ON MARCH 8, the Vallejo City Council will decide whether to OK a $30 million loan to redo and retrofit a nearly 60,000 square-foot building on one of the most beautiful stretches of town, the waterfront.

The 400 Mare Island Way site is the former home of a gigantic State Farm Insurance building that was purchased by the city in 2019 for $13 million in hopes of housing the police. Vallejo knew that the place needed work, specifically millions in retrofitting and remodeling, so it put Measure G on the ballot in an attempt to raise the funds. But then something unexpected happened — Measure G failed with the voters, largely, some say, because people didn’t want to pay millions more for a new police building.

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Katy St. Clair got her start in journalism by working in the classifieds department at the East Bay Express during the height of alt weeklies, then sweet talked her way into becoming staff writer, submissions editor, and music editor. She has been a columnist in the East Bay Express, SF Weekly, and the San Francisco Examiner. Starting in 2015, she begrudgingly scaled the inverted pyramid at dailies such as the Vallejo Times-Herald, The Vacaville Reporter, and the Daily Republic. She has her own independent news site and blog that covers the delightfully dysfunctional town of Vallejo, California, where she also collaborates with the investigative team at Open Vallejo. A passionate advocate for people with developmental disabilities, she serves on both the Board of the Arc of Solano and the Arc of California. She lives in Vallejo.