Font ResizeHALF MOON BAY — If an earthquake or tsunami were to strike the coast tomorrow, Half Moon Bay's police and city officials would form a plan of action at their trusty "emergency operations center" — an empty conference room in the single-story main fire station just east of Highway 1, with a table, a few cable TVs and some wall jacks.
The Half Moon Bay Police Department has long combined its "can-do" attitude with a "make-do" spirit, especially where work facilities are concerned. But city officials have long acknowledged that when it comes to emergencies, having a dependable place to stage planning and operations is an absolute necessity.
That's why City Councilwoman Marina Fraser was so thrilled with the news, which the city received last week, that Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, had gotten $750,000 toward a new Emergency Operations Center and police station written into the Homeland Security Appropriations Act being considered in Congress.
If the bill passes in its current form, the money would cover only a portion of the cost for the building, estimated at somewhere between $3.5 and $5 million. The facility, to be constructed on a site to be determined, would include necessities such as wireless Internet and satellite TV, backup generators and an independent electrical system.
"We need a new police station, and if there's any way we can expand this to be more useful to the entire coast, we should," said Fraser, who
The cramped police station has been in place for nearly 15 years, even though it was meant to be a temporary headquarters when it was erected, Fraser said.
City officials have been trying to find funding for a new police station for years, but the Highway 1 closures in 2006 at Devil's Slide shed fresh light on the need for a central emergency operations center for all Coastside public safety agencies, including the California Highway Patrol, the county Sheriff's Office and fire and state parks officials.
Police Chief Don O'Keefe is confident he'll find enough funding for the project, possibly from the county, to begin planning for the new building next year. The conference room at the fire station is adequate for now — it was last used as an emergency center during the January floods — but needs to be set up with filing cabinets, tables and computers and then dismantled later on.
"Right now we use the training room the Coastside Fire District has. But it's not part of the city and if they say they have other uses for it, we'll be on our own," O'Keefe said.
The prospect of losing all three roads that connect to the Bayside in a major earthquake is very real, O'Keefe said. Two major earthquake faults bisect the coast, and the roads have already fallen victim to slides, flooding and erosion over the years.
It might even be possible to lose all land line and cell phone communication, which happened in April 2006 when a landslide cut an AT&T fiber optic cable on the coast. Even the police station lost telephone access.
Losing access to the Bayside would also mean losing access to rescue workers, most of whom live elsewhere. On a typical night shift, four Half Moon Bay police officers are on duty, along with 10 firefighters and six sheriff's deputies — three of whom are spread out over Skyline Boulevard and the South Coast.
"We're going to get cut off in a major disaster, like a major earthquake, for instance," O'Keefe said. "If there's any type of disaster we're going to have to handle it on our own."
Reach Julia Scott at 650-348-4340 or julia.scott@bayareanewsgroup.com.
