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Redwood City Mayor Diane Howard has decided to pull two proposed pay raises from the agenda when the City Council meets tonight — by teleconference as a result of new coronavirus restrictions pursuant to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s order.

The public cannot attend, but even all seven council members won’t freely assemble. Most apparently will be participating “safely” apart by Zoom, although Howard will be present with an IT staff member “to make sure I run this properly. I’ve never run a Zoom meeting.”

Despite the mayor’s earlier promise that only essential, time-sensitive business would be taken up while the “virtual” meetings are being held, the council was to have considered whether to grant delayed pay raises to the city manager and the city attorney.

The agenda item drew ire from some community members on social media.

“People are hurting and struggling and facing very uncertain financial futures,” Redwood City resident and activist Johanna Rasmussen stated in the Facebook group, Redwood City Says What. She added, “Let’s hope this [city council agenda] item was an oversight and it will be pulled.”

After being questioned by Climate this morning, Mayor Howard conferred with both the city manager, city attorney and Vice Mayor Shelly Masur. All agreed the subject should be put off into the future when the public can be present to state their views.

“I gave it a lot of thought and I thought, here our staff has been working 24/7 and they are pushed to the edge and are tired and they keep going,” Howard said. “And if this created negative feeling in the community, it would not help morale with our city staff for anybody.”

When the City Hall team was putting the agenda together, Howard said they were more focused on allowing time to address how to respond to the threat of eviction for people who can’t pay the rent.

“We had a lot of things on our plate and this (the salary increases) had been deferred so long,” Howard added.

The council was to vote on resolutions that would give City Manager Melissa Stevenson Diaz a 7 percent raise, retroactive to last October; and City Attorney Veronica Ramirez a 6 percent boost, retroactive to last September. Their respective salaries would go from $295,006 to $316,104 and from $251,606 to $266,928.

The proposed increases followed January performance reviews by the City Council. Both women will get 3 percent cost of living increases, which Howard said they were entitled to contractually, and 3 percent merit increases. Stevenson Diaz would get an additional 1 percent to maintain “internal equity.”

The mayor said the increases would have been up for a vote earlier but had been delayed both because the city didn’t for a time have a human resources director and the council has had very heavy agendas. Both Stevenson Diaz and Ramirez have been patient about waiting, but Howard notes that the next performance reviews and increases will be coming up again in the fall.

“My concern is that here we are already at the end of March,” Howard said earlier today, “and their contracts come up again in September and October and we haven’t even addressed last year’s salary increases.” When she talked to Stevenson Diaz and Ramirez about postponing the matter to later, they “were very gracious about it.”

Their last raises were in the fall of 2018. Howard said the council sets compensation, in part, to align with comparable cities and both Stevenson Diaz and Ramirez were below the median.

“So this is something that was overdue,” Howard said. “We really value the two of them very much. Competition for good qualified people is very stiff.” Howard couldn’t say when the item will be back on the agenda, as so much is dependent on the coronavirus emergency.

“I’m just glad we can do business at all,” she said. “I guess you would say it’s another argument why this probably isn’t the right time to do raises or have those discussions because the public really isn’t able to participate in the fashion they’re used to.”

Councilmember Janet Borgens said she will be participating in the meeting from home via the Internet. “I stay at home as much as possible,” she said. “I’m taking this very seriously. I think we have to lead by example.”

Councilmember Giselle Hale, who will be at home too, said there have been some technical issues and the meeting may air with audio only plus a photo of the council member to identify them. “Everyone’s figuring out how to do this,” she said. “… We can do this. We have the technology.”

Please don’t throw disinfecting wipes in the toilet. They belong in the trash.

That’s the message from local and state officials this week as citizens increase their use of disinfecting wipes to clean surfaces in order to reduce the spread of the coronavirus, or COVID-19.

Wastewater treatment facilities around the state are reporting issues with their sewer management collection system due to the problem of wipes, paper towels and similar products being flushed down the toilet, according to the California State Water Resources Control Board. Even wipes labeled “flushable” can clog sewers and cause backups and overflows at wastewater treatment facilities, officials said. This could create “an additional public health risk in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic,” the Water Board said.

Earlier this week, the City of Redwood offered this useful statement: “Only the 3 Ps should go down the toilet (pee, poo and tP), everything else should be thrown in the trash can.”

The City of San Mateo shared a similar message today on social media, adding that some anti-bacterial sanitizers have harmful chemicals that can “hurt our water” when flushed rather than discarded in the trash.

Wipes, the leading cause of sewer system backups, along with paper towel don’t break down like toilet paper and clog systems quickly. Backups cause spills that end up in lakes, rivers and the ocean with harmful environmental impacts, state officials said.

The San Mateo County Board of Supervisors will vote Tuesday on a proposal to ban nonpayment evictions for renters impacted by the coronavirus pandemic, and also to provide $3 million to start an emergency fund to assist residents, nonprofits and small businesses.

The ban on certain evictions would include both incorporated and unincorporated areas of the County, totaling over 105,000 rental units, according to a County statement. Eligible renters include those who, due to the COVID-19 outbreak and related shelter-in-place order, experienced job loss, cutbacks in work hours, needed to stay home with school-age children or care for a stricken loved one, or who become ill with the disease.

Under the regulation, renters would have to pay landlords what they owe within 180 days after the state of emergency ends. The County Counsel’s Office is working with the Department of Housing to develop a process where renters can petition landlords for rent relief, according to the County’s statement.

Meanwhile, the County supes on Tuesday will also vote on a plan to provide $3 million in seed funding to develop the San Mateo County Strong Fund. The Fund would provide emergency assistance exclusively to presceened individuals and families, small businesses and nonprofits serving the most vulnerable residents. The Silicon Valley Community Foundation (SVCF) would administer the Fund and seek to grow it with additional donors. A website is being created in partnership with the San Mateo County Economic Development Association (SAMCEDA) where those impacted can apply for emergency aid and donors can add to the fund.

In a statement, County Manager Mike Callagy called the impacts from COVID-19 “swift and far-reaching.” Rosanne Foust, SAMCEDA president and CEO, said “residents and businesses, and especially our small businesses and sole proprietors who do not qualify for unemployment benefits, are reeling from this crisis.”

Elected leaders have a duty “to do everything within our power” to form a social safety net, Board of Supervisors President Warren Slocum added.

“So many people have been hurt by this outbreak,” Slocum said. “Our hearts go out to anyone impacted by the disease itself as well as the families and individuals who have experienced layoffs and cutbacks to their hours.”

The Board of Supervisors meeting will start Tuesday at 9 a.m. at the Hall of Justice in Redwood City. While members of the public cannot attend, they can view a video broadcast of the meeting here, and may provide written comments by email to boardfeedback@smcgov.org.

Photo: Still image from video of County Manager Mike Callagy addressing the community on the COVID-19 pandemic response. Full video here.

San Mateo County officials are encouraging current or retired medical professionals to volunteer to assist in the COVID-19 pandemic response.

Doctors, nurses, dentists, and medical assistants are needed, according to Darcy De Leon, administrative technician for the City of Colma, which is working with the County to get out the word on the volunteer effort.

The location and the type of volunteer work needed is not yet established, De Leon said. As of this morning, 30 people from across the Bay Area have signed up to volunteer.

Those interested are encouraged to call (650) 997-8300. Your information will be recorded.

San Mateo County politicians with backgrounds in public health are urging the community to heed the prevailing advice of public health experts on the fast-spreading coronavirus.

While San Mateo Mayor Joe Goethels and Redwood City Vice Mayor Shelly Masur both hold master’s degrees in public health, San Mateo City Councilmember Amourence Lee spent her early career working for UNICEF in Beijing focused on health and nutrition programs, and San Carlos Vice Mayor Laura Parmer-Lohan has a background in marketing and administration in the healthcare sector and currently works in the biotech industry.

These are some of the politicians taking part in daily briefings conducted by the San Mateo County Manager’s Office. On Thursday, we spoke with them about the ongoing pandemic and why they believe it’s crucial to follow expert advice on sheltering in place and social distancing.

In other words, it’s time to “break the handle,” said Mayor Goethels.

The mayor shared the story of the London cholera outbreak of 1854, when the waterborne disease was traced to a specific well contamination. As it was then and remains now, the public health field is understood by three factors — epidemiology, human behavior, and statistics. To avert the cholera outbreak, people needed to stop using the water from a certain well, but simply telling them this was ineffective. Ultimately Dr. John Snow, one of the founders of modern epidemiology who traced the source of the cholera outbreak, broke the handle from the water pump in question, an act that seemed like an extreme intervention. History tells us that was needed, Mayor Goethels said.

“It is important to support interventions that work, breaking the handle was extreme and necessary,” he said. At this point, “…we can accurately predict the need and so this overreaction in the right reaction.”

Fellow San Mateo City Councilmember Lee worked for UNICEF at a time when there was no sex education programs in China and HIV/AIDS was beginning to spread across the country.

“Sadly, this is not my first pandemic,” Lee said.

Lee stressed a “multi-sector and layered approach” at the County level, and a commitment by community members to practice social distancing, a version of breaking the handle. Her children are learning via Google classroom, allowing them to see and hear their teachers and classmates and feel a sense of normalcy in unusual times.

To be a leader in the community is to follow the shelter-in-place order, added Masur, who believes emergency declarations at the local level were the right call. While maintaining distance is an adjustment, “we need to recognize none of this is personal – our neighbors, our friends, members of our community – this isn’t rude to them, we want everyone to stay safe. Practicing social distancing is our path to slow the transmission.”

Meanwhile, San Carlos Vice Mayor Parmer-Lohan, whose city recently made headlines after one of its hotels became a field hospital for passengers from the Grand Princess cruise ship, isn’t just warning about the spread of the coronavirus, but also the spread of inaccurate information, particularly on social media. The San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office has reported that coronavirus-related phone and Internet scams have been popping up in the community and encouraged local residents to stick to guidance from reputable sources such as the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the San Mateo County Health Department (see below for links and additional resources).

“Please follow instructions from reputable sources,” Parmer-Lohan said.

Goethels, Masur, Lee and Parmer-Lohan all emphasized the need to follow the shelter-in-place directive that orders families to stay home and away from crowds, and requires nonessential businesses to close their doors until further notice.

The directive aims to slow the spread of the coronavirus in order to keep hospitals and the healthcare system from being overwhelmed with patients.

This event shouldn’t merely be viewed from the lens of doom and gloom. There are some benefits to breaking the proverbial handle.

“See this as an opportunity to spend time with your family,” Mayor Goethals suggested.

Vice Mayor Parmer-Lohan added, “Find moments of joy, life still needs to be lived.”

Lee’s opinion? “Compassion, transparency, and collaboration will get us through this virus,” she said.

Recommended Resources

Local

City of Redwood City

City of San Carlos

City of San Mateo

San Mateo County Health Department

San Mateo & Santa Clara Counties – screening and testing information

State

California State

Federal

Center for Disease Control and Prevention

International

World Health Organization

Photo Credit: San Mateo County from outside of the Regional Operations Center at County Center in Redwood City.

Caltrain is suspending its planned changes to Clipper fares due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The decision in September would have raised the single-ride adult fare to 30 cents for Clipper customers on April 1. It would have also increased the adult monthly pass by $9 for Clipper users.

Because of the ongoing public health crisis, Caltrain fares, including Clipper fares, will not change for the time being, according to Caltrain.

“Caltrain will continue to assess the situation to inform future decisions about any fare or service changes,” the transit agency said in a statement.

On Monday, when the regional shelter-in-order was announced, Caltrain announced its one-way and day pass ticket sales had declined by about 75 percent from their levels two weeks prior. With continued dramatic ridership declines expected, Caltrain began operating on a reduced peak-hour schedule that no longer features Baby Bullet Service. The updated weekday schedule is available at www.caltrain.com.