Clearlake Planning Commission to hold hearing on development agreement, discuss signage and daycare expansion

CLEARLAKE, Calif. – This week the Clearlake Planning Commission will hold a hearing on a proposed development project, discuss signage and consider a request from a daycare that wishes to expand.

The meeting of the commission – sitting jointly as the Parks and Recreation Committee – will begin at 6 p.m. Tuesday, July 5, in the council chambers at Clearlake City Hall, 14050 Olympic Drive.

On Tuesday the commission will hold a hearing to consider whether to recommend the Clearlake City Council adopt an ordinance approving a development agreement with Orosco Development No. 19, LLC for property located at 15885 Dam Road.

Documents available for the meeting do not give specifics about the project. City Manager Greg Folsom is expected to give a brief report on the project, input will be taken and, the discussion will be continued to the July 19 meeting.

In other business, the commission will discuss amendments to the city's municipal code relating to signage in response to a June 2015 United States Supreme Court decision that found an Arizona town's sign regulations violated the First Amendment's free speech provision.

Among the proposed changes are those relating to how election and political signage is regulated, limiting window signage size, clarifications on how signage size is calculated and adding a clause which prevents the city from favoring commercial messages over those that are noncommercial.

Also on Tuesday, the commission will consider a use permit request from Cherry McCracken of Rumsey Rascals, a daycare facility located on Rumsey Road.

McCracken is asking to enlarge the small in-home family daycare facility from a maximum of eight children to a large in-home family daycare facility that may care for up to 14 children.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.

California Controller's Office publishes 2015 salary data for city and county governments

State Controller Betty T. Yee has updated her Government Compensation in California Web site to include 2015 self-reported data for cities and counties.

The data covers 668,240 positions and a total of more than $42 billion in wages in 2015 for 54 counties and 459 cities.

Users of the site can view compensation levels on maps and search for compensation by region; quickly see lists of top earners at cities, counties, and other local governments; narrow results by name of employer or by job title; build charts and trend graphics; and export raw data or custom reports.

The new data shows that the average wages across all 54 reporting counties is $63,823. The three counties with the highest average government salaries in 2015 were Santa Clara ($81,808), Alameda ($76,832) and Los Angeles ($73,722).

For cities in 2015, the average page was $64,058. Vernon was highest ($107,848), followed by Hayward ($103,607) and Palm Desert ($97,997).

In Lake County, wages in 2015 for 1,160 county employees averaged $38,542. In the city of Clearlake, which had 66 employees last year, the average was $44,063 and in Lakeport, which had 83 employees, wages averaged $29,984, based on the Web site.

Average wages in city governments increased by more than 3 percent from 2014 to 2015, from $61,724 to $64,058.

Average wages increased by almost 5 percent in county governments, from $60,831 to $63,823.

The top paid county elected officials in 2015 were in Los Angeles County, Riverside County, San Bernardino County and Santa Clara County. For cities, the top paid elected officials hailed from Redondo Beach, Long Beach, San Francisco and Santa Clara.

In Lake County in 2015, the top three paid elected officials and their total wages (salary and benefits) were the sheriff-coroner, $123,467; district attorney, $116,295; and the auditor-controller/county clerk, $102,870.

The top three paid county of Lake employees overall, none of which were elected, were the public health officer, $172,798; county counsel, $139,398; and Social Services director, $134,123, according to Yee's Web site.

The top three paid employees in the city of Clearlake in 2015 were the police chief, $129,037; city manager, $117,684; and police sergeant, $113,244, the data showed.

In Lakeport the Web site showed the top paid employees as being the city manager, $121,365; finance director, $94,008; and police chief, $93,772.

The new data show that average retirement and health care costs in counties increased by more than 5 percent to $25,352 and by more than 1 percent in cities to $19,067.

City governments with the highest average retirement and health care costs were Industry, San Jose and Vallejo. For county governments, it was Alameda, Kern and Orange.

The city of Clearlake had retirement and health care costs averaging $16,046, followed by Lakeport with $10,526. The county of Lake's average costs were $12,624.

Twenty-three cities and three counties failed to file or provided incomplete or late information. A list of noncompliant entities is available at http://publicpay.ca.gov/Reports/UnavailableData.aspx .

Since the Web site was launched in 2010, it has registered nearly nine million page views. The site now contains information on more than 2 million jobs in California, as reported by each government entity.

State government, California State University, superior court, and special district compensation data for 2015 will be added this summer.

Lakeport City Council to meet new staff, consider agreement for Carnegie Library project design documents

LAKEPORT, Calif. – This week the Lakeport City Council will meet a new police officer and staff interns, and consider awarding a bid for design and construction documents needed to move forward on upgrades for the city-owned Carnegie Library.

The council will begin with a closed session at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, July 5, for labor and property negotiations before the public portion of the meeting begins at 6 p.m. in the council chambers at Lakeport City Hall, 225 Park St.

On the meeting's agenda is the introduction of new employees, including Lakeport Police Officer Joe Medici, police intern Natalie Sylar and Administrative Services intern Savannah Rasmussen.

Carolyn Ruttan of Lake County Water Resources also will give the council a presentation on the latest quagga and zebra mussel prevention grants awarded to the Lake County Watershed Protection District.

Community Development Director Kevin Ingram will take to the council the proposed award of a bid to Garavaglia Architecture Inc. and approval of a professional services agreement between the firm and the city.

The bid and agreement is for the development of design and construction documents for Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant accessibility upgrades to the Carnegie Library building.

Garavaglia Architecture, based in San Francisco, is estimating the cost will be $34,900 to complete the documents, according to Ingram's report to the council.

Ingram said the city has $140,000 in Community Development Block Grant funds for the project, including design, construction and contingency.

The firm has experience working with the city regarding the library, having completed the building's reuse feasibility study, as Lake County News has reported.

In other business, the council will consider approving the issuance of refunding bonds in order to refund certain outstanding bonds of the dissolved Lakeport Redevelopment Agency along with the necessary associated actions; consider authorizing City Manager Margaret Silveira to execute a professional services agreement with JJACPA for independent auditing services; and is expected to approve having Silveira execute the second amendment to the professional services agreement with NHA Advisors for independent, registered municipal financial advisory services.

On the meeting's consent agenda – items considered noncontroversial and usually accepted as a slate on one vote – are ordinances; minutes of the regular Lakeport City Council meeting on June 21; the warrant registers for June 22 and 23; approval of application No. 2016-018 with staff recommendations for the annual Rodeo Parade to be held July 9; approval of a right of entry agreement between the city of Lakeport and the county of Lake to allow the city to carry out all necessary work required by the proposed resolution approving the memorandum of understanding between the city of Lakeport and the Lakeport Police Officers’ Association for the period July 1, 2016, through June 30, 2018, and authorizing its execution.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.

070516 Lakeport City Council agenda packet