicular traffic to accommodate outdoor dining.

The proposals are part of an effort to boost business for local restaurants impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Even when indoor dining is allowed to return, eateries will continue to be impacted as they will likely be required to reduce indoor dining capacity, officials say.

Redwood City proposal

City staff’s preliminary recommendation includes piloting full and partial rotating street closures Fridays through Sundays to allow local eateries to serve customers outdoors, according to city documents.

Identified downtown street segments for full and partial rotating closures include:·

• Main St. – between Middlefield and Broadway
• Broadway St. – between Main and Jefferson (Jefferson open to traffic)
• Broadway St. – between Jefferson and Middlefield (Middlefield open to traffic)
• Broadway St. – between Hamilton and Marshall·
• Broadway St. – between Perry St. and El Camino (Broadway St. open to traffic)

The program would run from July — with a proposed start date of July 11 — to late September and would be reassessed in September, the city states.

The city has been working within a task force on the plan that includes the Redwood Downtown Business Group, Redwood City Improvement Association, Redwood City-San Mateo County Chamber of Commerce, and New City America. The organizations have been working on a broader post-COVID-19 mitigation plan to support the local economy.

The taskforce aims to dedicate takeout and delivery areas for restaurants during the street closures. In addition, the taskforce is exploring the possibility of allowing restaurants citywide to use private sidewalks and parking lots for outdoor dining, carhop dining and takeout.

A cost for the pilot program has not yet been determined. The proposal is set to be reviewed at the Redwood City council remote meeting that starts at 7 p.m. on Monday. Access the agenda and city documents here.

San Carlos proposal

For a period of six months ending Dec. 31, the city is proposing to temporarily close the 600 and 700 blocks of Laurel Street and temporarily eliminate parking on portions of Laurel Street and San Carlos Avenue to allow outdoor dining. Under the plan, restaurants and other businesses would be able to use street parking spaces to serve customers within these blocks, which would open to service, delivery and street maintenance vehicles tentatively from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. daily.

A subcommittee that developed the proposal did not recommend closing the 800 and 900 blocks of Laurel Street or the 1100 bock of San Carlos Avenue to vehicular traffic due to the potential impact on downtown traffic patterns. Instead, it proposed using barricades to separate the parking spaces from through traffic to allow businesses in these areas to use the parking spaces to serve customers.

The San Carlos program is expected to cost roughly $95,000 for the barricades (water walls) and signage, city documents said.

The proposal is set to be reviewed at the San Carlos council’s remote meeting that starts at 7 p.m. on Monday. Access the agenda and city documents here.

San Mateo County will allow outdoor dining and charter boat operations with social distancing protocols starting Saturday in a revised public health order. Sorry folks, bar areas must remain closed per the revised health order.

Tables in outdoor service must be spaced so customers are at least six feet from other customers, and no more than six customers are allowed at a single table, the County said. Tables should be comprised of people from the same household, as well. And if you offer outdoor dining, you must also offer curbside pickup, take away, delivery or similar services.

The new order also permits indoor funerals with up to 10 individuals present, while outdoor funerals are limited to 25 or fewer attendees.

Read the full order: https://bit.ly/2Yg6b7t

San Mateo police report that about 2,000 people attended a peaceful protest and march in San Mateo Wednesday over the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police.

The event, organized by teens from the local chapter of Coalition Z in coordination with the city, included a demonstration at San Mateo City Hall about 5 p.m. and a 1.7 mile walk to the San Mateo Police Department for a 3-minute moment of silence. Protesters chanted loudly for justice, and some took issue with law enforcement showing up to the demonstration in riot gear. But in the end the event remained calm, with no reports of injuries or damages to businesses. Some business owners and community volunteers passed out water to protesters.

In a statement, the San Mateo Police Department commended a “wonderful turnout” and pledged to citizens a commitment to listen, learn and stand beside them “against racism and discrimination wherever it exists.” That message drew praise in the community and also skepticism over whether gestures of solidarity will ultimately result in a solution to systemic racism.

Event speakers included former San Mateo Mayor Claire Mack, lawyer Jonathan Madison, Rev. Lorrie Owens of the San Mateo NAACP, San Mateo-Foster City School Board Trustee Shara Watkins and San Mateo County Democratic Central Committee Corresponding Secretary Alexis Lewis, among other local activists.

“Proud to represent proud Black Americans and a multiracial community that gets it,” Congresswoman Jackie Speier, who also attended and spoke at the event, posted to Facebook.

Speier called racism a pandemic and added, “George Floyd has changed America forevermore.”

San Mateo Councilmember Amourence Lee, whose home was targeted on Tuesday by a rock-thrower in an incident police are investigating as a possible hate crime, also joined the protest.

“My message to folks is that this one event cannot be the end of our collective action– it must be the beginning if we want to see real change,” Lee said on Facebook. “That means showing up to our city council meetings, joining our boards and commissions, getting involved in our neighborhood associations, and Neighborhood Watch groups. This is a long march, it is a test of our values and stamina – stay in it for the long haul.”