As Flood Risk Grows, Suisun City Weighs Annexing California Forever Land

But this neighborhood, and a large swath of the marshy city, is located in what climate scientists call one of the Bay Area’s top sea level rise hot spots.

Suisun City, a working-class community on the edge of San Francisco Bay, faces a slow-moving crisis: rising seas could swallow parts of the town within decades. It also faces an imminent budget crisis threatening insolvency.

Among other solutions, city leaders are eyeing a controversial fix — annexing thousands of inland acres from California Forever, a tech billionaire-backed company — a move that could raise tax revenue and secure higher ground, but risks fierce fights over growth, climate adaptation and the city’s future.

For years, city officials have debated how to prepare for climate change. Suisun City Mayor Alma Hernandez, who grew up in a tan apartment blocks away from the waterfront, said that point hit home a few years back, when she hiked up a hill nearby and saw how the marsh — the largest brackish wetland in California — seemed to dwarf her tiny city of about 30,000.

“My city will be affected by flooding, and no one really knows about it,” Hernandez said.