LAKEPORT, Calif. – With the city of Lakeport and the county of Lake at loggerheads over the city’s goal of annexing the South Main Street corridor, the Lake Local Area Formation Commission is proposing the two governments sit down and try to find a solution.
At its Nov. 14 meeting, Lake LAFCO decided to recommend that the city council and supervisors meet with a facilitator and try to work things out, according to Lake LAFCO Executive Office John Benoit.
The city of Lakeport has long had as a goal the annexation of the full stretch of South Main Street, lined mostly by businesses and therefore the most lucrative commercial area in the county for sales tax, according to county officials.
County administrative staff previously have estimated that the corridor accounts for about 25 percent of the county’s annual sales tax revenue, or about $600,000 a year.
City Manager Margaret Silveira said no current annexation application is on the table. However, beginning more than a year ago, as the city started taking the necessary preliminary steps to add the corridor’s 197 acres to the city limits, the county came out against the plan, citing what it felt were shortcomings in the planning process the city was following.
This fall the Board of Supervisors sent the Lakeport City Council two letters asking to meet to discuss the South Main Street annexation area and a water main loop project.
On Nov. 6 the city council approved a letter that, essentially, said no thanks to a meeting until after some level of negotiations between the staffs of the two governments resumed relating to, among other things, a tax sharing agreement for the annexation area, as Lake County News has reported.
The following week LAFCO – which ultimately must approve any annexation the city proposes – decided that it wanted the issues between the city and county sorted out ahead of its proposed adoption of a policy on how to charge agencies for sphere of influence updates, which must precede annexations, Benoit explained.
The issue came up because Benoit said here have been numerous letters circulated to the city regarding its general plan environmental impact report, which LAFCO must reaffirm when a sphere of influence is considered.
Benoit said the commission – the membership of which includes city council and Board of Supervisors members – intended to send a letter proposing the meeting between the city and county after Christmas in order to allow Lakeport’s new council to be seated. Three new council members were sworn in on Dec. 18.
He told Lake County News that the commission also was proposing a facilitator be used to assist in the process.
Benoit said ultimately the commission would like to see the city and county come to terms on the annexation issue which, he added, “is really financial.”
That’s because the county stands to lose those hundreds of thousands of annual sales tax dollars if the city absorbs all of South Main Street. That’s why revenue-sharing agreements have been part of the discussion between the two governments previously.
While Benoit said the commission can understand the financial concerns, “We would like to see the two entities get together and come to some sort of resolution rather than just fighting,” he said.
He suggested that LAFCO could hire the facilitator, who he said should be someone familiar with both the law and local government finance. Benoit said he has a few people in mind.
Benoit suggested that such a meeting likely wouldn’t take place before March.
“I’d like to see some resolution to the city's and county’s differences. This has been going on for years,” said Benoit, who had been a county planner in the 1980s.
He added, “It just seems better that the two entities work together.”
However, it’s uncertain that the county and city will in fact come to the table.
County Administrative Officer Matt Perry told Lake County News he wasn’t comfortable commenting on the matter until he had a chance to discuss it with the Board of Supervisors.
Silveira, who Benoit said seemed to be open to the meeting, told Lake County News she felt such a meeting was premature.
“We haven’t even sent in an application to LAFCO for an annexation,” she said.
That step would need to be taken before any kind of facilitation would be appropriate, she added.
Silveira said that, with three new council members, the city needed time to bring them up to speed on the issues.
The city doesn’t have a timeline for an annexation application, and Silveira said the city was waiting for a response from the county regarding the November letter asking for negotiations to continue.
If the county won’t negotiate, Silveira said, she’s not sure why the Lakeport City Council would pursue the facilitated meeting LAFCO proposes.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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