As Cambria residents continue to focus on the accountability of the CCSD management and the elected Board of Directors it is important to remember that the CCSD is not in control over the so called “citizen committee”. The good residents of Cambria own the accountability issue – lock, stock, and barrel. It is critical that the CCSD does not claim ownership or direct the energy flow of our rightful fiscal accountability requests. It is important to remember that the Board of Directors work for us and THEY are responsible for the enormous increase in CCSD staffing, questionable litigation practices, allowing the CCSD to become “more then a Water, Garbage, and Sewer District”, and for funneling millions of water and sewer fee and tax dollars to lobbyist, consultants, and non-profits who largely have nothing to do with providing up-keep on existing water and sewer infrastructure. Cambrians do not need the CCSD permission to review any public documents nor do we need their permission to name who we want on any committee wanting access to public records or accounting practices. While it important to work cooperatively it is imperative that the CCSD not manipulate, direct, or oversee who is allowed to view public documents, question expenditures, or inquire about other fiscal issues that cause concern.
While it was entertaining to hear that the CCSD would ‘allow’ a citizen committee to review the spending habitats of staff it is important to remember that the CCSD staff and board of directors have little authority to stop anyone requesting information whether it be a committee of individuals or a person.
Lastly, it is apparent that dramatic changes to our local government will be coming. This likely will be in the form of decreased spending which could mean decreasing the current staff levels of the CCSD. These hard decisions will be made soon and it is of the utmost importance that civility be maintained as our community adjusts to the realities of economics of this century.
Last 5 posts by Richard Hawley
What is the specific law that requires the provision of water to each and every purchased plot of land in a community services district?
I’m traveling at this time and so I don’t have access to my files, but here’s an overview from memory:
1. US Constitutional guarantees of due process and property rights. You have to allow me beneficial use of my property. That doesn’t mean I can do anything I want with my property such as create a nuisance. It means you have to let me do something with it. Since my lot in Cambria is in the center of a tract of homes, the only suitable use for it is for another dwelling. If you won’t let me build a home, can I rezone it back to agriculture? Maybe I’ll put in a chicken coop or a pig farm.
2. CCSD’s charter. It says their responsibility is to provide water and sewer services in their service boundaries. They are not given a limit or a cap.
3. California state water law, including the famous section 350.
4. Case law, including Lockary v Kayfetz (the decision that supported the famous Bolinas moratorium on new water service), two cases against Marin Muni Water District, and the Tahoe property rights cases.
Taken together, items 2, 3, and 4 tell us that ultimately CCSD is responsible to provide the services they are chartered to provide, and if they don’t provide them they will be liable for damages. A district is afforded protections in case they run into a shortfall, and that’s why they can have a moratorium. But all the court decisions are careful to admonish districts that they had better have good reasons for not performing, and controlling growth had better not be one of them.
Cambria has already run afoul of the conditions laid out in these decisions that would protect it from a taking claim.
Bear in mind here that these cases are from the 70′s. What was infeasible then is now feasible with new technology. Increased land values also support measures that were previously economically infeasible.
How long a moratorium can last has not been adjudicated. It will probably stay on a case-by-case basis. I would suggest it will be when the district runs out of excuses, which in Cambria’s case is right about now.
5. A situation that is peculiar to Cambria is the fact that all lots in Cambria were assessed to pay for the sewage treatment plant. Conditions of the federal funding for that plant include that all members of the district be served without discrimination. You can’t tell me I can’t have sewer service I paid for because I don’t have water, when it is you who wan’t give me water.
The other little problem is the water availability charge that all lots in the district were assessed for many years. You can’t charge us for things and not provide them.
I’m not sure what the smoking gun is. That will be found in a discovery phase of a trial. But clearly the district knows there is one. That is part of why the buildout reduction plan includes buying back lots. It’s to make the lawsuits go away.
Be careful not to think of the CCSD as a foreign entity. On the contrary, it is you the citizens of Cambria. If the district fails, you Cambria citizens will be left holding the bag. The County will not step in and take up the slack. You can already see it playing out in Los Osos.
“Taken together, items 2, 3, and 4 tell us that ultimately CCSD is responsible to provide the services they are chartered to provide, and if they don’t provide them they will be liable for damages.” Daryl
Government agencies cannot be held liable for the finitude of water. Their policies, however, must acknowledge this reality. Otherwise standards of living incompatible with future survival will be embodied in official policies.
Yes, the worldwide supply of water is finite and no government can change that. But there is plenty of water available to Cambria and its CCSD to serve the rest of the property owners in its district. If CCSD’s policies can be shown to be constructed so as to deny access to that water to a select few, then they lose. I think we have arrived at the point where that will be fairly easy to prove.
Deryl, when you say “plenty of water available to Cambria and its CCSD,” what exactly do you mean in terms of quantity? What do you mean by “available”?
I mean plenty of water to supply the rest of the applicants that are in line to build a dwelling.
By available I mean that it can be obtained and delivered by reasonably conventional means.