Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors make Sandhills home improvements easier

By Jason Hoppin

SCOTTS VALLEY - As regulatory hurdles go, few stand taller than the Endangered Species Act.
But after a decade of talks, Santa Cruz County officials Tuesday put the finishing touches on a plan that should allow thousands of homeowners living in the hills between Scotts Valley and Ben Lomond to make improvements without tripping over the Mount Hermon June beetle and other rare and endangered species.
With a unanimous vote, the county's Board of Supervisors approved a plan that allows the county, rather than the federal government, to green-light construction permits in the region, which was already well developed by the time it began earning recognition as a unique biological habitat.
"There have been some folks who've been legitimately held back from doing some of the things they want to do" on their home, said Board of Supervisors Chair Mark Stone, whose district includes the hills. "This should allow them to do that."
Since 2008, homeowners could offset an encroachment into the territory of endangered species - and that could include everything from planting a garden to installing outdoor floodlights - by buying mitigation credits through a local land bank. But they still had to submit their plans through the federal government for approval, a costly and time-consuming exercise.
Under the plan approved Tuesday, which has taken years to finalize, the county would assume the task of reviewing those plans and make regular reports to the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife. The city of Scotts Valley is expected to weigh a similar plan at its meeting Wednesday.
In other business, home health care workers spoke in droves before the county board to plead for a new contract, a scene that's repeated itself countless times since the deal expired in September.
In talks, the two sides have been at loggerheads over the hourly wage home care workers receive to help the elderly and disabled perform daily tasks, and in same cases keep them out of long-term care facilities. Mediation between the two sides broke down last week, with the Service Employees International Union Long-Term Care Workers, which represents about 2,000 county home care workers, asking for $11.50 an hour.
"It's really important that our members and the people that receive these services, low-income seniors and the disabled, have health care professionals that receive a living wage," said Erik Larsen, an SEIU representative.
The county is offering to pay $10.35 an hour, still among the highest in the state for home health care workers, though lower than the county's living wage for contractors. Home health care workers are not considered contractors.
The dispute stems from the loss of federal stimulus money. Home care workers are paid from federal, state and local sources, and for a time the federal government picked up a larger share of each paycheck. Those funds are no longer available, and the county maintaining that the $10.35 an hour offer still amounts to an increase in county spending of $1.4 million.
The gap remaining between the two sides amounts to a little more than $500,000. With the dispute approaching a year, home health care workers have maintained their $11.50 an hour wage.
"For all of us, it's a major issue that we're trying to resolve," Stone said, after the board met in private to discuss the situation. "They're not the highest-paid folks in the county by any stretch."