CGF sponsors Community Design Day on the future of South Santa Clara County

The video below is from the Community Design Day that CGF sponsored in Morgan Hill:

CGF Coyote Ridge hike in Morgan Hill Times

Just a quick note that our annual hike to Coyote Ridge got a nice writeup in the Morgan Hill Times:

....Last weekend, I was reminded of this there's-more-there-than-meets-the-eye lesson here in my own back yard.....How many times does mom need to remind us that the charms of a person or a place may not be evident at first glance? Our guided walk up Coyote Ridge was a reminder than mom knows what she is talking about. A number of phenomena converge here to create a community of rare and unusual interest.

....

We lunched among the flowers, taking in the beauty near and far. A small herd of tule elk lounged on the ridge below. A prairie falcon darted overhead. A golden eagle drifted across the face of the ridge below. 

In 1868, John Muir, in California for only a matter of days and on his way to Yosemite, walked along this very ridge and later wrote, "the landscapes of Santa Clara Valley were fairly drenched with sunshine. All the air was quivering with the songs of the meadow-larks, and the hills were so covered with flowers that they seemed to be painted."

The work of good people at the Santa Clara County Open Space Authority (www.openspaceauthority.org), the Silicon Valley Land Conservancy (www.siliconvalleylc.org) and the Committee for Green Foothills (www.greenfoothills.org) have allowed us to enjoy this setting much as John Muir did 140 years ago.

Sign up for our Action Alerts to be notified about this hike, other events, and calls to action to help the local environment.

-Brian

CGF at Morgan Hill City Council

Morgan Hill puts its City Council meetings online, so I wanted to point to two items where we were involved.

We announced our Nov. 7th event on the South Valley in Gilroy:

City of Morgan Hll City Council Meeting 10-7-2009 Part 1 from Larry Talbot on Vimeo.

(You need to let it buffer for a few minutes and then move to the 11:15 minute mark.)


Also, I summarized our concern about the proposed outward expansion of Morgan Hill into farmland:

City of Morgan Hll City Council Meeting 10-7-2009 Part 2 from Larry Talbot on Vimeo.

The item starts at minute 22, citizen comment at minute 33:30 with me first, then followed by Julie Hutcheson and Beth Wyman. The City Council made sympathetic noises about the concerns we raised, but unfortunately they then just did what staff recommended. We'll just have to follow the EIR process to make comments.

-Brian

Support for the Single-Use Carryout Bag Fee Ordinance

(We submitted the letter below to the City of Morgan Hill regarding the proposal to require a fee for using plastic or paper bags. -Brian)

January 8, 2009

Tony Eulo

City of Morgan Hill

Re: Committee for Green Foothills' support for the Single-Use Carryout Bag Fee Ordinance

Dear Tony;

The Committee for Green Foothills supports Morgan Hill's proposed Bag Fee Ordinance. As any Morgan Hill resident that has taken the opportunity to hike Coyote Ridge can see (and if any residents haven't hiked there, they should), even a well-managed landfill like Kirby Landfill has problems with wind-blown plastic bags escaping the landfill and polluting the countryside. These bags often settle in Coyote Ridge stream areas where they obstruct growth of endangered plants only found by the streams. Any streamside hiker or canoeist throughout the County will find countless plastic bags along larger creeks and rivers, and bags often obstruct storm sewer grates and limit flooding drainage. From the esthetic ugliness along roadsides alone, plastic bags constitute the perfect example of an environmental externality whose cost, absent the proposed fee, is imposed instead on society at large.

Paper bags create similar problems. When we opposed the permanent logging permit that San Jose Water Company requested for thousands of acres of redwoods and Douglas firs from Lexington Reservoir extending southeast halfway to Morgan Hill, we were appropriately challenged as to where wood and wood pulp would come from instead. An important response to this challenge is to avoid wasting wood pulp and energy in paper bags, and the fee will appropriately reduce that waste.

We hope that Morgan Hill will move forward in support of the position of City staff, Santa Clara County Cities Association, and the Recycling and Waste Reduction Commission of Santa Clara County.

Please contact us if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

Brian A. Schmidt

Legislative Advocate, Santa Clara County

News Release: Morgan Hill must hold developers to the Coyote Valley standard for cost recovery, environmentalists say

(CGF issued the following news release last week. -Brian)

Committee for Green Foothills
NEWS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 1, 2008

PRESS CONTACTS: Brian Schmidt, Legislative Advocate, phone (650) 968-7243, brian@greenfoothills.org

Morgan Hill must hold developers to the Coyote Valley standard for cost recovery, environmentalists say

IN COYOTE VALLEY, DEVELOPERS PAID ALL PLANNING AND ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW COSTS FOR DEVELOPING THE AREA; Committee for Green Foothills states that Morgan Hill taxpayers deserve the same.

Committee for Green Foothills argues that Morgan Hill taxpayers have a right to expect the City-initiated planning for the "Southeast Quadrant" meet the same cost recovery standard imposed on developers by the City of San Jose for the Coyote Valley planning process. "San Jose also had a city-led process for analyzing potential development of Coyote Valley," said CGF Advocate Brian Schmidt, "but no one denied that the motivating force was the developers who owned much of the land. San Jose required developers to pay for every dime of environmental review and planning involving that area, and Morgan Hill taxpayers should not be presented with a bill for proposals that increase the property value in that area."

Last night, the Morgan Hill City Council voted to initiate an Environmental Impact Review (EIR) process to convert the Southeast Quadrant area mainly to non-agricultural use, with a small portion to be retained for agricultural or open space uses. The Council also voted to initiate a study of the feasibility of agricultural mitigation and long-term agricultural viability in the broader Morgan Hill area. "None of the EIR costs should be borne by taxpayers," said Schmidt. "These EIRs will only exist because of the landowner interests in development. As for the costs of studying the feasibility of agricultural mitigation, that's mitigation for the loss of farmland due to proposals like the Southeast Quadrant, and any transfer of developer responsibilities to taxpayers is unacceptable. Only costs for studying agricultural viability and mitigation separate from the rezoning proposals in the Southeast Quadrant should be handled by taxpayers.

Schmidt continued, "the Coyote Valley planning process was riddled with flaws, but at least they claimed to get back all the money they spent from the developers. If these Southeast Quadrant studies don't even meet that standard, we fear the other results may be even worse.

# # #

About the Committee for Green Foothills

Committee for Green Foothills is a regional grassroots organization working to establish and maintain land-use policies that protect the environment throughout San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties. Committee for Green Foothills, established in 1962, is a Bay Area leader in the continuing effort to protect open space and the natural environment of our Peninsula. For more information about the Committee for Green Foothills or about our work on this issue, visit www.GreenFoothills.org.

More good news from last week - County denies sprawl proposal near Morgan Hill

We'll have an article mentioning this in the Fall 2007 Green Footnotes - Santa Clara County last week rejected a proposal to redesignate 60 acres of land on Watsonville Road from Hillside designation to Rural Residential. The redesignation would have tripled the amount of allowed development, and because only about one-third of the parcel touch Rural Residential parcels, it would have stretched the concept of "infill" beyond recognition. This isn't what we need, especially so far away from city limits.

Instead, the Supervisors voted 5-0 to reject the idea. It didn't seem like we'd have such a resounding victory at the beginning - we at CGF spent a lot of time calling Supervisors, meeting with them and their staffs, and appearing at the hearing. We're very glad to have stopped a bad precedent and maintained a good one.

-Brian

Letter to Morgan Hill about the Institute Golf Course

(We sent this letter today about the latest problem with the Institute Golf Course in Morgan Hill. -Brian)

August 29, 2007
Morgan Hill City Council

Re: Agenda Item #4 – Institute Golf Course

Dear Mayor Tate and City Councilmembers;

The Committee for Green Foothills has reviewed the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society letter regarding the Institute Golf Course, and we endorse its contents and recommendations.

Speaking as someone who has followed this issue for four years, I can also attest to the frustration of watching a sophisticated and wealthy set of individuals get away with environmental murder repeatedly. The City’s entire response for the last ten years since the golf course was illegally constructed has simply been to legalize what has already, illegally been done to the property. This latest manifestation now is to legalize the landowners’ decision to ignore mitigation deadlines, replacing the old deadlines with new ones and old mitigation standards with new, undefined concepts that call for completely –unearned trust in the City’s vigilance. With little hope, we request that the City this time take a different stance, reject the staff recommendation, require immediate compliance with the numerous mitigations that can be complied with immediately, and bring an enforcement action against the landowner requiring them to stop using the golf course until all other mitigations have been complied with.

It may be relevant to bring into the open the rumors that have circulated that Frys may move its corporate headquarters to Morgan Hill, as the rumors might also explain the consistent kid-glove treatment that this Frys-associated landowner has received from the City. Even if the rumors had some basis in fact, they do not justify the landowners’ noncompliance or the City’s non-enforcement. Equally important though is that the rumors appear to be wrong. I first heard them over three years ago, and I’m sure they circulated for longer than that, yet there is no sign of movement to Morgan Hill. I am concerned that these background rumors can influence decisonmaking here and in other cities could possibly be hearing similar rumors. If the City wishes to do some kind of deal, it should do it in the open.

Finally, to supplement mention of the many legal flaws described in the Audubon letter, we point out that CEQA acknowledges the existence and significance of temporary impacts, so the failure to put mitigations in place in a timely fashion is a significant impact that must be analyzed. In addition, “take” under the ESA is generally recognized as a significant impact under CEQA, and acknowledging the take means a Supplemental EIR must be prepared. If the City is permitting “take” without requiring the relevant state and federal ESA permits first, or if it is permitting such take for a longer period than anticipated and analyzed in the original EIR, then a new and unanalyzed significant impact is present and requires at least a Supplemental EIR.

Please contact us if you have any questions.

Sincerely,
Brian A. Schmidt
Legislative Advocate, Santa Clara County

Comments submitted to LAFCO about Morgan Hill expansion and Coyote Valley

(Normally I don't write out my speaker comments in advance, preferring a more natural speaking style and the ability to react to other commenters and new information. Yesterday though, I wrote out my comments to the Santa Clara County LAFCO regarding the unwarranted Morgan Hill USA expansion. The comments are below (although I also adlibbed some changes). -Brian)

Good afternoon, Brian Schmidt from the Committee for Green Foothills. I would like to put all our cards on the table for this agenda item: we seriously considered suing LAFCO over its decision to approve the Blackrock project based on documentation that LAFCO’s own staff report said is inadequate, a problem that I pointed out to the Commission just immediately before approval was granted.

However, we’re not going to sue in this case. We ask you to reconsider your decision, not because of an implicit threat – there is none – but only because it’s the right thing to do.

Actually, there are two things to do – one is about this project, but the more important one is about Coyote Valley, where the exact same mistake is currently in motion.

On Black Rock, you have several reasons for reversing your earlier decision, and either denying approval or requiring additional documentation. Our attorney’s letter lays out why the lack of consultation with LAFCO gives the Commission the authority to become lead agency. The Morgan Hill City staff opposed the decision to request expansion and were overruled by their City Council on a split vote, something that I expect wasn’t known by the Commission. You can verify that with your staff. There are also about ten acres of farmed land literally across the street from Blackrock, land that undoubtedly will be lost to sprawl because of LAFCO’s decision. Some of that land may not meet the soils definition of farmland, but because it’s planted in grapes, I’m sure it would satisfy a revenues definition.

Given my three-minute time limitation, I’d be happy to answer any questions about the various assertions in the staff report and by the Blackrock attorneys, but none of them are valid reasons for standing by a wrong decision. While I understand that staff is not recommending reconsideration, I suggest that if you do think reconsideration is advisable, you ask LAFCO Counsel to advise you as to whether you have the independent authority to reconsider, a different question than whether they recommend that you reconsider.

Finally, this same problem is in process for Coyote Valley, where it threatens 3,000 acres instead of Blackrock’s 18 acres. They plan to use the vague and subjective LESA process, apparently after the project has undergone approval and have not even defined a preservation ratio, something worse than Morgan Hill’s action. While the Committee for Green Foothills would like reconsideration and denial of the Blackrock USA expansion, it is still more important that LAFCO avoid the identical problem in Coyote Valley by demanding recirculation of a Draft EIR that meets adequate environmental standards, and if this is not done, then by litigating over the failure to do an adequate analysis, becoming lead agency for USA expansion purposes, or denying the USA expansion outright.