Three candidates squarely behind fixing heaving, expensive
problem
Gilroy – City council candidates say they have a plan to fix all of the city’s cracked and uprooted sidewalks. But once the perennial problem is solved, they say homeowners must take on the entire burden of upkeep and liability.
Councilmen Bob Dillon and Craig Gartman and Planning Commission Chairman Dion Bracco, who will seek election to the city’s top governing body in November, have endorsed the idea of an “internal revenue bond” to back citywide sidewalk repairs. Instead of raising taxes, they say the city could borrow up front against projected increases in tax revenues from the new shopping centers off Highway 152.
“Council broke the sidewalks with the trees, so council gets to fix them,” Dillon said, referring to the city’s mandatory tree-planting policy. The incumbent councilman said that under his plan, homeowners could cut down liquidambar trees, the main culprit for raised sidewalks in Gilroy, and replace them with a tree from a city-approved list.
A rough estimate three years ago placed the cost of sidewalk repairs at $6 million or more, according to Gartman. He calculated that a 10-year bond would cost the city roughly $600,000 annually. Funding for the debt, he explained, would come from the city’s general fund – a pool of undesignated money that now stands at $23.3 million. The city is currently drawing on that balance at a rate of about $3 million annually, but Gartman said officials could repair sidewalks without eating up additional reserves.
“We just need to change our priorities,” Gartman said. “The budget is full of wants. We need to focus on our needs.”
City Administrator Jay Baksa said the city’s five-year budget accounts for anticipated increases in sales tax revenues. He explained that any new programs or bonds, including a sidewalk repair proposal, would require draining more reserve funds or cutting programs or services.
Dillon acknowledged Gilroy’s budget realities and said “there may be services we decide to forego” to repair sidewalks. But such cuts are necessary, he said, since the city’s 50/50 program, which splits the costs of sidewalk repairs with homeowners, has failed to keep up with the problem.
“I’ve heard about (sidewalk issues) for the last 12 years,” he said. “We’ve essentially patched it with the 50/50 program. Let’s see if we can get it all done at once.”
Dillon and fellow councilmen in July proposed creating a task force to study all aspects of the sidewalk problem. The group, which council plans to appoint in coming weeks, will study a range of sidewalk-related issues, including handicapped accessibility and shifting liability for “trip and fall” accidents on homeowners.
Baksa said the candidates’ latest idea would naturally fall under the task force’s workplan.
“The council wanted the task force not only to talk about the intricacies and complexities of the issue,” he said, “but also the funding side.”
