Pacifica Tribune/Ester Harris, Correspondent, 2/24/16. "Proposed library still on city's radar. Some express concerns over site's possible exposure to coastal erosion over time."
.... "Julie Finklang, the manager for Pacifica libraries, said 'There is a lot of misinformation being spread through blogs and social media regarding the new library site.'
| There went the Beach Blvd library! I learned that on Riptide, it's true. Library will be on Palmetto Ave? Coastal Commission approves, and seawall is getting fixed? No... |
| 1 City library only, 2 floors, underground garage, modern. County funds a portion, and we fund the balance through a tax. |
.... ... Eric Ruchames (member of the Pacifica Library Foundation) stressed the importance for people to understand this project has been in progress for years and years. “It’s not just something the City is trying to slip through,” he added.
Plans for the new library are moving forward. Finklang said the City is working on putting together a library advisory committee. They are currently seeking applicants interested in facilitating plans to move forward with the new library. Five applicants will be selected to serve on the committee. People may obtain applications at both the Sharp Park library and Sanchez library as well as at City Hall." Read article.
Reference, planning. City of Pacifica, the new Pacifica library, "City Council votes for next planning steps..." "At the meeting held on November 23, 2015, the City Council voted unanimously to take the next steps toward realizing the vision for a new library in Pacifica. Those steps include: Hiring an architect to complete the next phase of library design known as “schematic design”; Recognizing that a new tax measure to generate new revenue will be needed to construct the library; Hiring experts to determine and measure community support for a tax; and Appropriating sufficient funding to match funds available from San Mateo County for library planning and design activities.
Related, video. Pacifica Currents, 7/14/12, "A new library for Pacifica", Video 28:30 minutes. "Pacific Currents host Steve Johnson interviews guests Pacifica Libraries Manager Thom Ball and Pacifica Library Foundation Board Member Eric Ruchames about a new library for Pacifica." The Group 4 Architecture conceptual design and discussion begins about 10 minutes into the video. Pacifica Library Foundation.
Note photograph. Beach Blvd by Cheyenne Brockett from Pacifica Tribune/Jane Northrop, 1/20/16,"Seawall collapses near Pacifica Pier." Graphic face page image from Group 4 Architecture.
Posted by Kathy Meeh
74 comments:
The new hole that opened up on Beach blvd this weekend isn't very reassuring.
Would be nice if it was a little closer to the highway.
Another day another hole in the sea wall.
Beach Boulevard falling apart is an image seared in the brains of every one in the Bay Area. We'd be a laughingstock to put a library here.
How dumb does city council think we are?
That pictures seems to show a one and a half story library.
Half of the 2nd story is open to the ground.
The letter in the Tribune said this would be a $50 million dollar bond on the November ballot, is that true?
I think this design for the new library would be beautiful
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/47/17/bf/4717bf1e4d185bae0f98e8a6982ae1c7.jpg
Council is using our money as landfill. $30 million, 50 million, they're out of control. Put it to a vote? And, when it fails, then what? The Walnut Creek maneuver where they ignored the clear public vote against a library bond and plowed right ahead. Perhaps emboldened by the Trump phenomena, Council is banking on the public's stupidity.
Julie Finking needs to realize that insulting the people discussing the library on social media isn't going to help her cause. If the facts are truly wrong, refute them, don't just issue a blanket, fact-free declaration that people are mistaken. At the end of the day though, I can't believe that there will ever be enough voters willing to tax themselves to build a new library when Pacifica has so many larger needs. Fancy new libraries are for towns with money to burn, this is not one of those towns.
That Tribune article rubs me the wrong way.
Is the $50 million library bond so tenuous that Todd Bray writing one comment is going to send it down the stairs?
I don't know all the facts, but I will say this.
I trust both FixPacifica and the PacificaRiptide more than I trust the City of Pacifica.
FixPacifica and Riptide never lost four million bucks of my money and pretended it didn't happen.
No way in Hell the library bond passes.
Does this type of bond need a 2/3rds majority?
Where is this city possibly going to get $50 million bucks?
You have got to be kidding me.
Beach Blvd crumbling
Pier falling over
Linda Mar Blvd in worse condition that streets in Afghanistan
Underfunded Pension Obligation
"unaccounted for" $4 to $5 million
And the geniuses want a new 40 million dollar library.
Build the Library. Take the money from the Highway Widening failed project.
Money Pit. We've had four sinkholes on Beach Blvd in the last month and we want to pour fifty million semolians into that same hole?
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is this City Council doing!
We should replace the sea wall with a real sea wall before we sell the Beach Boulevard property.
If it's worth $10 million now it will be worth $15 million after we replace the sea wall.
Where will city council meet if 2212 Beach Boulevard is sold?
Are you we building new council digs as part of the new library or are we going to have city council meetings at the conference center in the new quarry?
Venice Italy is underwater yet they have the Biblioteca Marciana still standing since the 1500s.
Just because the property may be underwater in the future doesn't mean we can't build a library that can survive for fifty years at that location even if it is underwater.
It may be a little more expensive to waterproof the foundations and lift the foundation 15-20 feet higher, but modern technology is capable of it.
Bothers me a little that City of Pacifica used the public relations officer San Bruno loaned it to attack blog postings of a private citizen (Todd Bray).
Give me a break, is the whole house of cards so unstable that one more post on Riptide would send the new library tumbling down?
Are we really going to use the Pacifica Tribune to shout down anyone who disagrees with Big Brother?
10:22
Bite your tongue. You are not in sync with the managed retreat, nothing for Pacifica gang. Don't you realize that you know nothing and they know everything?
Now stop your silly human talk and start bleating like all the other sheep who dutifully obey the rules as written by the "I Got Mine's".
Todd is a very Big Brother. You best not get in his way. Plus he's the smartest man in Pacifica.
1150, as known, the ongoing misinformation campaign by eco-nimbies in this City is huge, and Pacifica Riptide is the promotional launch pad blog for that mythology.
In this instance, the "Big Brother" library project approval you may be referring to as a "shout down" to your theory of land stability is the California Coastal Commission-- all so amusing isn't it?
New library is doomed to failure at that location.
City really thinks that Todd Bray is the only one who watches the news on television?
He's just the first one who's not afraid to say it in public, because everyone knows you raise your hand in protest and this city is going to grab its hammer and use its resources to attack you for it.
Biggest problem is that if the city admits the new library's location between beach and palmetto is bad, they almost have to admit the Palmetto Streetscape location is bad too, and they already have the ribbon cutting on that bad boy planned.
Sorry folks, the only thing that can stop that library from being built is El Nino. Even a ballot defeat can be overcome by a determined Council and a couple of super-sized egos. Maybe El Nino will be El Nono? Hate to hope for that.
I've never bought the global warming bullshit Obama spews. I've lived here forty years and the old sewer plant has never been underwater once. Not once. I'll be dead in twenty years so I don't really care if it lasts 21 years or 22 years or whatever they predict. Most public buildings don't even last that long.
Build the library. We've neutralized the Coastal Commission for a very short period of time while their own President got kicked out and they could bounce back any time and stop it if we don't get started right away.
(and yes 10:04 a.m. of course we have to replace the seawall first, that goes without saying.)
Another vote @1256 for suspending reality! I chuckle every time I hear the new library called an 'anchor' for the Palmetto reboot.
Sure, sure, why wouldn't I vote to add a few hundred bucks a year to my property tax bill since neither myself nor my kids have stepped into a library since the late 1990s?
Libraries are dead. You could get books and videos delivered to your house for eight bucks a year from multiple sources, why would you pay several times that to have to drive down to Manor, fight through that traffic, find parking, and then wade through the ranks of the homeless showering in the sink to deal with checking out a paper book at a bricks and mortar library.
Does no one on Pacifica city council use Netflix? It's embarrassing to keep hearing them plan stupid stuff like this.
Kathy can you link to Coastal's letter on land stability?
It's not on their website.
I support switching locations, but to me the money matters. Is the County paying only 10% or are they paying 50%?
If they're paying 50%, let us build a nice twenty million dollar library (not at the sewer plant, someplace dry) and we can use the money from Sharp Park and Sanchez to pay for it without even having to take out a loan.
If they're only paying 10%, rebuild the Sharp Park library on the Sharp Park location with whatever cash we can get from donations plus county money.
Beach Boulevard falling into ocean and requires $29M to repair.
Pier is falling into ocean and requires $6M to repair.
Esplanade apartments falling into ocean and CITY is paying $400K to demolish!!!
Sewer and water mains along Esplanade will need to be rerouted at a cost of?????
Dollaradio falling into ocean, how much will city pay to protect this heritage site????
$1.2M set aside to start the Palmetto revitalization project went missing.
A total of $4.75 in loans needs to be paid back.
Pension obligations are being restructured in 2017 requiring greater contribution from city.
Eyesore business vacancies all up and down the main thoroughfares of town.
Violent crime and robberies with weapons up.
City unwilling to take any action to protect the most vulnerable in town by increasing funding for Resource Center
City unwilling to take steps to prevent unjust evictions
City ignores CCC direction regarding mobile home park -- did someone say lawsuit?!
Somehow Lori Tinfow can drive our "streets" and not immediately fire Ocampo for dereliction of duty.
City goes on kumbaya team-building session, complete with beach balls, beach chairs and fake campfire and decides that its answer to all the above will be to....
PUSH FOR A LIBRARY CONSTRUCTED IN A CRUMBLING FLOOD ZONE EVEN THOUGH THEIR OWN POLLING SHOWS THAT THE $90 MILLION NEEDED (BOND+INTEREST) HAS NO CHANCE OF PASSING!!!
Why roll the dice on that location with fifty million dollars?
It would be so easy just to move it to dry ground.
What about behind the police station? There's a huge empty field there. Its close to the highway, south of the sharp park traffic pileups, and if there's any danger to the kids the police are right there.
Yup, a big fancy brick and mortar library for $50m is exactly what Pacifica needs in the year 2016! I say, put it right in between the blacksmith shop and the fortune teller's tent; you know, right across the street there from the barber surgeon's office. Hell, let's go f'in medieval on this project!
County will pay less than $2M total, regardless of how big we build the library, and will not pay a dime for construction, only for furnishings.
The coupon clipper in says we should match the county buy in exactly (if county pays $1.7M, we pay $1.7M and build a $3.4M library) and build a much smaller library for exactly two times whatever funds the County of San Mateo will provide.
The City wants fifty million United States dollars so it can demolish our two perfectly good libraries to construct yet another library in order to anchor Palmetto. Palmetto!!!
YES! Let's con people into passing a $50 million bond so that we can bring lots of outside visitors to our wonderful "downtown" filled with coin laundries, metal fabs, auto wrecking yards, and tattoo parlors.
BRILLIANT!!!
Seems like the city has two arguments. That they'll be open more hours with one library than two and that they'll have more computers.
They could staff both Sharp Park and Sanchez libraries twenty four hours a day, and buy fifty new laptops per library with just the annual interest from a $20M library, let alone a $50M library.
Again, the answer is keep both libraries, staff them 7 days a week, add 50 laptops or tablets each, and save Pacifica citizens $49M.
Watched the thirty minute video.
Metrics like "CD-ROMS in Library Collection", and "Number of chairs in library" are meaningless between smartphones, iTunes, Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime and YouTube, metrics. They just made me feel bad for the old guy in the video.
Might as well advertise "number of feeding troughs and hitching post rings" to today's kids and offer free leaches to cure their ills... the odds of this bond passing in November will be the identical.
321 I'd vote for you if you're running! Sounds like the most common sense solution yet.
Will the new library allow dogs or have a doggie area?
Libraries are largely dead, but that doesn't mean we can't at least make the Sharp Park location cosmetically acceptable.
Take $7-10 million from the sale of Beach Blvd property and redo Sharp Park.
Projected cost of new library per capita = $50,000,000 / 40,000 = $1,250.00 per every man, woman and child in Pacifica (This does not include operating and personnel expenses). When evaluating a bond issue, how many people are willing to pay $1,250.00 plus interest for every member of their family to fund this library?
Here's a novel idea:
1. Close down all libraries and sell all properties including proposed site (income = $10,000,000)
2. Layoff all library personnel (annual savings = $400,000)
3. Buy every needy household with a child between 5-17 years old; or every household with a library card; or every household with financial need a laptop/tablet plus subscriptions to e-encyclopedia and e-book services. (estimated cost = 1,000 households @ $700 = $700,000)
Take the savings from the proposed $50,000,000 expenditure and pay down our debt and fix out infrastructure. For just once, let's run this city's finances the same way we have to run our own.
*Note- All figures are estimates. Expert opinions may vary.
"Crazy pills" wrote: "...our two perfectly good libraries...". That just shows what taking crazy pills will do to you.
@3:21: I suspect that you haven't been in many libraries recently. Pacifica has a couple of crop-dusters while every other city is operating or building modern jets. Maybe the new library will offer material on critical thinking and finance?
436, every other city may be building modern jets, but the wars are being won by drones flown remotely from a Colorado bunker.
People don't use libraries anymore. Like cds, beta, and eight track tapes, they are largely obsolete.
Every single item in the library's inventory can now be acquired online from the comfort of your home.
What's next, will Pacifica invest half it's budget in Blockbuster or travel agencies?
I hate to break it to the Rah-Rah Library Cheerleading Squad, but the library bond won't pass. Sorry. You can wish as hard as you want and think it's the best thing in the world, but it will not pass.
Polling done in 2012 showed the bond didn't have enough support at the time and with the Category 5 financial shitstorms that have hit Pacifica since then, you're delusional if you think public sentiment towards the measure hasn't gotten much, much worse. But hey, knock yourselves out. Put on the whole dog and pony show, mail out a dozen slick flyers showing some crying kids without books or computers, trot out the same old civic volunteers, flush another couple of grand down the toilet on lawn signs.
Any argument you make for the passage of the bond can be countered with the simple question, "If the city doesn't have a goddamned clue about how $5 million seemingly disappeared into a puff of smoke, why in hell would anyone trust it with $50 million?"
And there's no answer to that one. None. So start scaling your library dreams waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down to match Pacifica's complete ineptitude when it comes to managing projects and money.
Gentle remodels of the existing spaces might fly. Might. Anything else is DOA.
I highly doubt the kind citizens of Pacifica will actually support this initiative. And even if they did, I am almost certain it would be impossible to raise that kind of money in the market today.
But, lets suspend reality and fantasize for a moment. If the city were to raise the said $50 million, it would probably be better to build an Aquarium in that location rather than a library. And use that Aquarium as an anchor to develop Palmetto to cater to the visiting traffic from all of SF Bay Area and beyond.
Widen the HWY1 to the Quarry. And all the way to Crespi.
Then we should also consider an amusement park in Quarry, similar to Santa Cruz Boardwalk along with Outlet stores. An amusement park with Outlet stores would be in conformance with the local zoning. And it would bring revenue to the town.
The closest amusement park to SF is in San Jose. That is a 40 min drive at 2:00 AM in the morning. Or the one in Vallejo which is about a 2 hr drive during day.
There is untapped demand. And a perfect location to utilize.
Make it happen. And put Pacifica on the map!
Ok, time to wake up and back to reality now ......
@4:49-
Rather, I equate this to killing an ant with an atomic bomb - a 50 megaton atomic bomb!
321 uses the right word to describe this library shell game. And the word is "con" as in con game. The new library is just the latest short-sighted, disingenuous, harebrained scheme from the same lunkheads that got sloppy with 5 million minimum in taxpayer funds. Not much glory in running Pacifica and there never has been. Their legacy is riding on this library/Palmetto plan. Will they take no for an answer from the voters? Don't bet on it.
Local Lib, Pacifica is already an amusement park, a carnival sideshow by-the-sea.
For a month straight every news article about Pacifica is about how Beach Blvd is washing away in front of our eyes and how the city is powerless to stop it.
As recently as three days ago the sinkholes are still appearing and edging ever larger and nearer to the sewer plant where we plan to build the library.
Not only should the new library not go there, we probably shouldn't even spend any money on Palmetto at all.
Amen on that 7:58
I trust FixPacifica and Riptide more than I trust the city too.
The Beach Blvd property is the large now-vacant spot by the pier where the sewer treatment plant once stood. Council chambers are there now, as well as a sewage pumping station (insert joke here).
The city thinks it can "add value" to the property by handing off a pre-permitted development to a set of builders who will construct condos/townhomes, a restaurant and a hotel.
Of course, this being Pacifica after all, "adding value" means spending literally a million dollars in consultants to study the property and recommend retaining a loud and smelly sewage pump station on the property and to insist that a kabillion-dollar vanity library (that the community doesn't support) be built on a sizeable portion of the property.
That being said, there will be some revenue generated upon the sale of the property, but just think how much of that has already been blown on the mobilization of the Third Airborne Fleecing Division of the Consultant Combat Command.
The claim has always been made by the city that this project, once completed in the year Twenty-Nevery-Never A.D., will bring in $500,000 in annual tax revenue. To which I say, they could have only come up with this figure while at a team building seminar at Burning Man and the city should probably dial back the hallucinogen use.
Nice to see the greatest hits making an appearance once again, 8:37.
How long until we see the next blowout of the seawall?
Five minutes? Five days? We all know the answer isn't five months.
Seems like a betraying voters to pump all our money into a hole for the next thirty years.
I love that Pacifica is spending money on a professional polling outfit whose marching orders are likely to be something along the lines of "phrase the questions to make it look like we have support for this boondoggle," when, if they want to really know what people think, council members need only read city blogs -- and doing that won't cost the already broke city a penny. I have yet to meet a person who supports the library, and, unlike other towns, there is no magic city surplus/account form which to borrow $50 million when the voters shoot down the ballot measure. Nothing like wasting money we don't have . . .
The Coastal Commission letter is not particularly relevant.
The EIR is from 2007, when Obama served his first full year as a US Senator
I think Todd Bray wins this round.
Now why would we do something this stupid.
City hall thinks one editorial in the Tribune attacking a local blogger will cancel out hundreds of news stories in exponentially larger publications showing whole blocks on Beach Blvd being reclaimed by the sea.
The real danger is that this folly will endanger disaster funding we might otherwise be able to obtain.
City Hall doesn't care you're being taxed to death.
City Hall doesn't care people don't use libraries anymore.
City Hall doesn't care that Netflix does it cheaper, and better.
City Hall doesn't care the old folks using Sanchez lose their library.
City Hall doesn't care about you.
OMG a $30-50M library? You have got to be kidding me.
What is wrong with this city that they can't see we want the roads paved first?
I sure as hell would never vote for that and neither would anyone I know.
7:18
Oh contrare. It secures disaster funding for generations to come.
736, but you would vote to pay a $30-$50 M tax for 1x road repair?
So many Anonymous comments. Who can say whether most of them may be posted by one person.
Nothing new about the proposal to put a library in that location, goes back to about 2003 when that City Council championed putting City Hall at the location of the proposed hotel.
800, interesting comment. What would best secure seawall funding for Sharp Park-- a whole bunch of people live there, doesn't that help?
When the City singles out people who post on blogs and tries to shame them in publicly in the newspaper no wonder everyone wants to be anonymous.
This city is on the wrong track. We've been paying thirty million dollars a year for decades and they haven't fixed the roads because they choose to do other things with the money, not because the money isn't there.
At no time was I contacted by the Trib for comment on this issue. Much like this blog the paper plagiarized a comment of mine without asking for permission. Having said that I thought the city and former employees like Rucheman, who collects a city pension, ridiculous. In the mean time I had nothing to do with the above article other than to be plagiarized (again) by some sort of writer that doesn't seem to have the ability to pick up the phone to do her research.
Having said that I found the article hilarious in it's attempt at legitimacy.
943 Calm down. The "government as bully" trend was bound to reach Pacifica. It's a small, petty, personal application, but what do you expect from official Pacifica?
Kathy: A whole bunch of people already live on Beach Blvd. Problem is, NOBY's have already demonstrated that people don't matter. Put a City Library there, community support is broadened beyond the defects who hate anything for people outside of their selfish "I Got Mine" circle. That's why they fight the library. That's why they put a sewer in the Quarry. That's why they fight Highway One improvement. Nothing for Pacifica everything for the devious NIMBIES. Get it???
943, what you claim to be a City quote, clearly is not. It is a an article quote from Esther Harris.
1100 Todd Bray, the comment you made on Pacifica Riptide is public. You said it, you presented what you said as understood and known fact.
And, since you claim what was said is a paraphrase, how does your original comment vary from the Tribune account? "On a local Pacifica blog, Pacifica Riptide, Todd Bray posted...
'I could see a new library if we lived on dry land, but as the CCC guidelines continue to show 2.5 feet of erosion on average per year, the library could well be the mean tide line in 50 years. If the city staff wants a new library, build it somewhere dry like where the current Sharp Park or Sanchez library branches are.'"
Of course if the City proposed building a new library on dry land, which included a residential tax, you might also be against that.
Then, there is the issue of 1 library vs. 2 that may be an obstacle for many affected residents.
Amen Kathy on the 1 library vs. 2 issue.
I love the Sanchez Library. It's nicer than many other libraries in cities our size and twice a week my mother walks down and takes my children there. She doesn't drive. She doesn't Facebook, but she has used our neighborhood library for decades.
I don't think the City was considering Linda Mar residents when they planned this out and the idea that we have to build the library in a bad spot simply because we planned it for so long is a little hokey. The idea that we can save money on the new library by firing a bunch of librarians is also distasteful to me.
I didn't know that the everything on these blogs was public and the newspaper could use it any time. From now on I will be anonymous.
No need to have the city try to embarrass you for free speech or participating in polite discussion.
City's plan is so half cocked they're using an environmental impact review from more than ten years ago.
Not sure how much money we've wasted in that last decade but it's time to rip the bandaid off and stop the bleeding.
Don't spend any more on this library. Keep the ones we have upgrade them a little for the few seniors left who still use libraries.
When that genre of library users passes, we can sell both properties and cease being in the library business. Not only can we cut staffing costs, we can eliminate them completely with Amazon, Hulu and online book deliveries.
1254, you're embarrassed by your own "free speech"? Or, are you embarrassed by your own purposeful lack of credibility to sign or substantiate what you say?
At the same time, credit to Todd Bray for signing his name to what he said, if he thought what he said was factual (which it may or may not be). Apparently City studies and Coastal Commission sentiments do not agree with his view at this time.
1254, how is it you did not know that public blogs, and public comments are not public? And how is it that you would not know that newspaper reporters would also have U.S. Constitution First Amendment/"free speech" rights?
306, apparently no library at all works for you.
No library at all works for me too. I'd rather hold the newspaper in my hand but my kids grew up learning to read books on their ipads, and they don't care about a physical library.
It's a small step to go from saying "we're not a neighborhood library system, we're a central library system" to saying "we're not a central library system, we're a central library server that delivers you all your books, movies and music in the comfort of your own bed" with no building at all.
Instead of saving a little on library staff costs, we can eliminate library staff completely. Not only are online libraries open seven days a week, they're open twenty four hours a day.
All movies in stock all the time and no late fees. Everybody wins.
I've never heard any of my neighbors in the Fairmont say they had used either Pacifica Public Library.
For the most part our family uses Daly City or South San Francisco because they are on routes I routinely travel, and of course, Netflix.
I would not be in favor of a bond that taxed me any more to build a new library when we've already got two I never use.
If they both closed and Pacifica saved a ton of money getting rid of library salaries, our lives wouldn't change at all.
Why are the posters on this blog split between:
1) Yes to Library
2) No to Library
Why can't we have a 3rd option? Like I've been saying, what about an Aquarium?
Another suggestion: a Museum of Micro-organisms (Bacterium and Virii)
Another suggestion: a Museum of Chemistry & Bio-Chemistry
These can be easily situated in 3 acres.
-- with all that Bio-tech research going on in Mission Bay SF & South San Francisco, I am sure it will attract interesting and intelligent people to visit Pacifica. Perhaps, even funding. It would create employment, generate revenue and really put Pacifica on the map.
I really can't bring myself to spending $50 million for a library in this day and age.
Now a Museum of Micro-organisms + Nano-technology? That would be awesome!
There is only one in the world: Micropia
And a Youtube Video of the displays.
Just imagine the number of kids it would benefit. And the kind of positive publicity it would bring to Pacifica.
Woah! Micropia only cost 10 Million Euros. I bet it attracts a lot of visitors
Look at the reviews on Yelp! and on Tripadvisor
Wouldn't we want *that* kind of a revenue generator in Pacifica?
the aquarium idea makes a lot more sense than a library at this point.
someone last week talked about partnering with seaworld and that really seems like the best and greatest use of the property.
"Eric Ruchames (member of the Pacifica Library Foundation) stressed the importance for people to understand this project has been in progress for years and years."
Back when people still used libraries.
Aquarium? There's something fishy about that idea, LL.
If we're talking uber lucrative tourist attraction potential, why not turn the City Council Chambers on Beach Blvd. into a Disneyland-esque multi-media animatronic attraction modeled after Disneyland's "The Hall of Presidents"? We will appropriately entitle ours "The Hall of Bad Pacifica City Councils Past". Featured will be some of the most memorable, show-stopping highlights of speeches/statements made by City Councilmembers of the past such as:
- the mind-boggling "Our environment is our economy" speech
- the infamous "I voted against it because I wanted more" speech
- the mystifying "Madam City Attorney, how should I vote on this?" speech
- the jaw-dropping "I can't see why anyone needs any more than 1,200 square feet to live in" speech
- the spine tingling "Since that business disagrees with us [City Council] I'm calling on all Pacificans to boycott them"
We have so much to be proud of here in Pacifica. Why not let the world in on it?
Sorry. I almost forgot the crowd-pleasing "We need to hire a consultant to tell us if we need a task force to tell us if we need a task force" speech. Very, very popular!
Personally, I love Aquariums. However, Monterrey Bay Aquarium is quite awesome. And the Aquarium in the city is pretty darn cool in its own right. Also, I think a sea world type setup in Pacifica may not be practical because:
1) Pacifica is not a bay nor a lagoon. We face the ocean and the fury that comes with it.
2) Building an artificial break-wall out in the ocean is a very expensive undertaking. Don't know how deep it is at the end of the pier, but its certainly deep enough to catch sizable fish.
3) If we build an aquarium, it would have to be over the top awesome to attract out of town visitors. It would be very expensive. Who would fund it?
That got me thinking. I truly believe a micro-organism + nano technology museum would be unique in the world. And if the city were interested, I think it would be possible to approach Genentech, Amgen and the like for funding. Further, I think they would be interested in donating equipment, guidance and resources (planning / design) for this kind of effort.
We live in the midst of some of the most advanced technology in the world. We should take advantage of it. We'd probably be able to pull this off for very cheap (certainly not $50 million) -- without a burden to taxpayers, be a revenue maker and benefit future generations.
Is that too much ask for?
Lib, you are a wild man, a fantastic dreamer. Your museum would be a real diamond in the rough. Might as well build it in Somalia.
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