Marin focus on key issues as decade begins

As we inch our way into a new decade, we’re bringing with us many issues that we faced during the decade we are leaving behind.

Decades are calendar milestones. They are also milestones that can be an impetus for change.

Resolving some of the issues facing our communities would be a great start. Some of these issues, such as housing and traffic congestion, have been around for several decades.

They are intertwined.

Traffic congestion also is Marin’s largest generator of greenhouse gases and a stumbling block for us meeting our goals of doing our share to combat climate change.

The lack of affordable housing contributes to our traffic jams. Due to the cost of housing, Marin imports most of its local jobholders.

As we begin a new decade, our local leaders need to encourage the construction of affordable, workforce housing of the right size, the right design and in the right locations. Seeking opportunities to build that housing close to improved transit service or jobs and shopping can help provide opportunities to take cars off our highways and byways.

Early in this decade will also bring some important decisions, such as the redesign of the Highway 101-580 interchange in San Rafael, the construction of a new transit hub in downtown San Rafael and extending funding for the SMART train and bikeway.

One of the challenges that has faced Marin for years was highlighted in 2019, racial segregation in the Sausalito Marin City School District, which has to comply with a settlement agreement with state Attorney General Xavier Becerra to desegregate Bayside-Martin Luther King Jr. Academy in Marin City.

A lasting solution needs to be reached with the involvement of communities on both sides of Highway 101. It needs to address reasons why the district’s charter school, Willow Creek Academy in Sausalito, has had success in growing to enroll nearly 80% of the district’s students — among them pupils from both Marin City and Sausalito.

A state investigation concluded that the long-lasting financial tug-of-war between the district’s two programs had fostered a situation that its Marin City campus was mostly composed of non-white students and that those students lacked some of the academic opportunities available to Willow Creek’s student body.

Coming up with a lasting decision that the entire community will support should be the objective in this important process of correcting this imbalance in the education of our community’s youth.

Just as important as the others, is making diligent progress in preparing Marin’s safety in the face of weather, wildfires and climate change.

Marin voters in March will be asked to approve a special sales tax to pay for a countywide effort to improve wildland fire safety. We already have witnessed the destruction wildland fires have done across our region. Last fall, as the Kincade Fire scorched its destructive path through Sonoma County, Marin was faced with long-term power outages, called by PG&E to reduce the threat of more fires.

Funding is part of addressing this need. So is a countywide approach. But both need to promote greater public awareness, not only in terms of individual preparedness, but in terms of telling the public how their tax dollars are being invested toward promoting safety.

Last year’s outages should help prepare us for others in the future and should compel public utilities and state lawmakers to make improvements to possibly reduce the expanse and extent of the blackouts.

2020 should also signal constructive progress toward resolving the decades-long threat of flooding in the Ross Valley, as well as, effectively addressing repeated flooding of Highway 37.

The change of a year — or decade — is often seen as an opportunity to resolve to set our sights toward important goals. These are a few important community issues that should top that list.