another chief officer and 5 staff members? how many division chiefs does this district really need? how does this compare with other cities and their call volume/population? it does seem like a lot of taxpayer money being requested. I do realize there has been substantial development since I moved here in the early 90s and the burden of facebook is worrisome, but I am also concerned how we spend our taxpayer money. I agree with Chuck and think this should be properly vetted. Thank you.

Here we go again. When will someone sit down with this Fire District Chief and give him a course in fiscal responsibility. This guy is a financial maniac.

The developer, i.e., Facebook should be responsible for paying the investment, i.e., new apparatus, resulting from its development. Hopefully, its additional taxes will cover the increased operating costs.

Given the huge traffic problems on both Marsh and Willow and the fact that neither Menlo Park or Atherton intends to do anything to ensure that emergency vehicles have a way to quickly transit these routes you would have to be an idiot to think that there is not an emergency situation.

All of the funds involved are existing property tax revenues and there are new taxes or parcel taxes required for the proposed new deployment plan.

Waiting until a house burns down or a patient dies because of inadequate response times would be an irresponsible decision.

This Chief is indeed a loose cannon. Seems to have mastered spending our taxpayer money and getting on tv. Sure hope the Board sees this.

At the November meeting of the District Finance Committee the following proposals regarding the Atherton property were considered.
1. Do nothing – Monthly maintenance only for the gardener and pool service
2. Demolish house and pool (separate costs)
3. Make it habitable for District personnel to live in
4. Make it suitable for a rental $332,706.00
5. Rental income versus property tax = $51,083.00
DISCUSSION
Staff recommends a variation to option 3 which includes relocation of the CERT Coordinator and Adapt Group to this site.

After spending $4.3 million to buy the house they are still trying to figure out what to do with it. If this is used for employee housing or office space it is sure to set some kind of record for housing public employees on a per square foot basis in the country. How does any of this improve conditions in the Facebook area?

At least Bernstein seems to care about fiscal issues. Where are the other Directors, too new or too busy with the Harbor Board to pay attention?

The Alamendral property was bought to permit future expansion of Station 3.

The $4.3 million purchase price was justified by the land value alone. Comparable sized lots in Atherton sell for $5 million just to tear down an existing house and build a Macmansion.

Utilizing the existing home, as recommended by the Finance Committee at its Dec. meeting, to ensure that there is a Chief level officer residing in the District (just as the Atherton Police Chief resides in a Town owned home) maximizes the value of this purchase.

The Town of Atherton allowed the chief to stay at the house while he looked for permanent housing. It will not be his permanent residence. The District encompasses three cities, including Atherton, Menlo Park and East Palo Alto. If the goal is to provide public housing for a highly compensated employee then surely the District can consider other options such as a housing stipend or more modestly priced housing than Atherton. Spending $.5 million to renovate a dilapidated old house so a public employee can live there is an offensive waste of public resources. I'm sure there are some great alternatives in East Palo Alto. Or, is EPA not good enough?

“The Town of Atherton allowed the chief to stay at the house while he looked for permanent housing. It will not be his permanent residence.”

Wrong. It is now his permanent residence.

boondoggle (North American informal) . noun

-work or activity that is wasteful or pointless but gives the appearance of having value: writing off the cold fusion phenomenon as a boondoggle best buried in literature.

-a public project of questionable merit that typically involves political patronage and graft: they each drew $600,000 in the final months of the great boondoggle.

Are you kidding, does this asking for money never stop? The fire district is as bad as the school district in how they manage their money. Lets see the fire district needs to hire more staff then they need more vehicles to drive around the new staff then they need more office space to house the new staff. The fire board needs to develop a backbone and stop this irresponsible and unnecessary request for more money, more vehicles and more staff that still handle 3 small cities Sure is easy to go back to the well when the tax payers have to pay for it

Let me get this straight. The district says it needs another truck? Before the district approves another one they better start using the combination pumper/truck in the east Menlo station as a truck. Today it’s only being sent as an engine. If they truly need another truck, the tax payers should expect the district would use its brand new combination rig as both a truck and an engine which is not the case. Looks like we have an issue with someone trying to misrepresent the need.

Slow service to emergency calls is due as much, or more, to impacted & gridlocked local roadways as to any lack of equipment.
Consider limiting new development, until ECR, Ravenswood, Middlefield, Bay, Valparaiso-Glenwood, & Alameda are widened (by banning street parking if nothing else) & connecting Willow Rd & Middle Ave.
Increased traffic caused by new projects, whether residential or commercial, exacerbates any slow responses by emergency vehicles & further endangers cyclists & peds.
Inline skating & skateboarding on Santa Cruz Ave further increases risks of collisions & slows vehicular traffic in order to avoid harm.

There is a huge disconnect between the Fire District’s responsibility to respond to disasters and the County, Cities and Town’s legal responsibilities for transportation design, approval of new commercial and residential
developments, disaster planning (including warning systems and evacuation plans) and post
disaster rebuilding.

The Fire District’s role in responding to these challenges will not be easy and its partner agencies do not appear to place a high priority on either carrying out their disaster related responsibilities or mitigating the impacts of their actions on the Fire District – I would be pleased to being proven wrong.

Regarding "[widening]...ECR, Ravenswood, Middlefield, Bay, Valparaiso-Glenwood, & Alameda" etc.

Here here! I'll add, though, that the bulk of the traffic under discussion is heading to/from 101 or Dumbarton. In this area, there is NO WAY to get to 101/Dumbarton except via Marsh, Willow or University. Anyone ignoring the obviousness of this fact is being willfully ignorant.

All 3 of these arterial roads need to support more capacity, and all 3 cities (Menlo Park, Atherton & Palo Alto) need to agree to improve the throughput of these 3 roads within some agreed-upon timeframe. And the design needs to keep emergency response vehicles in mind as well

Also, it is unreasonable to expect just 1 of these roads to to be redesigned for more throughput, both because 1 road change won't be enough, and because it's not reasonable to expect the burden of (even partially) addressing this congestion to fall on 1 city.

Agreed. Marsh should be the most easily widened if Atherton would cooperate, but access to it is by a narrow congested Middlefield or Bay.
Eliminating parking on University Ave from Alma to 101 would help too. Without diagonally parked cars between Alma & Middlefield, 2 car lanes in each direction might be possible (I haven't measured) or at least bike lanes could be added.
The new attempted restrictions on traffic through the Willows just makes the Middlefield inadequacy worse.

"Agreed. Marsh should be the most easily widened if Atherton would cooperate"

I agree with your agreement :)

That said, the relative ease of additional throughput is irrelevant, and in fairness to Atherton, they have been more cooperative than Menlo Park or Palo Alto in planning for future capacity needs for the roads in question.

All 3 arterial roads need to have capacity increases, or none of the 3. It is just as unreasonable to expect only Marsh to increase capacity (affecting nearby Menlo Park, Atherton, Redwood City and unincorporated San Mateo County residences) as it is to expect only Willow to increase in capacity.

All of the communities near these 3 arterial roads have a shared fate, and it's long overdue that the cities (and counties) that represent these communities work together to add capacity on all 3 roads.