January 17, 2008

County postpones emergency response, disaster preparedness fee

Elects Pete McHugh as chair

The Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to postpone its decision on establishing an Emergency Response and Disaster Preparedness Fee to allow for additional public comment on Jan. 29 at 2 p.m.
It also selected Supervisor Pete McHugh as chair of the Board of Supervisors for 2008. McHugh will complete his third and final term as a county supervisor this year. He has already served as board chair twice.

Recover some costs
The proposed 20-cents -$1.01 fee for residential users, $1.50-7.58 per month for trunk line users, and $4.80-24.24 for high-capacity trunk line users, would recover a portion of costs for providing 911 emergency communications and disaster preparedness services for residents in the 15 cities and unincorporated areas within the county.

Pete HcHugh

“The Emergency Response and Disaster Preparedness Fee is designed to recover costs for services used by residents in Santa Clara County. This is not a tax. It is a fee determined by careful analysis of services,” said County Executive Pete Kutras. “More and more, local counties are being called on by federal and state government to be self sufficient in disasters and be prepared for disasters. There is a limit to the services we can provide without additional funds.”

The proposed fee would be applied to an estimated 2.3 million telephone lines in Santa Clara County, including land lines, wireless numbers, trunk lines and voice over internet protocol (VOIP) access. Approximately 250,000 lines would be exempt, including low-income “Lifeline” telephone service customers; pay phones; nonprofit, tax-exempt hospitals; nonprofit, tax-exempt schools; government agencies; and service suppliers.

Added revenues
The ordinance will add approximately $3.1 million for fiscal year 08 (March-June 2008) and $9.3 million in revenue annually, approximately 25 percent of the county’s anticipated expenditures to provide emergency communications and disaster preparedness services.

While the disaster preparedness cost component of the fee would be a flat fee to recover the annual costs for disaster planning and preparation, the emergency communications fee component would vary by city based on the level of emergency communications services received by the community. The 15 cities and unincorporated areas of Santa Clara County receive varying levels of service that may include: 911 call answering, law enforcement dispatching, fire dispatching, ambulance dispatching, pre-arrival medical instruction, disaster preparedness and backup 911 call answering.

Revenues from the Emergency Response and Disaster Preparedness Fee Ordinance will recover costs directly associated with services provided by County Communi-cations, the Office of Emergency Services (OES) and Public Health services. OES is responsible for coordinating with county departments, cities and special districts in mitigating against, preparing for, responding to and recovering from disasters.

This responsibility includes maintaining county and city emergency operations centers in a state of readiness, evaluating training and simulated disaster exercises. As part of its responsibility to coordinate all emergency medical activities in Santa Clara County, the Public Health oversees disaster-medical health planning and response, including multiple-patient management, emergency public health operations and medical-health mutual aid coordination.

The board will consider the Emergency Response and Disaster Preparedness Fee on Jan. 29 at 2 p.m., in the Board of Supervisor Chambers at 70 W. Hedding in downtown San Jose.

McHugh named chair
“I am honored to be chair of the board again,” said McHugh. “I fully realize that 2008 is going to be another challenging year for us; however, I am confident that the diversity, talent and dedication of our employees will enable us to continue delivering essential services.”

McHugh’s focus in 2008 will be to improve the county’s financial sustainability. He will outline initiatives and strategies at the State of the County Address on Tuesday, Jan. 29, at 11 a.m., during the next Board of Supervisor’s meeting.

Prior to joining the board of supervisors, McHugh served for 20 years on the Milpitas City Council, and became the first elected mayor of Milpitas in 1978.