San Mateo City Hall just threw us a curve ball.
We shipped our belongings to California via a “PODS” temporary storage container. Last week, Carol went to San Mateo City Hall to get a permit to place the Pod on the street near our building (there’s no other place to put the Pod because the yard is completely fenced in).
The people at City Hall told Carol there was a brand new requirement that we get an insurance certificate absolving the city of all liability. We were not surprised by this, since New Bedford had recently instituted a similar requirement. But they also said they were going to charge us $800 for the permit.
I called Brian, the manager of the local PODS franchise, and told him the story. “Eight hundred dollars?! I can’t believe that,” he said. “I’ll drive down to San Mateo tomorrow and talk with them about this.”
Brian called me this morning. It turns out that it’s worse than we all thought. They city of San Mateo has banned all placement of temporary storage containers on the street, and they told Brian that if they find a temporary storage container on the street they will fine the company that owns it $1,000 a day. The fire chief has said that temporary storage containers interfere with firefighting, and cannot be allowed any longer, as of a week ago. Apparently, then, City Hall gave incorrect information to Carol — this is not about insurance, this is about firefighting.
Brian has gone out of his way to accommodate us. He is going to dispatch a truck with our belongings first thing Monday morning. The truck driver will wait while we unload the contents of the Pod into the garage and driveway. Now we are gathering a crew together to help us unload as quickly as possible. (If you’re in the area and want to help, send me email — I’ll buy you lunch!)
I’d feel better about this if the city’s new requirement made sense to me. But our building is on a street corner with about 150 feet of street access, and one 16-foot storage container is not going to create a significant problem for firefighters. This is the sort of thing that makes people cynical about City Hall.
Sigh. Just what we need. More stress in our lives.
You have to admire San Mateo’s ambition. I don’t hold that it is impossible to make New Bedford look good; but it is an ambitious goal.
Moving is at best an exhausting occupation. I suggest – get as many people as possible to help you… Unload as much as possible to the room of destination and put away as much as possible right then. Order pizza. Feed these people. Like a bandaid – Rip it off. And then quietly work to throw the bums out. What a lovely introduction to your new city. Permit, fire department I hope some day they get their story straight. If you get a big enough crew to help, this could be a massive blessing. All done at once, then you’d have to send city hall a thank you note. If you manage to stay in the moment you can master the stress monster. At least that’s what I hear.
Gee whiz — that completely sucks. Just on a weird hunch: does anyone in City Hall or the Fire Department have interest in traditional moving companies? You know. Ones that might be, oh, competing with PODS?
Hang in there — the dust will soon settle!!!