Abstract
Nobody wants to repeat Hurricane Katrina’s aftermath. However, even in a region historically prone to flooding, the City of West Sacramento must provide more than stormwater and flood protection. There are many competing interests for the funds in the City of West Sacramento's General Fund. This all-purpose pool of money funds programs, infrastructure, salaries, and benefits across many functional areas of city government. While the City needs to buy fire engines and pay police officers to patrol the streets, the stormwater infrastructure quietly siphons money from the same pool used to fund those critical services. The City wants to reduce or eliminate this competition for funding, without reducing the protection the stormwater system provides. The City’s financial and planning documents, Yolo LAFCO Municipal Service Reviews, and stormwater industry documents provided me likely alternatives, but no clear framework for deciding what option best suits the City of West Sacramento. In this project, I evaluate four alternatives against four criteria, using a qualitative criterion alternatives matrix. Ultimately, I believe efficiency and equity considerations make creating a stormwater utility the best alternative for the City. However, I recommend that the City begin a four-step plan to have an appropriately funded stormwater system. First, the City needs a good accounting of the stormwater needs and expenditures. Next, the City needs to update the assessment district rates. The third step is implementing the stormwater utility, and finally the City needs to consolidate flood protection and stormwater protection. Although these recommendations will carry the City a long way with its stormwater funding, the complicated local governance structure and previous failure of a reclamation district mean the City likely has more stormwater problems ahead.