Although in many ways this is the perfect illustration of “inside baseball” and something that I’m sure most San Carlans were not aware of, the San Carlos School District was involved — along with the Sequoia Union High School District and the San Mateo County Community College District, in a lawsuit against the San Carlos Redevelopment Agency (RDA). Yesterday, the judge ruled in the case, and he ruled completely for the plaintiffs and ordered the RDA to pay the school districts a total of $4.3 million (of which $1.7 million due to SCSD). You can read an article summarizing it in the Daily Journal today.
How did this come about? It’s very complex, but it boils down to this. Approximately 15 years ago, there was legislation passed (and then subsequent agreements among school districts and RDAs) that required RDAs to pay a small share of tax revenue they received to school districts to offset the fact that the existence of the RDA was effectively redistributing tax dollars to the detriment of schools. Every RDA which had such agreements with their school districts — with the exception of San Carlos — made these payments. It’s lost in the annals of history as to exactly why the San Carlos RDA never made the agreed upon payments, although there is evidence that the school districts did ask for them a number of times over the years. This issue was again brought to the attention of all of the parties a couple of years back, and when researched, it was understood that this was a major failure on the part of the RDA.
The school district never wanted to sue the RDA — as Dr. Baker pointed out in last night’s board meeting, it’s like “suing your brother.” My understanding is that the district tried to work with the city to sit down and work out some sort of settlement. There were clearly ways in which the two agencies could have worked together, particularly in the area of facilities. The city refused, and remained steadfast in its argument that it did not have to pay these amounts (but in all fairness to my fellow elected officials on the San Carlos City Council, this was so “inside baseball” that many of them weren’t even aware of the issue or the lawsuit until recently). Unfortunately, attorneys representing the city never gave any good reason beyond “we just don’t have to.” So, that’s why the school district joined the lawsuit, and the judge came to the exact same conclusion, in fact admonishing the defense attorney for their willful disregard of the law. If you’re a glutton for punishment, you can read the entire judge’s decision.
Of course, the city may appeal the decision, and it’s even threatened to shut down the RDA in response. My hope is that perhaps this decision would be a catalyst for kicking off discussions in earnest that should have happened years ago. I’d certainly be interested in a way for the parties to collaborate, especially on finding a site for a new school and create a win-win situation, as opposed to the win-lose situation of which we were force to be a part. Notwithstanding that we were clearly in the right, it was never my preferred path.
