Street War Simmering in San Clemente : Roadways: City pushes a new assessment district and a $55-million levy on homeowners for needed repairs. Opponents want a citywide vote on the matter.

During a hot and sticky July better suited for small talk of surf and sunshine, residents of this beach town find themselves discussing streets.

The focus is on a proposed assessment district and $55-million levy on homeowners to repair the nearly 67-year-old city’s streets, some of them as potholed as Baja California’s worst.

Nearly everyone agrees that something must be done, but not, opponents of the district say, with what amounts to a new tax that would be in effect for 18 years.

And after four weeks of door-to-door signature gathering, opponents plan to present City Hall on Wednesday with a stack of letters demanding a citywide vote on the proposed district. The move is scheduled just hours before the City Council is expected to approve the new levy.

City officials argue that the assessment district’s cost of $90 a year for the average homeowner is affordable. But opponents, who have seen city water, sewer, landscaping and lighting and trash fees all increase in the last year, call it an end run around 1978’s Proposition 13, adding that no other city in Orange County has such a district.

“Most of us believe they ought to find a way to cut the fat in our bloated city bureaucracy and get out and fix the streets,” said John Koch, 64, a 19-year San Clemente resident and a leader in the fight against the assessment.

If Koch and other opponents can obtain signatures of 6,000 San Clemente voters on the letters they can force a citywide vote, according to the city clerk’s office.

Mike Sorg, city director of public works, warns that any further postponement of needed street repairs would eventually make the repairs much more costly.

“The streets are falling apart so quickly, if we don’t do something soon we will add millions and millions of dollars to the cost,” Sorg said. “The streets deteriorate at an accelerating rate.”

City officials say the assessment district idea is the result of a survey showing that 60 miles of San Clemente’s 120-mile public road system is substandard because of decades of neglect and recent rainy seasons. Most of the damaged streets are in residential areas.

Many streets are beyond repair and need to be rebuilt at an estimated cost of $1 million per mile.

Some of the city streets, which date back to the 1930s, were built under old standards that required laying only 1 to 2 inches of asphalt over bare dirt with no base material, city officials said. Today, standards for rebuilding those same streets require 4 inches of asphalt over 7 inches of gravel base, placed over compacted soil, according to a city report.

“If we were talking about one street that needed to be repaired and it was a one-time expense, that would be different,” said City Councilman Steve Apodaca, one of four council members expected to vote for the district. “But we are talking about a huge undertaking, a major capital improvement project over the next 18 years. There’s really no other revenue source for this.”

A citywide vote would only postpone the repairs that are “desperately needed,” Apodaca said.

“Voting always serves a purpose if you have an option. But to my way of thinking, not fixing the streets is not an option,” Apodaca said. “We are talking about the basic quality of life in our city and our property values. Moreover, we joke about the potholes, but our streets present a very serious liability hazard to the city.”

Councilman Patrick M. Ahle, the newest member of the five-person council, is expected to back the opponents and cast a dissenting vote. Ahle believes other proposals for assessing city residents should be considered and they should all be put on the ballot.

One suggestion would be to assess by the number of cars each homeowner uses.

“The streets are crumbling. They are really bad . . . but this is tantamount to a new tax, and each time it has come up, I have suggested people ought to be able to vote on it,” said Ahle, a deputy district attorney for the city of Anaheim. “Maybe we could put three different scenarios on a ballot and let the voters decide.”