City to Tend Overgrown Strand Medians

Arguing that the state has shirked its responsibility to care for the medians on the Silver Strand, the City Council decided to do the job for them, voting 4 to 1 Tuesday with Councilwoman Barbara Denny in opposition.

“We owe it to the Cays, they have the right to expect the same maintenance” for their medians as the Village enjoys, Mayor Casey Tanaka said.

The Silver Strand is a state highway so Caltrans is responsible for maintaining it. When the medians were installed in 1997, the city hammered out an agreement with the agency to beautify the medians with deer grass and aloe.

Since then “it has been an unending struggle to cajole and jostle the state agency to do its job,” said Liza Butler, who served on the committee that negotiated the agreement.

“The coastal-like grasses and the bold red spikes of the Aloe make a stunning combination. Wowing residents and tourists alike” she said.

Their beauty has been camouflaged with an invasion of weeds and non-native plants. Some of the weeds grow six feet high, according to Phil Monroe, a former councilman, who showed the council pictures of the blight. 

The irrigation system and the native plants were supposed to ensure easy care, but has been feeding the weeds that are not being pulled, Monroe pointed out. According to the city staff report, the last Caltrans maintenance was a year ago.

“It doesn’t take much care, but it does take care,” Butler said.

Costs are minimal. A landscape contractor the city contacted estimated the initial clean up at $2,760 and monthly maintenance at $438.

The staff report warns that costs could “increase significantly” if Caltrans imposes traffic control and other requirements on encroachment permits. City Manager Blair King said that with liability, costs could rise by up to  $1,200 a year.

Before the city takes over, it will have to obtain an encroachment permit from Caltrans and seek bids from contractors. The permit costs $400.

“Once it began it would continue in perpetuity," he warned.

While there was much Caltrans bashing at the meeting. Councilwoman Carrie Downey came to the agency’s defense on this issue. “They have to maintain Balboa Park and (state Route) 163 and that is where its resources have to go,” she said. “We’re the last thing to be done.”

Denny argued that these “piecemeal decisions” made by the City Council will lock in taxpayers to paying for the maintenance.

She pointed out that city no longer has redevelopment money and needs to continue to husband reserves. She suggested turning the medians over to volunteer “guerrilla gardeners.”