City of Ramona Now

LAFCO

November 9, 2007: Menifee Valley has been approved by the Riverside County LAFCO for their ballot measure to incorporate. It was unanimous. They were very successful in reducing their costs by negotiating with LAFCO for reduced requirements on their studies, and by doing a lot of the actual studies themselves.

Our Boundaries Committee is looking for help. This is a critical next step. It has become apparent that a formal polling will help to determine boundaries. We are working on the structure of the poll. There will be a fund raising effort to off set costs. If you have experience or an interest, please contact Paul Tarr 760-788-9600.

We are looking for a site to hold regular meetings that will accommodate 60+ people on occasion. The most promising site is the Community School multipurpose room. Application with the school district is in process. Monday nights seem to work best for most.

October 16, 2007: This has been a busy couple of weeks. We need people urgently. The next steps are to activate a dedicated Boundaries Sub-Committee under the LAFCO Committee. Bob Hailey is the current chair. 760-789-4624

Please consider who you might know that would be interested in defining the City of Ramona.Fund raising committee is also looking for some folks to plan events. We need a calander of events. Call Paul Tarr 760-788-9600

October 15, 2007: Monday, Oct. 15th, Bob Hailey, Torry Brean, Rath Webster, and Paul Tarr traveled to Menifee to visit with Joe Daugherty, a Sun City Financial Planner. Sun City is in the middle of their planning area. Joe is the President and driving force behind their incorporation group. Menifee has attempted the process once before in 1994. Menifee now has their application for incorporation in to the Riverside County LAFCO and most of their studies completed. They are hoping to be a city by Jan 1, 2008. This meeting was extremely encouraging from the financial point of view as Joe recited ways that their group saved money by negotiating with LAFCO on the necessity for some requirements, and what sort of acceptable alternatives might work. They also saved money by doing some of the studies themselves. Some of their fund raising activities were very creative, as well. He had a through understanding of the issues, and added some insight on winning consensus with the different areas they have chosen to annex in. Though the area is different than ours, it was a most enlightening meeting. He has generously offered to avail himself to our efforts (at a nominal cost).

October 8, 2007: I would like to talk to as many newly incorporated cities as we can in the next 30 days and ask if we might review their petitions to those independent LAFCOs. The Catch-22 here is just too big to be ignored. Any process in government is developed and designed to achieve a goal. The last city to incorporate in San Diego County that I can find was Encinitas Oct 1, 1986, then Solana Beach July 1, 1986, than Poway and Santee on the same date: Dec 1, 1980.

I am becoming more convinced that LAFCO is setting the bar pretty high for us to just get started. How will it play out once the process is begun. I heard Mike Ott say that once they get our petition, they review it to determine what steps will need to be taken. It could become more cumbersome at their will. We need to discuss how we might get something in writing that assures us that the hamster wheel will stop at a predetermined point, before we go much further. One way might be to compare openly the differences between other LAFCOs requirements and theirs. I suspect we will find differences.

We need to make a formal request to the County of San Diego to receive revenue figures and engineering fee numbers from 2006 (those are the biggies, though the engineering fees are not supposed to be over departmental costs). We should take a close look at Poway’s budget. I saw it at Beverlys. We need to make some noise about these figures. I am going over to pick up Poway’s budget (and maps) from George’s before the meeting.

Woody, George confirmed 2:00pm this coming Wednesday for us.

October 5, 2007: Friday, Oct 5th the executive committee along with Doug Wilsman, and Maureen Robertson met with Mike Ott and Shirley Anderson at the 1600 Pacific Hwy. County Office of LAFCO. It appears that should the RMWD be dissolved, Prop NN restrictions will convey to the City. Ramona NOW! needs to update the initial fiscal analysis done in November 2005 by RSG. The application process requires a careful description of the need to incorporate. We need to include at least 4 variations of the boundaries with a Metes and Bounds description of each. Careful study needs to be conducted. This is our top priority. Please, if you haven't already, read the article in the Ramona Sentinel Thursday, Oct. 11th by Maureen Robertson. It is a good objective review of the meeting.

October 3, 2007: Wednesday, Oct 3rd the executive committee met to refine agenda for Friday's LAFCO meeting.

October 2, 2007: Tuesday, Oct 2nd President Bob Hailey and Director Paul Tarr had lunch with Chris Brown with the Montecito Ranch development to discuss how their project is progressing, and explore what their EIR and other impacts might be. Chris supplied maps and offered to provide a copy of their EIR.

Spetember 26, 2007: Wednesday, Sept. 26 the Executive Committee met with Doug Wilsman and guest Troy Romero (involved in incorp. in Wa.) to refine agenda for meeting with Mike Ott and LAFCO Oct. 5th. Doug Wilsman brought the RMWD budget and there was discussion of RMWD operations. We are exploring the options of contracting for RMWD services v. absorbing the RMWD as a Dept. of Public Works v. dissolving the RMWD as an agency with LAFCO. The passage of Prop NN has hindered the RMWD from major projects with a requirement for voter approval on projects requiring funding in excess of $1 million. Civic infrastructure projects are large investments usually paid for with a bond measure. The voters have usually voted down these projects. There are several projects in the wings. Doug estimates that there is enough sewer capacity for 620 more hook ups in town. MWD water rates continue to rise. The R O effluent treatment plant in SDCE has been shut down since 1996 and now is useless. The Nature Conservancy has ordered RMWD to cease its use of the spray fields that they now own with the acquisition for the Gildred Ranch. This may require an eminent domain action. The discussions have been enlightening, and Doug Wilsman has been very giving of his time and expertise.