Community Assessment - Health & Quality of Life in San Mateo
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Community Issues

evaluation of community social environment

racial and cultural tolerance

Socially, community panels described the diversity present in San Mateo County, not only in the presence of many different ethnic groups, but also in the presence of various economic levels, age groups, and social viewpoints.

"Certainly the Latino population, Chinese, Filipino, Tongans, African-American, it would be hard to name a culture that’s not present. There are 33 languages spoken in my daughter’s high school."
— Business Leader

"The difference between Belmont and San Carlos and Redwood City, I didn’t realize there is as strong an Asian community in Belmont as there is, and then of course the Hispanic community is the majority community in Redwood City, whereas San Carlos is predominantly Caucasian, most of the residents are college graduates and higher."
— Business Leader

"Everybody seems to be from somewhere else here. There’s very few people who actually have been here all their lives. We’re just so fortunate here to have so many people from so many different places."
— Social Services Representative

"There are many families now that are going into the second generation without having some kind of religious values as part of their actual development of their family…"
— Business Leader

Though panel members believe San Mateo to be accepting of diverse ethnic groups and viewpoints, they acknowledged there can be some conflict between American and other cultures.

"Many of us of color live multiple lives and we have to. We have to be articulate in English, we have to have jobs, we have to perform in that arena. But in many cases, whether it’s out of habit or out of choice, you find your own place with your own people from whom you have that security. As we continue to isolate, that may become a greater and greater issue."
— Business Leader

"Another issue is the gap culturally between the parents and the kids. Kids… go to school, they become educated, they start to speak [English] and then there are gaps in understanding between the parents and the children. Being a social worker, I see that the children are growing up much faster than I think the parents would like because the children are often placed in the position of having to translate for their parents when it comes to health services or mental services or translating between a teacher and the parent."
— Social Services Representative

Detracting from the level of social tolerance is the growth of San Mateo County. This business representative believes as the area grows and becomes more crowded, residents become less tolerant of immigration even though a large portion of that immigration is from within the United States.

"What is frightening for me and California in general, is we have too many people, and so it’s, ‘I was here first, early, and so everybody else is not as good as I am.’ Where it used to be comments at a party, it’s now part of our state initiative system. The anti-immigration issues are of concern …it’s immigration from within the United States that’s adding the greatest pressure. Northern California, particularly the Bay Area that’s in this economic boom time, the immigration that we’re seeing is from Southern California because when those people had money or had skills, [they] didn’t want to live in Southern California anyway, they lived there because the jobs were there. When the jobs weren’t there anymore, they got the heck out of there and came back to Northern California."
— Business Leader

 

tolerance for different viewpoints and lifestyles

"Two other aspects I see in our diversity have to do with our wealth, or lack of it, because we have two of the wealthiest communities I guess in the country… Another aspect of our diversity has to do with age. Sensitivity to the needs of seniors, older people, I think is at a pretty high level here."
— Business Leader

"I think there are a lot of resources and, along with the diversity, there are a lot of diverse resources and different viewpoints about things, and those translate to things getting done in very different kinds of ways. I’m thinking for the most part [about] health and human services, [but also] access to various art
programs and to cultural awareness and support services."
— Social Services Representative

"I think one of the other pluses is being on the fringes of San Francisco, we’re really a lightning rod for a lot of social issues. Everything from gay rights issues, capital punishment, you name it, if it’s anywhere out there in the state, we’ve got contingencies, we’ve got people voicing their opinions."
— Business Leader

 

community involvement

resident involvement

Panel members stressed that, when looking at ways to address concerns in San Mateo County, community members need to be asked for their input because they are often most in touch with the needs of their own neighborhoods.

"The community needs to be involved in the decision making. I think they would support it if they work together. There would be more buy-in."
— Social Services Representative

"If there’s a need, I think there are ways to go about putting
a call out there for people to get involved."
— Social Services Representative

Participants emphasized the need to develop leadership from various ethnic groups to hear their voice when developing community programs or initiatives.

"As it relates to certain groups, they’ve got to be culturally focused. They’ve got to involve Latinos. The particular model we work with, you take people in the community and you develop them to be the ones to bring along the rest of the community. And we have found that has worked."
— Social Services Representative

"There’s a lack of representation at the leadership level of city government and at the political level of constituents. [In] the Hispanic community in Redwood City, there’s some, but you don’t really have a broad base of representation. Part of that may be some cultural issues and development of leadership and letting people understand how the system works. I think that creates friction and creates problems for communities."
— Business Leader

In addition, this social service representative said the community must also listen to youth.

"My concern in this county is that we work together to make sure that our youth are heard and that all the issues that are important to them are addressed. I do know kids and I do know that what they say and what they decide, they firmly believe in."
— Social Services Representative

Several participants urged San Mateo County to work to include the faith community in initiatives, indicating the faith community is frequently the best way to reach new immigrants.

"The other concern I have which is universal is that the religious community, particularly in California, has really poor self-esteem. There is a tremendous resource pool there that is not being tapped except once in a while. At the same time their numbers are dwindling, their resources are dwindling, their self-esteem is dwindling. I wish there was some way to turn that tide."
— Business Leader

"How do you draw them in? The reason I’m asking is because we had a big juvenile public forum and invited every pastor, reverend, priest in the county – I mean we invited all of them –and I think we had two come."
— Business Leader

"I think the churches are a wonderful resource, a wonderful way to get to people in the community, to get to youth. That is the most under-used resource and the most powerful resource, obviously it doesn’t reach everybody, but it particularly reaches our most recent citizens, the ones who are most underrepresented."
— Business Leader

This social service representative did say, however, the faith community has worked on some homeless and African-American issues.

"I think there are some efforts through the faith communities to organize around the homeless issue, around some of the African-American issues, some of the populations that haven’t had a voice before."
— Social Services Representative

Another concern voiced was that wealthier community members have the opportunity to isolate themselves and therefore not recognize concerns of the greater community.

"San Mateo County epitomizes the gap between the haves and have nots. The haves can totally walk away from the problem and not have to deal with it because they can live in a way that it can never affect their lives. So in many ways we have a very divided world. I’m not sure that there’s the will or the intent on the part of the private sector to take people’s needs seriously in 1998, enough to solve the problem. I don’t think there’s anything scarier than the gradual willingness to have this split in the caste system. So many people can make a lot of money and buy themselves privacy and say, ‘It’s not my problem.’"
— Social Services Representative

"One of the other problems in San Mateo County is we have 23 cities with less than a million people. The major problems are in Redwood City, San Mateo, Daly City, South City, and some out on the coast. The rest of the cities can pretend they don’t have problems and don’t have to pay any attention to it and feel okay."
— Social Services Representative

"I would say as people are longer term residents of the community, perhaps raising families in the community, their awareness will just naturally raise and they will become participants, I hope."
— Social Services Representative

 

volunteerism

Two participants discussed the benefits of volunteerism, not only for the people being helped, but also for the volunteers themselves. One community leader stated that the fastest growing segment of volunteers in the area is youth.

"The greatest asset we have is our community itself. Why do people volunteer? Everybody does it for a paycheck and it’s not necessarily money. It’s to see results helping somebody… to be part of that, you want to see some results and you want to be heard and you want the city to support you."
— Business Leader

"We are seeing an increasing number of students who are really trying to connect to their community by giving service. And we are seeing educators that are educating differently now. There’s this new phenomena you may have heard of and it’s called service learning and the Bay Area is one of the leading areas in the United States that is starting to implement this concept which is putting an educational value on community services, broadening the school to include the larger community. There seems to be a real effort to try and reach students where they are and to somehow engage them with the larger community so they don’t feel disenfranchised, so that they feel a sense of responsibility, so that they can see others besides themselves. I will say that in this particular county, people 18 and under are the fastest growing population of people who are providing community service. We’ve really seen this building over the last few years…"
— Community Leader

Panel participants recognized that many of the established businesses in the area donate resources to the community, but believed philanthropy varies among new businesses and in communities with fewer businesses.

"I think that the established businesses have become a part of the community and have tried to become major players and we see a real commitment. But many of the newer firms I believe, need some education about that and [how] to become a better part of our community."
— Community Leader

"I think one of the real positives of this area is there is such a strong history of corporate philanthropy, involvement in the community. The companies that have been around for awhile have set a fine standard I think in terms of involvement and that involvement, I think, is not only financial in terms of support, but is really engaged in the community. I don’t think that that is necessarily universal in all of the communities in this county. I think it varies tremendously. I think San Mateo, Redwood City have some real strength in this regard. Pacifica, there really isn’t that kind of business involvement in that community. I think it varies, but where it’s strong, I think it’s very strong."
— Community Leader

"One that stands out to me is that the Hewlett Packard involvement in a lot of different things has been absolutely wonderful… Sprint in the schools in Pacifica. There’s a number of businesses that take that stance of real public interest."
— Social Services Representative

"A little while back I was a member on the board of the Peninsula YMCA and their board is composed of primarily business folks. I was extremely impressed with the time they put in and their motivation to make sure that brand new YMCA ¾ really a fine facility ¾ did all it could to reach out to the community around San Mateo. My department was specifically benefited because they took on a program of gang kids, where they actually brought in about 20 kids at different times, identified gang kids on probation, and they were willing to mentor, provide education, after-school educational activities, and then allow those kids to use that facility. I was real impressed with that group and they’re from the private sector, largely."
— Community Leader

Social service providers cited great untapped potential for business participation in the community and specifically mentioned Oracle and businesses in South San Francisco as companies which could become more involved.

"Oracle, that just stands out to me that has huge potential. On the downside, you could put into a little thimble how much they’ve actually done."
— Social Services Representative

"The whole bio-tech community, I think South San Francisco could contribute to the Northern part of the county a whole lot more… somehow we don’t get connected to those important people."
— Social Services Representative

"High-tech firms have an enormous amount of resources. Not just money, there’s a lot of management know-how in the whole peninsula area."
— Social Services Representative

"My sense is sometimes that those people are not really connected to the community in the way that they should be, and that’s where we need to concentrate some efforts to find a way to have them take a break from all this research and development and take a look around and participate in the community."
— Social Services Representative

Foundations were identified as influential in drawing businesses into community giving.

"I see the foundations taking more of an active stance in helping to bring people together to help formulate agendas and how to approach them… those people from the foundations could also bring in those people from South San Francisco, bio-tech, too."
— Social Services Representative

Also, this social service provider said they are beginning to do outcome evaluations to show the corporate world the difference that these programs make.

"We’re also pushing for the evaluation side. That’s really helped to be able to show those who don’t believe in these programs that they make a difference."
— Social Services Representative

 

homelessness

estimates of homeless population

Social service representatives suggested there is a large homeless population in San Mateo County, though much of it is hidden.

"There is a significant homeless population. The problem is they’re scattered, so they’re not that visible."
— Social Services Representative

"We have a lot of clients that live in cars. Therefore, for a while, a lot of people were living on the state beaches until there was a law enforcement effort to stop that."
— Social Services Representative

"One of our staff became homeless this year and it was totally unknown to anybody else working with her. That was such a terrible stigma that she just did not want to share with anybody, and so she was living in a shelter during the night, coming in during the day to go to her job. The only reason I found out about it was because she lost her pager and it turned out it was because she was in the shelter and someone had stolen it from her. That’s the hidden part of it that here somebody’s co-worker could be homeless and we are working with this person 8 hours a day and we don’t even have a clue about that. That’s the kind of social pressure here."
— Social Services Representative

"A lot of seniors are now becoming homeless because of what it costs to rent an apartment. We’re now seeing a significant amount of seniors who will sporadically stay in a shelter, maybe in a shared living arrangement with some people for a while, in a single-room occupancy hotel, then they’ll be out on the street or in a car."
— Social Services Representative

 

shelters & programs

Participants did say that there will soon be an emergency shelter for the homeless in San Mateo County for the first time, but regret it took many years to establish.

"For the first time in the history of San Mateo County, there will be a year-round emergency shelter for the homeless, starting in October. That has been easily an eight-year struggle. This county could care less about anybody who’s homeless, pardon me for saying so… I don’t even want to get into some of the experiences we’ve had with trying to bring this topic to cities."
— Social Services Representative

"Communities basically dive into the sand as soon as the issue is even raised. [They] see it as other communities’ problems and don’t do anything about educating residents about any kind of shared responsibility for helping people. So there’s just not any political will, the fact that in this county it took 8 years to get a year-round shelter is really scandalous. The fact that there are kids who are homeless is just unacceptable."
— Social Services Representative

 

housing

housing supply

A dominant issue surfacing in all community panels is the lack of affordable housing for residents who are not at the high end of the income spectrum. Several indicated that the lack of affordable housing is driving residents out of the area.

"Housing is really a very big issue in the community because without adequate housing, it undermines the stability of the people in the community and therefore the community. I mean, it’s really a baseline for a healthy community that people have adequate housing."
— Social Services Representative

"The whole issue around housing is such a barrier for so many families. They spend so much energy trying to get the housing thing taken care of that they have no energy for some of these other pieces."
— Social Services Representative

"When we’re talking about this booming economy, we have an undercurrent where we want people making $6 to $9 an hour in many, many jobs in this community as a support base for the economy. Then when the sun sets, ‘Sorry people. You can’t stay here.’ There’s no place to live. We have given rental assistance to many people to move to Hayward and Oakland and East Bay. Then the irony is the people who make the least amount of money have to travel the farthest to go to work. It’s crazy. I think that’s the biggest thing that’s on a head-on collision course. Sooner or later this isn’t going to work. Sooner or later it’s going to crash. The biggest evidence will be in more people out on the street so that we’ll start looking like San Francisco."
— Social Services Representative

"The pure lack of housing and therefore housing prices and, in general, prices for almost everything here make it very difficult for us to maintain a mix in the population that includes the folks who work in service industries. And so those individuals aren’t making enough money to adequately live here and yet we need them to be working here as part of the overall mix. We have to pay them more, which means we’re going to have to pay more for services, or we’re going to have to build housing that they can afford to live in."
— Community Leader

"The Welfare reform here in San Mateo County has brought the housing issue to the attention of more people. With housing being as expensive as it is, people are traveling greater distances in order to work here because they can’t afford the housing. And yet, they’re being pushed into work. They’re in a tough spot."
— Business Leader

"I think one of the hardest things in this county is the high cost of living, which is very, very hard for people who are on Welfare or can’t even get on Welfare and they can’t find housing. We have families living in hotels who have been in the shelter, still couldn’t find housing."
— Social Services Representative

Furthermore, as these comments show, affordable housing is not an issue just for those with the lowest incomes, it is an issue for middle-income individuals as well.

"I think it’s impacting middle class families as well, maybe in somewhat different ways. I still have two adult kids living at home with me. I know very middle-class people in big houses who are renting out one or two
rooms in order to pay the mortgage."
— Social Services Representative

"I think housing is the one issue that crosses all socio-economic lines. We see it in poor immigrant populations and we see it in people at this table. My husband and I, we both work and have good jobs and we’re okay. For $1200 a month in Palo Alto, this small apartment… it crosses all lines. It would seem to be an issue where people could pull together. This is an issue that affects us all."
— Social Services Representative

"I’m a Department Head, and I’m not complaining about my salary, but even 6 years ago I couldn’t afford to live here. That was really one of the problems, if you have a pre-Prop 13 house, I mean, that’s the big difference is the tax level."
— Business Leader

"An apartment in East Palo Alto runs $800 to $1000 a month for trash, I mean absolute garbage and it’s an unsafe neighborhood. It’s an unsafe kind of an environment for raising kids. There’s a lot of two families living together or four families living together or somebody renting a garage or one room in an apartment. We have that on one side, and these very big houses that are single family houses on the other. It’s really an upside down curve here with the haves and have nots. It’s a big issue."
— Social Services Representative

Participants said the community recognizes that with the continuing growth there is a need for more housing. However, there is little developable land and great sentiment against higher density housing, such as apartment complexes, fearing that that will bring even more people and more congestion in the area.

"In the next 10 to 15 years we need four to five percent as much housing as we have even to keep pace with the kind of job growth that we are going to have. I think one of the difficulties of unsnarling all of this is that transportation and housing and job creation are all intimately involved with each other…"
— Social Services Representative

"There’s a real adversity to the idea in the suburbs of increasing any kind of density of housing. There’s a real antipathy to having an apartment house in a neighborhood where there are one-family houses. You can’t have it both ways —everybody with their little one-story cottage or larger house and a backyard and a front yard and then park space."
— Social Services Representative

"I’d also like to add assisted living, there just isn’t any. Any program that you hear about, there’s waiting lists that are 5 years long. Of course, most of the people won’t even live that long to get an apartment."
— Social Services Representative

"Yet you have 150 people going to the Daly City City Council meetings protesting any kind of housing for lower-income people."
— Social Services Representative

"There’s the need for more housing, but there’s not a lot of developable land. That’s a tension that most of the communities are feeling now because the policies are moving towards more housing and more affordable housing, but then implementing those policies [brings] a lot of conflict."
— Community Leader

"As someone who attended his first housing conference here 25 years ago, the same issues are being discussed today. Yet I think the solutions are farther away than they were, and that’s simply because some of the land that was available at that time for an affordable housing development has really been taken up when this became a world class corporate center. With the affluence that continues to be in this county and with the low unemployment rate, this led to the race for more services, more goods, retail and others."
— Community Leader

"I think getting housing is going to be more difficult, not only because of the land, but also because in the minds of many people, more housing will mean more people. It’s going to be very difficult to convince people that we need more housing for the people that are already here, and if we don’t do that, then we’re going to create more and more difficulty in traffic, more and
more damage to the environment, etc."
— Community Leader

This individual suggested mixed-use buildings, which combine retail space and living space, as a partial solution to both the housing and transportation problems.

"I see this nice building in Redwood City which has the shops downstairs and affordable dwellings upstairs and I think, Europe’s been doing it for centuries."
— Social Services Representative

However, this participant felt any solution to the housing and transportation crises would be many years down the road.

"I think that one of the things that we have to face as a reality relative to our quality of life is that the issues of housing and transportation are not going to be solved in the next decade or two. Getting more housing on line – particularly with what we have to do which is primarily in-fill and higher density – it’s going to raise a lot of questions for folks and it’s going to be
a very slow and laborious process city by city."
— Community Leader

 

overcrowding

A resulting problem of the lack of affordable housing is overcrowded housing as low-income families combine resources to find a place to live, which can further lead to increased health risks for those individuals.

"Once again I see some of those who are in low-income kinds of jobs where they’re living with 10 people in a two- or three-bedroom place. We see that tremendously in the Asian population. Some, but perhaps less in the Hispanic population. The black population, although it’s not a huge number compared to the Asian population, there again they tend to be congregated in an area where
living and health conditions are not great."
— Physician

"A lot of families are moving in with other families and so the health conditions within… it’s really, really crowded spacing."
— Social Services Representative

"The other day a young man came in who had chicken pox. He was living with the family of a woman who was nine months pregnant, so that baby was in grave danger…"
— Social Services Representative

Not only did participants identify health risks as a result of overcrowded housing, they also believed those individuals to be at increased risk for involvement in crime and family violence.

"In some poor areas in our county, you see gentrification where somebody buys a lot and wants to build an oversized house and sell it for a ton of money. That pushes all the poor people out and I’m not sure where they go. And the other areas where they get stuffed in, that’s going to be an incubator for crime in the future."
— Community Leader

"We see about 16 percent of our domestic violence cases come from one small area. And I think that the major reason is sub-standard housing, just having everybody jammed into small places. It causes a lot of tension, a lot of friction, people act out. We just desperately need to do something about that."
— Community Leader

"One of the things about sub-standard housing is it’s a breeding ground for [gangs]. Kids, when they become teenagers, are not going to stay in a place with a bunch of adults crammed together. They go out to the street, and you can see the germination of that when the kids are hanging around the Laundromats and the parking areas and the garages. So far the county has been blessed with a really low crime rate, but I am concerned about those pockets of poor people who just don’t have the access to the means that the upper classes and middle classes have in the county."
— Community Leader

 

physical environment

community appearance

Most community panels view the natural beauty or physical environment of the area to be one of San Mateo County’s best assets.

"One of the things that brought me here from the great state of Ohio is climate. Unfortunately my first year here was El Niño, but rumor has it that the climate is great. That I think is something that is real special to this area, particularly to San Mateo County because I understand as you go to San Francisco County, you’ve got a lot more fog and right here you kind of seem to have the ideal temperate climate."
— Community Leader

"I think the most fascinating thing about this county is that, as you go from Daly City to Redwood City, it’s almost like a continuous city although it somehow still feels small. Then you can drive out to Skyline to the watershed, you can go up to the coast. I actually take people when they come from foreign countries, I take them from Rose City, San Mateo, to Pescadaro. Pescadaro’s like the nineteenth century. The same families, the music family that owns the store is the same family that’s been there since the nineteenth century… what a difference between San Mateo’s coast and the other side…"
— Community Leader

 

impact of growth on the environment

Several participants were concerned that the growth of San Mateo’s population is having a negative impact on the environment, particularly air and water quality, as well as land use.

"There’s a real concern: is it getting too crowded? Is there enough open space? What’s the quality of our air? I think there is a concern about our environment and the quality of life in terms of the things that we’ve kind of taken for granted: that we live in one of the most beautiful areas in the world, we’ve got all these conveniences. Then we get road rage when a trip that used to take us 15 minutes can sometimes take us an hour or two hours, or we can’t find a parking place downtown and we always used to be able to. It’s a real difficult problem for all of us here because we like the growth, we like the prosperity, we like having all these wonderful stores to shop in and we don’t want that to go away, but on the other hand, we still want to have all these other things, too."
— Business Leader

"The idea that we know the population is going to increase if all the statistics that I’m hearing come to be. We need a place to put these people and we need to transport these people. I know there’s a lot of ideas and planning in the works right now, but it doesn’t exist currently and more people means more demands on land, more cars, more emissions, more pollution. As a result of that, I have a lot of concerns related to the environment."
— Community Leader

""Not so much financial issues, I think there are land use issues. And the fact that we are probably the biggest economic boom county other than Santa Clara."
— Social Services Representative

Furthermore, this business representative felt San Mateo is not doing enough to protect the environment.

"There are a lot of things that we can do for the environment that we aren’t doing. We talk about transportation and the impact that that has on the air, but it has a tremendous impact on our water because all of that stuff that collects on the roadway, it rains then runs into the ocean and the bay. There are things that we can be doing to protect the environment, but if you look at an analysis of the San Mateo County budget over a 10-year period, everything has gone up, except for environmental services. That has gone down and it’s just a tiny, tiny piece of the overall budget. Clearly, we talk about making it a priority in San Mateo County, but I don’t really think that we have."
— Business Leader

 

environment health effects

This social service agent mentioned health risks, particularly for the low income population, that are related to environmental contamination.

"Low-income people who live in certain areas are exposed to more toxic and asbestos than some of the rest of us. All we need to look at is Bay View Point in terms of some of the higher incidence of cancer and other diseases as a result of being exposed. The poor people are the ones that end up the victims because they’re the ones who have to live in the outer areas. I think that’s an issue that we’re not seeing what the impact is, but I think as time goes on as it relates
to the health costs it’s going to really affect us."
— Social Services Representative

 

transportation and traffic

public transportation

In regard to transportation, panel participants first indicated they would like to see more bus routes and shuttles connecting communities, particularly for the seniors and youth in the county.

"I’d like to talk about transportation, some sort of a Redwood City Bus Service within the city. Not only to help unite the city – now we have Redwood Shores and we have Fair Oaks and different projects – but when you look at seniors and the youth, they need that transportation."
— Business Leader

"Ironically our county bus, the SamTrans, has been going in the opposite direction. Instead of increasing buses that serve residences, their latest proposals are to eliminate these routes because there are not many people on the bus. They insist for their economics that they’ve got to have the large buses because they’re providing transportation to the kids for school at twice the cost of what the school district used to provide the transportation, but for whatever reason, they’re removing and they’re making it more difficult. So we really need another way to look at transportation, providing service, and we probably need more shuttles, smaller buses, maybe more things that are on call. Certainly with technology, there should be some way you should be able to call in and find out when a bus would be close to you. We need to rethink the way we’re doing it, because we’re not providing service to older people, even young people, working people who don’t have access to automobiles."
— Business Leader

"I hope that the city will try to do more with shuttles… to see if we can apply for more state and federal funding that would support this because it is expensive. This is a service that would have to be subsidized, it’s not a money-making proposition, but the dividends can be enormous in terms of solving some of our pollution, environmental concerns, plus traffic."
— Business Leader

"At the library, one of our problems is for the older people who are lifelong readers and want to continue it. We’ve got a lot of vans coming from the group housing, but very few that are coming from individual housing and it really isolates those people… The young adolescents, from age 10 to before they get their driver’s license, they’re also very isolated. The Y continues to pay incredible insurance for the shuttle buses they run, but it’s absolutely necessary. You can’t have a program if you can’t do that."
— Business Leader

Not only is transportation for social activities difficult, panel members indicated it is also difficult to find transportation for medical and employment needs.

"There’s terrible lack of public transportation that we use to get seniors to doctors’ appointments and efficiently to appointments."
— Social Services Representative

"That’s the biggest need I see with my seniors, transportation. I hear that probably 20 times a day. Ready-Wheels is not reliable and a taxi is too expensive."
— Social Services Representative

"One of our primary objectives is to get [disabled] individuals into jobs and make them more self-sufficient and try to make them taxpayers. Most of our folks, they don’t have their own automobiles, they depend on public transportation and, in many cases, paratransit such as Laidlaw or Ready-Wheels. Public transportation doesn’t go into the industrial parks and so there’s a lot of potential jobs that we can’t access for these people. Also, the [paratransit services] we have set up to bring people to our facility, those don’t transfer over to a job if somebody goes into a job. Paratransit won’t take them to work, so we have a real hard time."
— Social Services Representative

"We have many new, big employers coming to San Mateo County and Santa Clara County who don’t use public transportation because of the problem of getting from the train or whatever to their work. If we could somehow perfect the shuttle system to serve employers, I think it would be major…"
— Business Leader

A few participants also feel the county could make better use of taxis to help alleviate the transportation problem.

"They have pretty good public transportation in the bigger cities in the East, but their use of taxis… Taxis in California have kind of a funny taint to them. They’re expensive, we consider them unreliable, we consider them seedy. It would be one of the last things that I would think about."
— Business Leader

"I know in Contra Costa County a lot of people are using taxis for their teenagers who don’t drive yet. They have in a sense created their own carpool shuttles by using a taxi service to do that. The taxis are actually glad to do that. They had regular business. They pick up the kids from school, take them to their cooking lessons, and Spanish lessons and music lessons, picked them all up and got them home at a reasonable hour. And then it sort of started going out in neighborhoods, they brought more kids on and got a van and they got like 6 or 8 kids and then it became very affordable for them to do that. So that’s another option."
— Business Leader

 

traffic congestion

All community panels were concerned with the amount of traffic created due to economic growth in the county. They believe the traffic congestion affects air quality, leading to possible health problems and also causes anger among local residents.

"I look back onto what happened to Redwood Shores when Marine World left and they brought in Oracle: they dumped traffic onto the 101 corridor and it couldn’t handle it. It’s that spirit of working jointly so that cities don’t get into that parochial perspective of ‘This is good for the city of San Mateo, and be damned with the City of Burlingame and whoever else is around us.’ We need to have this complex here because it brings tax dollars in."
— Business Leader

"I think one of the reasons for the great increase in asthma in this county is because of environment and more and more cars on the road. Where I live, it used to take me, on the Coast Highway 92, like 20 minutes from my house to San Mateo. Now it could take you an hour, easily."
— Social Services Representative

"There’s kind of a fascism that’s very frightening. I mean, I see it in the drivers. Anger that people have. I think we see that reflected in our children and that’s why they need the services of the conflict resolution center by the time they’re in high school."
— Social Services Representative

In order to address the traffic problem, some believe the area should develop and promote a better public transportation system, while others mentioned mixed-use buildings and business involvement in transportation and housing development.

"We have to find some point where it is cheaper to use public transportation than it is to own a car and convince people of that. Every time we turn around, the governor’s doing something new to make it cheaper to use cars."
— Business Leader

"Cities are looking now to do more joint development of retail-residential, and I think that’s something that we need to continue to do. That helps to reduce the activity of traffic because everything is available to people in that local area. I think that that’s something that the cities need to continue to look at."
— Business Leader

"One of the big things is where business actually gets involved. I think you saw a proposal for where the first privately funded BART Station is now in the East Bay, and part of that is in order to develop the housing development and put people on to a certain corridor. The company feels that they could build their own BART Station, finance it and do all those things and then run shuttles… They are going to build schools, they are building a retail area and business area, and then they will be shuttling people back and forth to BART. But what they want to do is to build their own station at the end of a line."
— Business Leader

 

commuting

These community panel comments indicated San Mateo County businesses are drawing employees who live in San Francisco as well as Santa Clara County because of their central location.

"I heard an interesting comment yesterday why all of a sudden Redwood City is booming and one of the comments was that they are drawing some of the people from San Francisco who are not willing to go all the way to Santa Clara and those from Santa Clara who are not willing to go all the way to San Francisco. So, all of a sudden, we are experiencing an explosion of software companies and start-ups in Redwood City."
— Business Leader

"We have two distinct types of employees: we’ve got the real artistic, creative people that create web pages that can do these things, they’re the types that want to live in San Francisco. They want to be there. Then we have the real strong technical types and we’re able to draw those out of Santa Clara Valley. It’s perfect. Thirty miles is about as far as anybody wants to drive."
— Business Leader

On another note, these participants said because the cost of housing is so high in the area, people are moving to less expensive areas to live, then commuting long distances to work, leaving them little time to spend with their families.

"It is true that people are moving out to areas where they can find more affordable housing, and the result is that transportation becomes worse because people have to commute so much further to their jobs. That’s just one example where a lack of economic diversity means that the community health and wellness is just going to suffer."
— Social Services Representative

"Some of those people are driving like two hours a day to get here. Then you think about what happens to their lives when they’ve spent two hours getting to work, two hours getting home. And then you wonder what happens when they get tired of driving and they say it’s not worth it anymore. They relocate somewhere else, and what is the economic impact on the county if you don’t have those people to support the whole economy?"
— Community Leader

"With this lack of transportation, people have to live so far away from where they work and there’s so much congestion. It’s taking longer and longer to get wherever it is you need to go – that has a real profound effect on the family."
— Social Services Representative

community services

trust in government

Through the following comments, community participants indicated that the local governments have the interests of residents at heart.

"Comparing this particular county to other areas that I’ve worked, it’s quite simple to get access to a member of the Board of Supervisors. It’s quite easy to contact and have a voice with people who make decisions here. It’s urban in a sense, and yet it’s got a real small town feel to it in that there are a lot of people that work together."
— Community Leader

"We have a County Board of Supervisors and Department Heads that have a vision that is a little more inclusive. That is key to beginning to make change."
— Social Services Representative

"There are a lot of people from the non-profit sector, government, people in general, who care a great deal about the community and people in the community and work very hard to meet their needs."
— Social Services Representative

"One of the best things about this county is that in general the county government is responsive to what’s happening in the community and society. They’re always trying to get a step ahead of what’s going on. I know other counties don’t necessarily have that."
— Social Services Representative

Participants further said that although residents of the community may be unaware that they can access local government, people in leadership positions are willing to listen to the community’s concerns.

"I do believe for the most part that people in leadership positions in the community want to hear and are willing to listen. But that doesn’t mean that people know that that’s there and that they can access that and how to access that effectively."
— Community Leader

"I think the accessibility does indeed exist for everyone. I don’t think everyone is aware of how to take advantage of that access. I’ve found that almost unanimously [elected officials] were open to hear from people and one did not have to be in a power position to have his or her voice heard and responded to."
— Community Leader

"I don’t know that the broad population has a voice that is heard, but I would echo what I’ve heard here that I think the leadership in the county is sensitive. Because of the size of the county, you can really muster a collaboration toward action, fairly quickly at times once a real issue is there that people need to work on."
— Community Leader

"There are a lot of people who take an active interest in their public services. So, maybe not every citizen in the county feels like they have that voice, but if you go from group to group, you see a large community of interest for whatever your issues are. It’s not hard to find people to be on boards and commissions and participate. That’s a real rich resource."
— Community Leader

In addition, one participant said community residents may not feel they have the time to become involved in city or county governance.

"I moved into a place where there’s a lot of younger working people, both members of the family are working. They’re never there. So they’re not a part of the governance of the complex, they’re not part of the city governance. They may know they have access, but they don’t take advantage of it because they’re working so many hours and it’s so hard to afford it."
— Community Leader

On the negative side, one community leader believes it is fairly easy for a small interest group to influence local government.

"I think our very strength of citizens having access to government is also one of our greatest weaknesses, because it’s easy for small groups of people to block a grander vision. So if someone talks about low-income housing, it’s pretty easy for neighbors to galvanize a coalition to block it. It’s pretty difficult for city and county governments to overcome that kind of opposition to have long-range planning."
— Community Leader

Furthermore, these business representatives see discord between city and county government.

"I’m kind of in a unique position because I’m between, in a lot of cases, the cities and the county government. The thing I hear repeatedly is the mistrust between the cities and the county. I think that’s one area where we could do better."
— Business Leader

"I’ve been out talking with a lot of City Council people and I would say probably at least 50 percent of the City Council people that I’ve met with in the last month have made disparaging remarks about ‘Oh those people at the county,’ or this or that, just a real strong sense of distrust that I’m hearing."
— Business Leader

 

collaboration and leadership

Community panel members believe that, in general, people in San Mateo are willing to work together on community issues, but identified two problems in collaborative efforts: turf issues and money issues.

"There are places where we can do better and areas where we don’t work together, but I think for the most part, San Mateo County has a reputation for being collaborative and cooperative in approaching issues and solving problems."
— Business Leader

"Each entity is trying to protect its budget and its turf, too. But by and large, compared to what the situation was 20 or 25 years ago, I think there’s more cooperation, probably again because there’s been less resources available."
— Business Leader

"I think collaboration as a concept can work if everybody that’s affected and all those at the table are at the same level of decision-making… I think collaboration means that everyone has to have a say or an input or buy into it and then
work it through. I think particularly as it relates to communities
of color, that’s not what happens."
— Social Services Representative

Some participants said it is difficult to connect the needs of all the different communities throughout the county; however, other participants felt because they don’t have a large city within the county, it is easier for the smaller communities to come together.

"With a diversity that is great, I’ve found that there is still a separateness. It’s like you have North County, you have Central County, and you have South County. The needs are very different… The challenge is trying to reach down the peninsula and make everybody connected or try to connect us a little bit more. Central San Mateo has to acknowledge the needs of South County, Redwood City, East Palo Alto, and North County. I think while we have this wonderful diversity and there’s a lot of sharing, we somehow get disconnected."
— Social Services Representative

"We have about 20 cities that have about equal status. We have multiple jurisdictions, environmental things, etc. It seems for San Mateo County
when it comes to dealing with regional problems, overall things like transportation, I think we have trouble coming together…"
— Community Leader

"The fact that we don’t have a San Jose or a San Francisco enables us to identify with a larger entity which is the county. I think because we don’t have one big city that wants to dominate, that everybody does band together."
— Community Leader

In addition, business representatives said they need to develop leadership, particularly ethnically diverse leadership, in the county.

"I think the programs that are put on by the Chamber of Commerce are an example of trying to develop some leadership. I think Councils have been aware of it by appointing people to commissions to try and get some diversity, to try and help them develop it, but it’s really an ongoing process that we as a community
need to take part in developing."
— Business Leader

"We are experiencing a very rapid change of demographics. Fast, very, very fast. We just had a little leadership conference and we invited roughly 20 people from each ethnic group and some were very lightly attended. The whole purpose was to be inclusive of everybody. I can’t even come up with a half a dozen leaders in the Latino community in Redwood City, there aren’t any. There’s one or two that do their own little thing. Daly City is changing, the Asian community is changing. Now the Tongans are almost one-third of East Palo Alto and they’re still not active at any level. Neither is the Latino. Now East Palo Alto is almost 50 percent Latino and 20 percent African-American, but who’s on City Council?
All black. We’re not there representing our communities."
— Business Leader

On another note, community panels thought they could do better sharing information not only with each other, but with residents.

"Even in this age of technology and fast information, there’s been so much research and so much progress, and yet none of us are getting all the information."
— Social Services Representative

"The other thing that’s happening is a lot of these kinds of studies are done and collection of data over and over and over again at all levels, local agency up to the national level. We participate in many of these things, and we wonder why aren’t we just passing that information on?"
— Social Services Representative

 

recreation and entertainment offerings

youth recreational offerings

senior recreational offerings

This community leader commented on senior activity offerings in the county.

"[Seniors] are among some of the most politically active and effective people. Things that I hear and read about seniors in other parts of the country don’t apply to the majority of seniors in this county. There is a higher economic level in this county, but there are also people at the lower end of the economic scale that have some of the problems. I saw a map that the Peninsula Library Information System put together and it was very interesting where the senior centers are located as opposed to where the actual seniors are in the county. I think they went there primarily because people had the clout and brought them into those areas. So now there is a need to have more senior centers and services spread out
into different geographic areas of the county."
— Community Leader

crime & violence

perceptions of area safety

All community panels believe San Mateo County to be a safe area; however, this participant believes because it is considered a safe area, they have different kinds of problems in that parents are not as worried about the safety of their children and thus they sometimes lack supervision.

"San Mateo County is in many cases still a very safe community and because we’re considered safe, going to the library is not considered a problem. I mean, sure my kid can go, they’re in third grade, they can go to the library, bring their little sister and I know they’re going to be safe once they’re there. What happens sometimes is more and more kids are left there for long periods of time… In Oakland, I saw that happening more in the Montclair and Rock Ridge area, more in the wealthy communities than in the poorer neighborhoods, because in the poor neighborhoods, the parents wouldn’t let their kids out. I mean you couldn’t walk on the streets to go to the library. It wasn’t considered safe."
— Business Leader

 

violent crime rates

Community panels identified law enforcement as outstanding in San Mateo County.

"We have outstanding law enforcement in San Mateo County. I’ve worked in law enforcement in other parts of the country and when I first got involved with San Mateo County, I was pleasantly startled with the quality of law enforcement in the county and their progressive attitude, their proactive attitude, their level of education. I think it’s reflected in what I see in the criminal justice system and I think that’s a strong positive in San Mateo County."
— Business Leader

"Crime is way down in this county… that’s probably for a variety of reasons: demographics, the economy I think, law enforcement, probation, I think the system has worked pretty well."
— Community Leader

 

juvenile crime

While participants believed overall crime to be low in the area, they do believe juvenile crime to be increasing and acknowledged gang activity in most communities in the county.

"Obviously the statistics show that crime is down both for adults and juveniles, but in our juvenile probation population, we are seeing an increase in the number of violent kinds of behavior among kids, more serious kinds of violent behavior. Delinquent behavior by girls is increasing more. Some of the social background that we seem to notice that’s fairly common is a lot of the girls for instance are abused. Abused girls are getting into a lot more violent crimes and petty thefts and things like that. That’s gradually becoming a bigger issue…"
— Community Leader

"In San Carlos we don’t have the problems that other districts not too far away from us have like gangs. I mean we do have some of those problems, but compared to other communities…"
— Social Services Representative

"We used to talk about it at budget time, the number of kids that are involved in gangs. What we see is that they’re not necessarily involved in drug dealings and bank robberies, it’s really not that. What they really do is they get involved and they become territorial and they intimidate. We held a community in one of our schools a year or two ago, and we put out little posters, and the gang members put out posters telling people not to come there. That’s very sophisticated."
— Community Leader

"We see the same kind of pattern with ethnic groups in the county, the intimidation and forming ethnic gangs. Unless we have some kind of a strategy to deal with it I think crime will once again take a monumental leap at some point when the economy turns down or at some point in the future when those gang kids become 17, 18, 19, get into cars, get more into guns, more into violence. We have this little grant and we’re trying to come up with a longer-term anti-gang strategy in our North Fair Oaks area. I do see that, Redwood City, North Fair Oaks, East Palo Alto, Daly City, San Mateo, it’s a fairly familiar pattern that we’re seeing amongst young people."
— Community Leader

"With the exception of Hillsborough and Atherton, there are gangs, multiple gangs in just about every city in the county from the North to the South. They aren’t all big gangs and they’re certainly not at the level that they might have in Los Angeles or even Alameda County, but some of them are pretty dangerous. And the ethnic gangs pose some real threats that we didn’t have before… gratuitous violence and I’m not sure that there’s any way to prevent it."
— Community Leader

This social service representative emphasized that many factors can influence juvenile delinquency, including child abuse, family pressure, and mental health.

"One of the things that we know is that about 65 to 80 percent of juvenile delinquents were abused as kids. The abuse then comes from stressors, from parents or caretakers who are unable to deal with whatever those stressors are. So you’ve got mental health in here, you’ve got education in here, you’ve got health in here. What do you do? Everybody’s part of the process."
— Social Services Representative

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