Gilroy city leaders are openly worried the state
’s anti-sprawl agency has found a new way to control how Gilroy
develops. The Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO) has
released a countywide review of fire services that calls for a
possible unification of the Gilroy, Morgan Hill and San Martin fire
departments.
Gilroy city leaders are openly worried the state’s anti-sprawl agency has found a new way to control how Gilroy develops.
The Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO) has released a countywide review of fire services that calls for a possible unification of the Gilroy, Morgan Hill and San Martin fire departments.
In Morgan Hill, fire coverage has been fragmented since the early 1990s when, because of a devastating financial shortfall, the Morgan Hill Fire Department was closed down.
Ever since, the city has contracted with the Santa Clara County Fire Department to provide protection from the El Toro and Dunne/Hill stations, both of which were sold to the county. Those stations’ cover of Morgan Hill’s large district is supplemented by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, South Santa Clara station on Monterey Road, just south of Vineyard Ave.
Difficulties in coordinating the two agencies, which back each other up during fire and medical emergencies, were spelled out in the recent Morgan Hill Fire and Emergency Services Master Plan Update. Joining up was suggested as one possible way to improve reaction time.
The City of Morgan Hill projected budget for fire services protecting its 35,000 citizens during 2003-04 is $3,745,220.
Taking a suggestion from the 2002 Fire Master Plan, the Morgan Hill City Council earlier this year said it might be interested in pursuing a single-agency format for the entire South Valley.
By February, the agency that controls whether Gilroy borders can expand could mandate such a partnership.
Gilroy officials are calling LAFCO’s review a “sneaky” way of ripping control from the hands of local leaders.
Even if LAFCO doesn’t make the South Valley form one fire department, city leaders say the agency could use the findings of the report to make it difficult for Gilroy when it wants to bring county land into city boundaries.
“LAFCO may not mandate anything, but they may make it miserable for us (to get approval on boundary changes) if we don’t do what they say in this report,” Councilman Roland Velasco said. “This is Sacramento driven, and sometimes when Sacramento says ‘We’re here to help you,’ it ends up hurting us.”
Among other tracts of land slated for incorporation into Gilroy is a 660-acre plot of farmland the city wants for campus industrial use. Just months ago, the city lost a battle with LAFCO that would have brought 63 acres of county land into Gilroy to become a much-coveted community sports park.
LAFCO is not required to approve or deny boundary changes based on the fire service review. However, Gilroy City Administrator Jay Baksa said he had spoken with a LAFCO staffer who told him there was no guarantee the agency wouldn’t do so. LAFCO officials could not be contacted for comment before deadline.
At a recent meeting between the fire department leaders and City Council, Baksa spent several fist-pounding minutes lambasting a trend he sees with the state. Baksa, still reeling from local revenue grabs by the state that were designed to keep California’s ailing budget afloat, is worried that local governments will slowly lose control over the services they provide.
“Home rule is dead and dying. Already cities have lost the revenue side of home rule to the state. Now the state’s entering into the service side of things, too,” Baksa said. “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that LAFCO will be the giant and charter cities will be irrelevant in this socialistic environment.”
While the 142-page LAFCO report does not mandate merging of the fire departments, it does spell out a number of “advantages” to consolidation.
The report states, “Given existing populations and the growth potential of the South County region together with the somewhat fragmented service delivery model currently found in this region, the potential exists to create a regional service delivery model that could provide for higher levels of service more cost effectively, than might be attainable from individual agencies providing separate delivery systems.”
It is unclear if unification would be cheaper for Gilroy taxpayers, Fire Chief Jeff Clet said.
Gilroy currently spends more than $6 million on fire services. Across the region, $12.3 million is spent on fire and rescue services, the LAFCO report states.
“We could get stuck paying for more than our fair share if things aren’t set up right from the beginning,” Clet said. “We contribute more to fire protection now than the other agencies.”
Clet is suggesting that fire department officials from Gilroy, Santa Clara County (which serves Morgan Hill) and the South County Fire District (which serves San Martin) meet to discuss what each agency believes is in its best interest. Clet also said there may be opportunities to find ways of creating more operational efficiencies between the three firefighting agencies.
One example, according to Clet, would be building a training facility, say in San Martin, that all three fire service agencies could use.
While that sort of joint effort could save fire departments money, Clet is not convinced overall unification is in everyone’s best interest.
“The true issue is that our level of autonomy will be diminished. Right now Gilroy has absolute control over its staffing levels, the amount of public education it does and how much it will pay for fire protection,” Clet said. “If this (LAFCO review) does nothing more than make us get together and talk, then perhaps it’s a good thing.”
The full LAFCO fire service review can be obtained online at http://santaclara.lafco.ca.gov. On the home page, there is a link to a PDF file that contains the 142-page report. It is called Draft Countywide Fire Protection Service Review Report.
