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Work begins on new Clearlake visitor center project
CLEARLAKE, Calif. – A project to turn a lakeside property into a new tourism visitor center and chamber of commerce headquarters is under way in the city of Clearlake.
The acre-and-a-half property is located at 14295 Lakeshore Drive, next to Highlands Park.
The city purchased the property for just over $207,000 in 2011, as Lake County News has reported.
The property has access to Clear Lake, and also has an older home.
A garage that had been located on the property was demolished week before last, according to city Public Works Director Doug Herren.
“I've been working on this for three years,” said Herren, who is glad to finally get under way.
The project is funded through an agreement between the county of Lake and the city of Clearlake for operation of a new visitor center, according to County Administrative Officer Matt Perry.
Altogether, the county of Lake has committed $100,000 to the project, Perry said, acknowledging the importance of providing information services in the county’s largest population center.
“They have a lot of visitors,” he said.
In 2013 District 2 Supervisor Jeff Smith presented a check for $50,000 for the visitor center plan to the Clearlake City Council.
Perry said the remaining $50,000 is being disbursed as costs are incurred.
Herren and city staffer Lee Lambert are acting as the project managers, a move that Herren said is helping the city stretch its funds to cover the entire project.
Originally, the city considered tearing down the house that is on the property, but Herren said they ultimately decided to keep it.
“It's a neat looking house,” he said.
Herren said he wanted to keep it a community project. As such, he's using local contractors, and noted that “so many talented people” are helping.
“We're going to get a lot done,” Herren said.
He said that with the combined funds from the city and county, they will have more than enough to complete a good project and “do it right.”
Herren said the work will include turning the renovated house into a visitor center. It also will include a sidewalk, alarm system, 10 horseshoe pits and two bocce ball courts. Additionally, they are looking at putting a dock at the site.
With he and Lambert doing project manager duties, no wages are coming out of the project funds, “just material costs,” Herren said.
Now that the garage is down, Herren said they plan to move on to taking off the old house's roof as they begin the work of restoring it fully.
He said all of the paint inside of the house is lead-based, and there also is asbestos throughout.
Herren estimated that the visitor center portion of the project should be done in late June or early July.
As for the larger plan for the property, the scope of that is still being drawn up, with the city working to tie up loose ends on a grant to cover the design costs, Herren said.
He said it's hoped the park's scope will be fully determined by later this year.
“It's going to look neat,” Herren said.
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House approves two-year extension of Secure Rural Schools Program; Senate action pending
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – A program that makes payments to schools based on lost national forest revenue has passed the US House of Representatives.
The Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2015 passed the House on Thursday in a bipartisan vote of 392-37.
The funding for the Secure Rural Schools and Self-Determination Act was included as a trailer to the bill on Wednesday, Lake County Superintendent of Schools Brock Falkenberg told the boards of the Upper Lake High and Upper Lake Elementary school districts during a joint meeting that night.
The districts receive a sizable portion of the funds that come to the county from the program.
“It's a bipartisan bill,” Falkenberg said.
Lake County's two representatives in the House, John Garamendi and Congressman Mike Thompson, voted for the bill.
In a statement on the bill, Garamendi said Lake's neighboring counties of Colusa and Glenn also benefit from the program.
The US Senate still has to take action on the bill, which President Barack Obama has pledged to sign.
Congress enacted the Secure Rural Schools and Self-Determination Act in 2000 to provide funding for rural counties and school districts to replace lost revenue as a result of dwindling forest receipts, according to a report from the Rural County Representatives of California, or RCRC.
RCRC said the program initially provided California's forest counties $60 million annually. Half of the revenue went to counties for schools, the other half for roads.
Since it was first enacted, Congress has reauthorized the program several times, but RCRC's report explained that, with each reauthorization, the funding amounts have dropped.
The United States Forest Service reported that the program expired Sept. 30, after the one-year reauthorization Congress approved in October 2013 ran out.
Under the most recent one-year reauthorization, RCRC said the total amount of funding for California was $38 million.
Garamendi's office told Lake County News that Lake County received $441,066.56 in the last round of Secure Rural Schools payments in 2013. That amount is down by a third from the nearly $600,000 the county received in 2012, as Lake County News has reported.
In January, the Lake County Board of Supervisors urged Congress to reauthorize the bill, the county share of which – averaging about $250,000 – is used for county roads.
The remainder goes to local school districts, primarily the Upper Lake districts, located at the gateway to the Mendocino National Forest.
Because there was no reauthorization for the program in 2014, the US Forest Service released payments to forested counties in January under the “25 Percent Receipts Rule.”
That amount was determined under a 1908 act requiring the US Forest Service to share with states 25 percent of gross receipts from timber sales, grazing, minerals, recreation, and other land use fees on national forests to benefit public schools and public roads in the counties in which the forests are situated.
RCRC said that funding mechanism has resulted in a near 75-percent reduction in monies received compared to what the Secure Rural Schools Program would have paid counties.
The Secure Rural Schools extension the House of Representatives approved Thursday is estimated to provide California counties and schools nearly $27.3 million in 2014 and $25.9 million in 2015, according to RCRC.
Falkenberg told the Upper Lake school boards that the Lake County Office of Education has been holding the Secure Rural Schools funds for a year, which is why schools locally have continued to receive the money, despite the lack of a 2014 reauthorization.
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City of Lakeport releases first annual report
LAKEPORT, Calif. – The city of Lakeport has completed and posted its inaugural annual report.
The report, titled “Find Your Inspiration,” can be found at http://issuu.com/jessicaking2616/docs/city_pafr_final or viewed below.
City officials said this document is different than other city reports in that it presents operational and financial information in a simple, brief and easy-to-understand format, linking it to outcomes that benefit the citizens of Lakeport.
This report will be prepared annually in coordination with the city’s financial statements, which is released in December.
Additionally, city management plans to produce a similarly formatted document for the budget, once adopted by the council.
As opposed to this Annual Report- which presents what was accomplished during the year - the budget version will highlight the priorities, policies, projects, and financing plan for the coming year.
Highlights of the report include:
• Keeping the report's theme in mind, the discussion of city functions and departments was geared toward demonstrating outcomes to the citizen as a result of city activity.
• The flow of the document attempts to guide the reader from policy, to function, to applicable financial information.
• Nearly all photos used are local (mostly within Lakeport proper), taken by a local photographer.
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Lakeport City Council plans special Friday fiscal workshop
LAKEPORT, Calif. – As part of its annual budgeting process, the Lakeport City Council will hold a special meeting this week to look at goals for the coming fiscal year.
The meeting will begin at 9 a.m. Friday, March 27, in the council chambers at Lakeport City Hall, 225 Park St.
The community is welcome to attend.
The council will discuss and set its goals for fiscal year 2015-16.
This is among the first steps in the work of building the new fiscal year budget.
During the council's midyear budget review in February, city Finance Director Dan Buffalo explained that the budget process includes meeting with department heads and building the budget document beginning in mid-April.
Public workshops on the draft document are anticipated to take place in June, with the budget timeline expecting the council to accept the final document later that same month.
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- Written by: Elizabeth Larson