A reader checked in earlier this week to say they’d tried to contact the nonprofit arts organization but their e-mail bounced out of a full mailbox and the phone number was disconnected. I called ACLO’s box office, and the number was indeed disconnected.

ACLO’s press person, Chris De Seguirant, confirmed the arts institution has fallen on hard times. She said its ACLO Kids summer camp is canceled, and that its 2010 season, which has not yet been announced, is “up in the air.”

De Seguirant said the theater company has shut down its box office and has been selling its things (they just had a sale on March 7). “We’re trying to consolidate,” she said.

De Seguirant said ACLO lost a lot of grants and funding they were dependent on last year. A 2008 tax return filed last June showed ACLO running a $62,014 deficit at the end of that year.

The company has put on 40 shows since its inception in 1997, plus concerts, camps and more. I’ll keep you posted if I find out more, but in the meantime, if you want to help out, there’s a donation button on the main page of ACLO’s website.

The reality of all those auto row closures has just about finished sinking in, to the tune of about $232,000 in lost sales tax revenue for transportation uses (cars and gas) over the same quarter last year. New car sales had traditionally been, far and away, the city’s main sales tax driver.

All told, the city was out about $376,000 in sales tax revenue compared to last year, representing a 21.5 percent year-over-year drop for the quarter that ended on June 30.

In addition to the Auto Row bloodbath that helped drive down transportation-related sales tax dollars by more than half, general retail dropped by 21.5 percent, from $339,564 for the quarter ending on June 30, 2008 to $266,394 this year, due to the closure of “a department store.”

Sales taxes from construction dropped by 19 percent or about 15 grand, and taxes for food products dropped 8.8 percent, from $397,118 to $362,299.

To underscore the departure of Park Street’s final new car dealers, sales taxes from the area of Park north of Lincoln dropped 63.4 percent, from $324,390 to $118,690 year-over-year.

Sales taxes from several other areas – Park south of Lincoln, Webster Street and the Bridgeside Center – dropped by close to 25 percent. The Marina Village Business Park – which has been plagued by vacancies – saw sales taxes drop by 40 percent, from $147,171 to $87,943.

But the report highlighted two small bright spots: Alameda Point and the Harbor Bay Business Park, which saw their respective sales tax takes rise by 9.5 percent and 3.8 percent.

The staff report – which has more sales tax data in it than even I could handle – shows that the declines were in line with those being experienced by, well, everyone else. But Alameda’s per-capita sales tax haul remains one of the lowest in Alameda County (thank you, Piedmont).

Sales tax is the city’s fourth-largest source of revenue for its general fund, generating about 7.5 percent of projected revenues for this year.

Oh, and before I forget, that convenience store the Planning Board okayed a few weeks back for a long-vacant Park Street storefront was appealed and is on the council’s agenda tonight.

Photo source: Wikimedia Commons

Citing fundraising issues sharpened by a morose economy, the folks at the St. Josephs Community are asking the Planning Board to extend approval of their long-running expansion and improvement plans for another 15 years.

Approval of the community’s expansion plans is set to expire at the end of November, a decade after it was granted.

“The reason for this request has to do with the capacity of the St. Josephs community to effectively and prudently raise capital to execute the projects in full, particularly within the current economic climate where both donations and lending are compromised,” St. Joe’s rep, Andrew Reed, wrote in a letter asking the city for more time.

The community, which includes an elementary and high school and a church, had won the okay for more than a dozen expansion and improvement projects.

The list of completed projects includes a high school library, remodeled high school science labs and a gym, elementary and high school music rooms, a new driveway, parking lot and perimeter fencing. To be completed projects include completion of the Science/Communication Arts Facility Building and second floor offices, Notre Dame Hall expansion and interior and outdoor gathering spaces.

Also on the agenda Monday night are a review of plans for the former Cavanaugh Motors site, which its new owner would like to turn into a set of commercial buildings called Park Vista Square that is envisioned to include a restaurant, retail and offices.

The board is also slated to review plans for a new, two-story home in an area of predominantly ranch houses off Fernside Boulevard that the board had considered zoning in a way that could have all but prohibited two-story homes. The applicant first submitted his plans to the city in December 2005.

The City Council may have passed a balanced budget this year, but we’re apparently not out of the woods yet, fiscally speaking. “Now what?” you may ask. How’s about multi-million-dollar increases in the city’s pension costs?

Apparently, the investment portfolio of the state-run Public Employee Retirement System, which Alameda uses as its pension fund, has seen losses over the last few years that some fear could be as high as 20 percent. And guess who’s responsible for covering those losses? A tip o’ the hat to those of you who answered with a hearty “We are!”

Many of us have 401(k) or similar retirement plans, and we are personally responsible for dealing with whatever losses they take. But the state’s system promises the same benefits no matter what happens in the markets. If they don’t earn enough to cover the benefits, the cities, counties and school districts that invest in the system must make up the difference.

CalPERS’ actual losses will become public in October, and city staff should get a letter detailing the Island’s pension rate increases in April 2010. Interim City Manager Ann Marie Gallant said that rates could rise by $3.5 million to $5.5 million starting in 2011. (Last year, the city contributed $11.1 million to PERS for its employees.)

Mayor Beverly Johnson asked Gallant if the city could drop PERS and join another benefit plan. Gallant said that some Southern California cities are doing just that.

“It’s a long process to drop PERS, but it’s something cities are thinking about,” Gallant said.

Meanwhile, city leaders still need to deal with that other retiree benefit problem, its growing retiree health care obligation (which, at $75 million and counting, is more than the city’s entire general fund budget this year). The council has okayed contracts with both police and firefighters that say they’ll talk about the problem but don’t offer any immediate changes to public safety benefits, which make up much of that amount.

Gallant said those costs, which the city is paying as it goes, will rise by $600,000 a year in 2011.

“I’m relieved and grateful for the Assembly’s actions,” Mayor Beverly Johnson told local scribe Jeff Mitchell, who penned this piece on the thwarted controversy for the Sacramento Bee. “The county was dead serious about the bridge situation. For now, it looks like a crisis has been averted.”

County officials had said that without the money, they’d have to leave the Park Street, High Street and Fruitvale bridges up at night, or risk huge fines from the Coast Guard (because ships, apparently, have the right of way). Their solution to the problem? More money from us.

Estimates for keeping the bridges staffed run from $1.9 million to $2.5 million a year (depending on who you ask), some of which may or may not be paid by us already. The bridges take about 85,000 vehicle trips per day, Mitchell reports.

Interim City Manager Ann Marie Gallant had previously dismissed the county’s threats as a “trial balloon” to seek more money from the city, and Vice Mayor Doug deHaan had said the threat had been raised in the past. But Johnson was concerned they were far more serious.

Meanwhile, the state is pressing forward with plans to take property tax money and redevelopment funds from counties and cities. That’ll cost us over $2 million in property tax money this year (though it’ll have to be repaid in three years, with interest) and some $5.4 million in redevelopment funds this year and next.

We should have a fix on how those problems will be solved when the proposed budget comes out, later this week, and the council will take a look at that budget at a special meeting at 7 p.m. Monday. Stay tuned.

Apparently, the city’s rules aren’t all that specific about what kind of fences commercial property owners put up around their properties. Which could be an issue as the downturn continues to suck businesses into its treacherous undertow.

“Although the lack of this type of control has not been much of a problem in good economic times when commercial properties are fully occupied or when commercial property owners are requesting entitlements for new construction or new uses and any proposed fences or barriers can be reviewed under those proposals,” the staff report on this proposal says, “the downturn in the economy has revealed the City’s inability to prevent or control property owners of vacant properties from erecting inappropriate fencing or barriers within the City’s historic commercial districts or in the other business areas of the City.”

In commercial or industrial districts, fences can be eight feet high in setback areas and “allowable building height” elsewhere; on Park and Webster, there’s no setback requirement, so fences as high as 40 to 60 feet could be erected in front of vacant properties. And there are no controls on the type of materials that can be used for a fence, except for a prohibition on barbed wire and razor wire.All that’s required is that it be structurally sound.

City staff want to require a permit process for the fences so they can mitigate the impacts on neighboring businesses and also property values (the city would also notify neighbors about what’s being considered and could require changes to what is proposed to be built). Decisions could be appealed to the Planning Board.

If okayed by the Planning Board, the new rules would be passed on to the City Council for approval.

From the you-know-it’s-getting-bad-when department: The Journal’s Peter Hegarty reported Thursday that Alameda police have caught a suspect in the June 30 robbery of the Bank of America on Park Street. His reason for allegedly committing the crime? He was hungry and he desperately needed money.

Alameda police arrested Adaski Joseph, 19, Wednesday in a converted garage in East Oakland, Hegarty reported. He is a 2007 graduate of Alameda High School.

“Unfortunately, he’s a young kid who was having some hard luck,” Alameda police detective Hank Morten told the Journal. “He told us that he was extremely hungry and desperate.”

I’m going to take this opportunity to point out some resources for folks who need help, like the Alameda Food Bank (523-5850) and Alameda Family Services (629-6300), which I just recently learned has the only teen homeless shelter in the county.

If you’re not sure where to call for what you need, dial 211, the county’s all-purpose social services operator.

Updated 10:41 a.m. Wednesday, July 22

City staff is moving full steam ahead with plans to present a 24-month budget plan to the City Council for their approval on August 3, with looming indications that the state could take far more money from the city than it had previously proposed.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced Monday that state leaders had cobbled together tentative budget deal that takes $4 billion from local governments, an amount that includes $2 billion in property taxes, gas tax and redevelopment funds. The money would be taken to help close a $26.3 billion deficit.

If the budget passes the Legislature – and there’s no guarantee that it will – Alameda stands to lose about $2.2 million in property tax money this year, according to figures released Tuesday night. The tentative deal calls for paying the money back after three years.

The city could also lose close to $2.5 million in gas tax money over two years. The money is required by the state constitution to be spent on transportation projects.

The city’s redevelopment agency could lose about $3.6 million this year and $916,000 in 2010-11, money that would be used to help pay for schools, according to estimates from the California Redevelopment Association, a statewide interest group. The city’s redevelopment agency is separate from city government and has its own budget that is independent from the city’s.

The state’s earlier proposals would have cost Alameda $2.4 million this year, plus $917,000 in redevelopment funds.

“We are really just almost speechless. It’s onerous,” Interim City Manager Ann Marie Gallant said. She and members of the council complained that state leaders are dumping the responsibility for fixing their budget problems on local school districts and government (Gallant pointed out that the state isn’t announcing layoffs, as the city just did).

Gallant said she’ll move forward with plans to present a budget on August 3, but she warned that she could be returning to the council to make changes in September or October.

Development Services Director Leslie Little said the budget, if passed, would impact redevelopment projects like a planned overhaul of electrical service along the former Auto Row. The project, which she said would cost about $500,000, is an essential step toward revitalizing the area, she said.

The California Redevelopment Association won an earlier lawsuit aimed at stopping the state from taking redevelopment funds. State leaders have since found a way to get around the suit and take the money, Little said.

Local governments have indicated they may sue to stop the state from taking their money if the budget passes.

On a more positive note, Gallant said her preliminary numbers showed the city’s finances were “solid and stable” through the June 30 end of the city’s 2008-09 budget year.

But she was less positive about the future. She said an economic recovery that was anticipated to be on the way in 18 to 24 months is now being projected three to four years into the future. (That future, by the way, may very well include multi-million-dollar increases in the amount the state’s pension fund charges the city for retirees’ pensions.)

More budget details should be released next week, so as I always say … more to come.

If that plan is enacted, Alameda County could also lose money, which could have a potentially bigger impact on the Island: The closure of the drawbridges that connect us to the rest of civilization. Apparently the bridges would operational during the day – after all this earthquake retrofit work is done, anyway – and then would be left up at night.

The Chronicle’s Michael Cabanatuan reports that the county-run bridges would have to be left in the up position if closed, because they could face millions in fines otherwise.

“We can’t afford those fines, so we would have to find other sources of money, or keep the bridges open – that is, in the up position,” the county’s public works director, Daniel Woldesenbet, told the Chron. “And some of the bridges carry 20,000 to 30,000 vehicles a day.”

Without the bridges, we’d only have the Webster and Posey tubes to rely on to get on and off the Island, and the ferry.

If the state takes the money, Alameda County would be out $36 million this coming year.

But Interim City Manager Ann Marie Gallant dismissed the suggestion that the bridges might be closed as little more than a bit of nifty political theater intended to get more money from the city.

“Obviously this was a trial balloon, and it was there to get the necessary reaction. It’s highly unlikely they would do that,” she told the City Council on Tuesday. “They want us to share in the expenses (of operating the bridges), and it’s just not possible.”

Vice Mayor Doug deHaan said a similar suggestion was floated in 1994, but that other solutions to the problem were found.

Their remarks came as the council opted to join the League of California Cities in exploring a lawsuit that would challenge the constitutionality of the state’s taking the gas tax money for its own budget-balancing use. Voters decided to amend the state constitution to require the use of gas tax funds for road and transit improvements effective July 1, 2003.

The mayors Alameda County’s cities have also banded together to demand that the state reconsider proposals to take the gas tax money and property tax funds totaling $42 million for the county (though that appears to, for the moment, be off the table).

Alameda One-Stop Career Center

Looking for local resources to help you find a new job? Look no further than the College of Alameda, which has got a One-Stop Career Center that is open to one and all. The center is located in Portable P on the outskirts of campus, and as I mentioned before, it’s open to students and non-students alike. If you’re looking for more info, you can check out this May 8 article from the Alameda Times-Star.

This coming Tuesday, May 19, the Alameda Free Library and the folks from the career center are hosting a free “Job Search 1o1″ information session to help applicants learn effective strategies for job searches, creating resumes, writing cover letters, interviewing, networking and more. The free session is from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. in the Main Library, 1550 Oak Street.