Sewer Overhaul, Montara Grant and Harbor District Friction Dominate Midcoast Meeting

The Midcoast Community Council (MCC) packed its April 8 session with presentations on a $13–14 million sewer pipeline replacement under a federal consent decree and a contested bike-and-pedestrian grant for Montara's Main Street — approving a support letter for the latter 5-0 despite pushback over proposed curb extensions. The evening also surfaced new hazardous-waste worries at the Cypress Point affordable housing site and a turf battle with the Harbor District over who gets to run the coastside's long-awaited multi-agency stakeholder meeting.

• $13–14M sewer force main replacement along Highway 1 presented to council; construction could start this fall under a June 2027 consent-decree deadline

• Council unanimously backs TDA 3 grant for Montara Main Street sidewalks, bike route and ADA bus-stop upgrades — over resident opposition to curb extensions

• Abandoned underground storage tank and asbestos discovered at Cypress Point housing site near Fitzgerald Marine Reserve

• Harbor District schedules competing stakeholder meeting, complicating MCC's months-long coordination effort on overlapping coastside projects

• Supervisor Mueller's office names David Cosgrave as new full-time coastside liaison, replacing Marisol Escalera

The basics: The Sewer Authority Mid-Coastside (SAM) — a joint powers authority of Half Moon Bay, Granada Community Services District and Montara Water and Sanitary District serving roughly 30,000 people — must replace two miles of 40-year-old ductile iron sewer pipe along Highway 1 by June 30, 2027. An environmental consent decree triggered by multiple sewage spills set the deadline.