Documenting Graft and Favoritism

We focus on 2 areas, Schools and Transportation.

• There is less congestion and traffic now on most county roads than 10 years ago. (VERY IMPORTANT See  Cal Trans and El Dorado County DOT Traffic Counts). Most of our local road traffic counts are below 2008 levels. As of last reporting, many El Dorado County Highway 50 ramp counts were below 2003 levels. The county still collects fees for mitigating increased traffic impacts when impacts have been declining over time. Highway 50 Ramp Counts indicates that local use is down over 12,000 trips a day. We do not include trips entering EDC at El Dorado Hills.

• Most school districts in El Dorado County have less students now than they did in 2000. (EDC CBEDS review). School districts are illegally charging growth impact fees when no growth has been demonstrated or documented for years and they have empty classrooms!

• The new HOV lanes on Highway 50 are expensive, inefficient, and underutilized. (See pictures, reports, and studies from Cal Trans) About 25,000 residents have paid for the HOV lanes and local road mitigation.

• The county has advanced expensive projects on Highway 50, when Saratoga, a cheap 1/2 mile capacity connection to Folsom’s Iron Point Road, could have eliminated the traffic jams now on Highway 50. (The Saratoga Road connector would help relieve traffic from the El Dorado Hills interchange. It is a General Plan project and was delayed with Green Valley in 1995 to fix Latrobe Road. Also, in 2002, it was recommended as a priority project by the director of Cal Trans, Will Kempton, who performed the studies.)

• El Dorado Hills westbound onramp congestion causes a Level of Service “F” on Highway 50 at El Dorado Hills. El Dorado County Department of Transportation indicates this is the only Measure “Y” offender on Highway 50.

• The El Dorado Hills Interchange has taken longer to rebuild than earthquake repairs to the San Francisco Bay Bridge, the 5 Freeway, and repairs to the Embarcadero. This has caused an artificially protracted impact on congestion, air quality, and safety.

• If Saratoga had been completed (2,300 lineal feet of paving) prior to the interchange, it would have relieved the westbound El Dorado Hills onramp congestion. See Joe Harn’s letter to DOT Director Shepard and the response.