From: Virginia Tincher
To: Council, City
Subject: City Council Meeting - Letter related to Agenda Item 22 - PUBLIC HEARING & PROPOSITION 218 HEARING:
Date: Monday, June 16, 2025 11:34:35 AM
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Palo Alto City Council Members,
As a resident of Palo Alto and a member of Tuolumne River Trust I am concerned the SFPUC is using overly conservative water supply planning that could adversely and unnecessarily affect Palo Alto’s water supply planning.
I am also concerned about the health of the Tuolumne River, our main water supply, and how the water is managed by the SFPUC using the overly conservative assumptions which have resulted in hoarding water during dry years and being forced to dump it in wet years to avoid overflows with overall negative impacts to the river.
I appreciate the ongoing efforts by Councilmember Stone as Palo Alto’s member of BAWSCA to get the SFPUC to look closely at their assumptions.
The assumptions with the biggest impact on users are the design drought and the daily use figures which harm the ratepayers with higher rates and the environment with poor management of water flow in the river.
As Tuolumne River Trust wrote in their letter to the SFPUC -
The 50% rationing figure espoused by the SFPUC is based on the manufactured Design Drought, which might occur once in 8,000 years. Furthermore, it’s based on unrealistic demand projections, acknowledged in the SFPUC’s own document – “Water Enterprise and Finance Bureau Water Demand Projections ” (July
5, 2022) – as “an outside bound.”
Through it’s membership in BAWSCA I urge the Council to support BAWSCA’s Regional Water Demand and Conservation Projections Study process – engaging stakeholders and doing a sensitivity analysis.
Encourage Strategy 2050 to start by identifying how much water might really be needed. Question the design drought – what is its return period? Consider supporting the ”alternative design drought.” Scrutinize the SFPUC’s Alternative Water Supply Plan.
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Encourage a study session on the Tuolumne River Voluntary Agreement (TRVA).
Thank you for considering these suggestions.
Regards,
Virginia Tincher Van Kuran
879 Garland Drive,
Palo Alto 94303
From: Clerk, City
To: Council, City
Cc: Clerk, City
Subject: FW: No confirmation
Date: Monday, June 16, 2025 10:46:45 AM
Dear City Council Members,
Please see the below public comment letter submitted to our office.
Best,
City Clerk’s Office
Subject: Item 22: Proposed Credit to Businesses Will Harm the City and the Environment Dear City Council Members:
One part of item 22 on tomorrow’s agenda is whether small- and medium-sized businesses in Palo Alto should receive a one-time credit of about $820 and $200, respectively, on their gas utility bill.
This credit attempts to approximate the savings they might have received for six months had the City adopted the 2025 COSA rate structure.
The staff report indicates that paying this credit to those businesses will cost the City about $1.1 million.
There are several important reasons to not provide this credit.
First, in no way are these businesses entitled to the credit. The 2025 COSA represents one possible fee schedule, but our existing fee schedule has also been determined to be fair and appropriate and is in fact the one we’ve adopted for 2025.
Under it, the businesses should
not receive this credit.
Second, there’s no reason to think that any of these businesses were relying on this credit. It will be a modest adjustment to their overall utility bill, which for most businesses is itself generally a small portion of their overall expenses compared to labor and rent.
Third, artificially lowering gas bills for businesses discourages conservation. The approximately 2,076 businesses receiving the credit will be less motivated to look for ways to reduce their gas usage, whereas we want them to be working hard to do exactly that.
Fourth, the staff report doesn’t mention a huge hidden cost of these credits. The City wants customers to switch from gas to electric. Therefore, if you are to subsidize anything, you should subsidize use of electric power, such as with a gas disconnect rebate. By instead subsidizing gas, you’ll then need to lower the cost of electric power to match the gas subsidy in addition to any other incentive. In other words, for every dollar spent on the proposed subsidy to businesses, you may need to spend another dollar on additional electric subsidies.
So the $1.1 million proposal could actually end up costing the City over $2 million.
Fifth, the credit will tap into the Cap and Trade auction revenues intended instead to reduce our City’s carbon footprint and improve the environment.
The staff report does indicate that
the proposed credits to small- and medium-sized businesses will be paid first from interest the City receives, but that interest will only cover a fraction of the credits.
Most of the money for
the credits will come from Cap and Trade auction revenues, which were never intended to lower utility bills.
Using such funds to lower rates and disincentivize conservation rather than funding environmental improvements clearly delays the vital changes our City needs to combat climate change.
It moves us backwards rather than forwards.
It conflicts with City policy and
sends a very wrong message about our intentions.
For all five of these reasons, I urge you to hold to your pledge to advance sustainability and therefore reject the proposed $1.1 million credit to small- and medium-sized businesses.
As a
compromise, you might allow that interest can be used for a smaller temporary credit to the businesses, but not any Cap and Trade auction revenues.
Thank you,
Jeff Levinsky
1682 Hamilton Avenue
Palo Alto
From: Cybele LoVuolo-Bhushan
To: Council, City
Subject: Item 22 Public 218 Public Hearing
Date: Friday, June 13, 2025 10:20:15 PM
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Dear City Council,
I’m writing regarding Agenda Item 22 on Monday’s Public Hearing and Proposition 218 Hearing.
According to Palo Alto Online, rate hikes are about to add $32 to our monthly utility bills.
This will have a big impact on fixed-income households, and inflation is already adversely impacting middle and lower income families.
I understand the need to invest in projects like retrofitting our wastewater treatment plant, but there must be a way to reduce rate increases. For example, I’ve heard that one of the main reasons our water bills continue to skyrocket is that the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission has taken on a huge amount of debt, and as a customer, Palo Alto has to cover a proportion of the debt service. Is this something City Council is monitoring? Please do not approve water rate hikes until
Council holds a study session on our water rates.
Palo Alto residents need to get a better understanding of our relationship with the SFPUC. I’ve read about the about corruption at the SFPUC, including the prosecution of a former General Manager: could there be more problems with the SFPUC that are ripe for discovery? Thank you for your service
Sincerely,
Cybele nee Judith LoVuolo-Bhushan
3838 Mumford Place
Palo Alto, Ca. 94306
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From: Ah Yun, Mahealani
To: Council, City
Subject: Comcast Letter: Items 15 and 22 for June 16th City Council Meeting Date: Friday, June 13, 2025 3:14:30 PM
Attachments: Comcast Ltr to Palo Alto 6 2025.pdf
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Hello Councilmembers,
Please see attached letter from Comcast California regarding City Council Meeting June 16th Agenda Item Numbers #15 and #22.
Mahealani Ah Yun
City Clerk
Office of the City Clerk
250 Hamilton Avenue Palo Alto, CA 94301
P:
650.329.2379
| E:
[email protected]
www.PaloAlto.gov
June 13, 2025
Ed Shikada
City Manager
City of Palo Alto
250 Hamilton Avenue
Palo Alto, CA 94301
Dear Mr. Shikada:
Since purchasing the original Cable Co-op in 2000 under an entity which was acquired by Comcast, we have been proud to provide the City of Palo Alto with world class services which has evolved over the past 25-years to meet the needs of our customers and expand through advances in technology and entertainment.
Comcast is proud to serve the City of Palo Alto, operate a Xfinity Customer Store on the El Camino Real near Page Mill Road, and partner with City staff on our efforts to continue to upgrade our infrastructure throughout the city with the goal of providing existing and new customers with a next-generation broadband network that continues to get smarter, faster, and more reliable.
As the City of Palo Alto, Utilities Department staff, Utilities Advisory Commission, and City Council continue to evaluate the implementation of a Fiber to the Premise pilot program, our Comcast team would like to ensure that all City stakeholders are informed about Comcast’s commitment to our customers in Palo Alto and our goal to grow our customer base through strategic competition, excellent customer service, and investments in our network and services.
Below are several updates which we want to share directly with you and the City Council:
• On April 17, 2023, Elad Nafshi, Chief Network Officer of Comcast Corporation, visited California to help rollout the new Xfinity 10G network across our footprint. Elad presented to a group of local officials, which included representatives from the City of Palo Alto Utilities Department.
• On August 15, 2023, Comcast becomes the first Internet Provider to offer a product designed to maintain connectivity when a storm hits, trees are down, or a customer experiences a local outage, with the launch of Storm Ready Wifi. • On December 15, 2023, Comcast announced that it has begun to introduce the first residential customers in the world to next-generation Internet powered by DOCSIS 4.0 technology. The latest version of DOCSIS technology is a giant leap forward in Internet connectivity that can deliver multi-gigabit symmetrical speeds to customers over the connections that already exist in tens of millions of homes in Comcast markets across the country. As a part of the launch, Comcast has introduced a new portfolio of symmetrical products for residential customers which we intend to begin rolling out in the City of Palo Alto and the Bay Area within the next 24 months.
• And recently, consistent with our mission is to provide fast, reliable, and secure internet to customers at prices that are clear and consistent – for the first time, new Xfinity Internet customers get the same monthly price for 5 years. The 5 Year Price Guarantee includes unlimited data and the best-in-class Xfinity Gateway at one simple, monthly price. There’s no annual contract required. Customers have the freedom and flexibility to cancel at any time without penalty.
On behalf of the Comcast team, I would like to thank you and the City of Palo Alto for your exceptional governance and partnership in supporting our continuous investments in our broadband network serving our Palo Alto customers.
Please do not hesitate to contact me with any questions or requests for additional information or briefings from Comcast technical team members. I will also continue to share updates and new information directly with you moving forward.
Sincerely,
Lennies M. Gutierrez
(she/her/ella)
Director of Government Affairs – Comcast California
South Bay & Southern Peninsula
Email: [email protected]
Cell: (408) 465-6979