Liang - Impact on Civic Services Should be Based on Real Data

From: Liang C
Date: Sun, Nov 15, 2015 at 9:22 AM
Subject: Comment on Vallco EIR - impact on civic services should be based on real data
To: "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." planning@cupertino.org

RE: Comment for Vallco EIR

Please study the impacts on civic services, such as library, police, fire station, medical emergency services based on real data.

Please study the impact on medical services, emergency and otherwise. The non-resident population would increase the demand for medical services since medical offices are open mostly only during working hours.

Even though the city doesn't provide any service for ambulances, the response time of an ambulance often means life or death even by just one second. Please study the response time of emergency vehicles to various points in Cupertino since traffic congestion could delay an emergecy vehicle to reach a residence on the other side of the town.

Please study not only facility and personnel needs, but also the impact on level of service. Especially, the response time for medical, police, fire emergencies. And the response time during peak hours in average and also worse case scenarios. Any delay in response time could mean life or death for both the resident and non-resident population. Please study the realistic impact supported by real data.

Please please study the impacts of non-resident population on these civic services since the employees do spend more than 8 hours a way in Cupertino and they need the parks and recreation services, police, fire and medical services as any other resident.

Please include cummulative impact, including ongoing projects like Apple Campus 2 and Main Street, and also proposed projects, like Marina, Hamptons, Oaks.

Please provide real data and statistics to support your claim or conclusion, instead of any undocumented personal communication, as it has been done for the EIR of GPA.

If any personal communication is documented through email, it should be provided in the appendix for reference.

e.g. Personal communications between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Derek Wolfgram, Deputy County Librarian for Community Libraries, April 4, 2014.)
e.g. Personal communication between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Cheryl Roth of the Santa Clara County Fire Department on April
24, 2014.

e.g. Personal communications between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Captain Ken Binder, Division Commander, West Valley Patrol,
April 11, 2014

Please do not make assumption that employees generated do not add any impact without providing sufficient data to back it up, such as the following:

e.g. EIR of GPA states: "Although the proposed Project would result in an increase in employees throughout Cupertino as well, only residents within Santa Clara County can apply for a library card; therefore, the following analysis considers expected population increases, and not employment generation as a result of implementation of the proposed Project."

Most of the employees in Cupertino are probably Santa Clara County residents also. If the EIR would claim that most residents are NOT Santa Clara County residents, statistics should be given to support that claim. In fact, even non-resident of Santa Clara County can hold a library card, according to an official from Santa Clara County Library:

"All public libraries in Santa Clara County allow free reciprocal borrowing regardless of address.  Currently 45,312 non-resident have a library card from our system.  This is 18% of our total library cards.

In the EIR for GPA, the impact level for fire station and police are also derived without any data. With 30% increase in residence population and 50% increase in non-residence employee population, the EIR concludes that there will be no additional staffing needs for fire station or police. But the conclusions were only based on "personal communication" with no document and no data to support it.

For example, based on personal communications, the EIR concludes that there is no need to expansion for police for 30% increase in residence population and 50% increase in non-residence employee population.

e.g. "However, the West Valley Patrol Division has confirmed that future development

under the General Plan would not result in the need for expansion or addition of facilities." (Personal communications between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Captain Ken Binder, Division Commander, West Valley Patrol,
April 11, 2014.)

If there is no need to expand, a written letter should be provided so that whoever makes the statement would be responsible for the claim. And attempt should be made to estimate the realistic impact of population increase and to explain using data why there will be no significant impact.

Thank you.

Liang Chao