California Wine Country Rattled by Magnitude 6.0 Quake

"Nooo! Not the wine! Anything but the wine"

California's Napa Valley was struck by a magnitude 6.0 earthquake over the weekend, causing injuries, buckling streets, sending casks of wine tumbling and damaging historic buildings.

The magnitude 6.0 quake, centered about four miles northwest of American Canyon, knocked out power to more than 60,000 people in Napa and Sonoma counties early Sunday and broke dozens of water mains that could leave 600 Napa homes without water for days, according to the city.

Across the region, the quake jolted residents out of bed, forcing some to flee through dark rooms littered with broken glass and displaced furniture. Others evacuated in the face of flames, with only seconds to grab pets, cellphones and other belongings.

Two people were critically injured, including 14-year-old Nicholas Dillon who was stabilized at the hospital’s triage center before he was flown to UC Davis Medical Center, spokeswoman Vanessa deGier said. The boy, who was in serious condition Sunday night, was injured when a brick fireplace collapsed on him, Napa city spokesman Barry Martin said.

The other seriously injured patient was an adult who suffered multiple fractures, deGier said.

The worst damage to buildings appeared to be in downtown Napa and surrounding areas. The quake dealt a significant blow to the city’s efforts to revive its core by renovating historic buildings, many dating to the late 1800s. Among those historic structures, the county’s old courthouse on Brown Street lost a large chunk of exterior masonry and was left with large cracks on the east side of the building.

Main Street’s Pfeiffer Building also suffered heavy damage with bricks falling off the facade, leaving a large pile of debris at its base that spilled onto the sidewalk.

To the south, in Solano County, buildings in downtown Vallejo and Mare Island also sustained some structural damage, leaving several with shattered storefront windows and toppled masonry.

The predawn quake came on a key day for summer tourism and events, including the IndyCar Grand Prix at Sonoma Raceway and the Santa Rosa Marathon, both of which continued as planned. It also hit in the middle of the region’s grape harvest, when wine tasting draws hundreds of visitors to area wineries and restaurants. The timing of Sunday’s quake, in the predawn hours, likely limited injuries to people who would otherwise have been going about their planned activities.

Amtrak suspended their San Jose-Sacramento Capitol Corridor service as tracks in the affected area. Early estimates say the quake has caused nearly $1 billion in damage to the area's wine industry and resulted in the Napa Valley Wine Train cancelling Sunday service.

The California Highway Patrol reported that a number of highways in the Napa Valley were cracked and buckled, resulting in damage and flat tires to some of the vehicles travelling over the damaged roads.

This was reportedly them most powerful earthquake in northern California in more than 25 years- the fault thought to be responsible is the fairly obscure West Napa Fault, which didn't even show up in a 2008 State of California earthquake risk assessment.

Sour Grapes- Napa Valley Wine Train No-Bid Stimulus Project Facing Massive Cost Overruns

Photo- Steven M Welch

Readers of this blog in its earlier days might remember the sweetheart no-bid contract Alaska Native Corporation Suulutaaq was awarded with stimulus money to do some work on a new bridge for the Napa Valley Wine Train- a project that Suulutaaq turned right around and subcontracted to Kiewit and Sons while pocketing nearly $20 million for doing next to nothing in the process.

Well, in perhaps the most surprising news since the tide coming in or sun rising in the east, the Napa Valley project that Suulutaaq subcontracted is looking at cost overruns of at least $6.2 million.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers may need as much as $6.2 million to keep work on the relocation of railroad facilities and Napa Creek flood defenses on track, Julie Lucido, local project manager, told the Napa Flood Control District's board of directors Tuesday.

"If we don't get those dollars for those two projects, we could be stopped," Lucido said.

Any disruption would undoubtedly end up increasing construction costs when work was resumed, Lucido said. Taxpayers would end up paying more, she said.

Dave Cook, one of the Army Corps' Napa managers, said he expects to know within 30 days if the companies working under federal contracts in Napa can keep working.

The corps is dealing with two issues, Cook said. The company with the $65 million railroad contract racked up substantial unanticipated costs last fall, he said. Also, the corps' overall budget has been reduced by Congress, he said.

In March alone, Cook said he approved more than $3 million in additional costs for Suulutaaq Inc., the general contractor for the new railroad bridges and related street work.

Suulutaaq and its partner, Kiewit Corp, ran into major complications last year in building a new rail bridge over the Napa River. It took working seven days a week to finish the bridge's foundation prior to the winter flood season, which allowed construction to occur throughout the winter, Cook said.

Although these construction problems ran up the price, the alternative was to delay the rail project a year, Cook said. "It saved the federal government millions and millions by having those guys work seven days," he said.

The Army Corps negotiated with Suulutaaq over the bills for unanticipated work, then reached a settlement, Cook said.

To keep work going, the corps shifted money from its construction management account, leaving a construction management deficit that must be filled if work is to continue this summer, Lucido said.

With money tight for many flood projects across the U.S., Cook said the corps was developing contingency plans on how to proceed. Some projects will need to be scaled back, he said.

Don Ridenhour, the county's public works director, suggested that Napa may ultimately end up paid for. "We seem to be a very popular project in the eye of the corps," he said.

Lucido agreed, noting that Napa has been the corps' "poster child" for flood control. The Napa project was one of the first federal efforts that provided major environmental benefits as well as flood control, she said.

Until this latest bad news, local officials thought that both the rail relocation and a two-year, $15 million contract with Proven Management for Napa Creek were fully funded.

The Napa Creek project and most of the rail contract are paid for by a $99.5 million grant from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the federal government's effort to jump-start the economy and end the recession.

Because Proven's winning bid was $14 million less than estimates, the corps ended up returning $14 million to Washington last September.

Keeping the $14 million in a contingency fund would have defeated the goal of the economic stimulus grant to "put people to work" right away, Cook said.

Even if this fiscal year's budget shortfall can be solved, the Napa flood project still faces an uncertain future in the new federal fiscal year that starts in October, Lucido said.

Until now, the Napa project was mostly paid for by federal "earmarks," or specific appropriations that elected officials such as Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, put into the federal budget, she said.

But Congress and President Obama have since banned earmarks, meaning there will have to be "some other process" for keeping the Napa project going, [emphasis mine- NANESB!] Lucido told the flood board.

This is where Napa's "poster child" reputation may save the day, she said.

"Some other process"? I'm dying to know what that will be. Since California is serving as an object lesson in out-of-control government spending by being about $43 billion in the hole, I doubt the state will be riding to the rescue. The municipalities in the Golden State are hardly better off, either.

So that would most likely mean Lucido and Congressman Thompson would somehow find another way to continue federal funding in some way, shape or form. Which means we will ALL get to foot the bill for this ill-concieved, wasteful fiasco in some way shape or form.

Wine Country Boondoggle- Contractor For Napa Valley Railroad Stimulus Project Pockets $20 Million For Doing Nothing

(Amy Miller)

According to California Watch and the San Francisco Chronicle, a project involving a new bridge and track realignment for Northern California's Napa Valley Wine Train as part of the larger Napa River flood-control project was awarded $54 Million in stimulus funds. The Napa Valley Railroad is a privately-run tourist railroad that takes tourists and sightseers between Napa and St. Helena, CA and serves meals and wine in restored coaches. The Wine Train began operations when the Southern Pacific announced it was abandoning it's Vallejo to Calistoga, CA branch in 1985. Former Rice-A-Roni and Ghiradelli Chocolate President Vincent De Dominico and local entrepreneurs would purchase the right-of-way from Southern Pacific, four 1950s vintage former VIA Rail Canada/Canadian National Montreal Locomotive Works FPA4 diesels and some former Rio Grande passenger cars. The wine train began operations in 1987, and aside from ballast for the railroad's maintenance-of-way, very little freight is hauled over the line.

The current project and the contractor that was awarded the funding in a no-bid contract have come under scrutiny. Anchorage, AK-based Suulutaaq Incorporated was founded by Alaska tribes and enjoys special access to Federal Contracts including the Napa River Flood Control project.

However, Suulutaaq turned around and subcontracted the project to Peter Kiewit Sons, Inc.

Federal records show that Suulutaaq is paying Kiewit $28.1 million - 53 percent of the total stimulus contract. Suulutaaq is keeping about $20.4 million, or 38 percent of the total. The rest, about $4.7 million, goes to other subcontractors, all from the lower 48 states.

So that means Suulutaaq basically pockets $20 million of taxpayer funds by subcontracting a public works project that was closed to bidding. In other words, the company made $20 million without even lifting a finger.

Walnut Creek, CA contractor Robert G. Brosamer had planned to put in a bid on the proposed project as early as 2008, but was told that no bids were being sought at the time as it was looking like the project was a "done deal with an ANC [Alaska Native Corporation]".

Brosamer, the Walnut Creek contractor, said the public was paying a premium for the Wine Train project, saying, "It would have been a hell of a lot cheaper if they had put it out to bid."
"The reality is, Suulutaaq isn't doing much," Brosamer said.

However, as the article points out, very few of the jobs awarded to ANCs actually go to Alaska Natives:

Critics have complained that the no-bid contracts provide relatively few jobs and little investment income to the tribes while costing taxpayers a fortune.

Alaska Native corporations don't have to prove that they're socially or economically disadvantaged," Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., said at a 2009 hearing. "They don't have to be small businesses. And they can receive no-bid contracts worth billions of dollars."The companies employ few Alaska Natives and "rely heavily on non-native managers," she said.

The current CEO of Suulutaaq is Samuel Boyle, who burned through an estimated $14 million worth of venture capital as CEO of sailnet- an online retailer of sailing and boating equipment that went bankrupt in 2005.

"My comment to anybody connected to this thing - if Sam Boyle is involved, watch out," said Arizona venture capitalist Kent Mueller, who said he lost more than $1 million in Sailnet.

[Hat tip: Zombie]