(CGF submitted the following comments for a massive project proposed in San Benito County that could affect Santa Clara County. -Brian)
February 2, 2009
Re: NOP Comments for El Rancho San Benito Master Community Specific Plan
Dear Mr. Henriques;
Please consider the following in preparation of the EIR for the El Rancho San Benito project:
·Effect on 500 year floods – it is foreseeable that flooding impacts will be considered by FEMA within the 500 year time frames.One can reasonably assume the constructed project will last at least 50 years, giving a 10% chance of a 500-year flood, and non-negligible chances of multiple 500-year floods.These impacts are not remote and speculative and therefore must be addressed.
·Hydromodification basin in flood plain – the EIR must address how it will function during flooding, when the current information about the project suggests the basin will itself be flooded during peak periods.
·Cumulative impacts of increased impervious surfaces not addressed by NPDES permits must themselves be addressed.Simple compliance with NPDES permits is insufficient to eliminate all cumulative impacts because NPDES permits contain exemptions for the size of storm event to be mitigated, cost of mitigation etc.See attached White Paper for more information.
·Cut and fill – should not assume that the need for cut and fill will occur simultaneously, addressing only the difference between the two.The EIR should assume the fill need will occur first, and track impact of needing the entire fill, and should assume the cut need will occur later and describe impact of disposing of the cut material
·The Amah-Mutsun Native American community should be consulted regarding areas of cultural significance.
·The EIR should address wetlands impacts as defined by either soils, standing water, or hydrophitic vegetation instead of requiring all three to be present.It is immaterial whether a Clean Water Act permit is necessary.All wetland impacts must be addressed regardless of whether the wetland is defined as part of the waters of the United States under the Clean Water Act.
·The EIR should address impacts from potential climate change, including potential reduced water availability.
·The EIR should consider alternatives where the equivalent development is dispersed within city limits in San BenitoCounty; within city limits in San Benito and Santa ClaraCounties; and within San Benito, Santa Clara, and MontereyCounties.There is no reason to limit alternative discussions to single areas that can accommodate equivalent amounts of growth; instead the growth can be dispersed.
·The EIR should discuss impacts from developing residential and non-residential uses at different periods, and mitigations that keep residential development from outpacing non-residential development until all the non-residential development is complete.
In the parks and along the trails of the Peninsula and South Valley, Indian families can be a common sight, with older women sometimes wearing saris and sandals picking their way along the dirt paths.
All cultures demonstrate a desire to be in nature and to seek wisdom. The strength of that interest in Indian and South Asian cultures transplanted to the Bay Area will have many sources, but one of those sources dates back to one of the most important epic stories from India, the Ramayana.
The myth, over two thousand years old, primarily concerns Prince Rama and a war he fought to recover his wife Sita from abduction by the demon king Ravana, followed by Rama's ascension as a king himself. The story goes far beyond a simple plot to outline relationships and duties in a community and how to achieve the wisdom needed to perform one's duties. Much of that wisdom comes from the extensive time spent in nature.
Prince Rama himself and one of his brothers spend fourteen years in "vanvas" (hermitage/exile) in a forest, where they lose their royal softness and learn from the spiritual hermits they encounter. In turn, Rama's sons Lava and Kusha are born and grow up in vanvas under the tutelage of the sage Valmiki, and only returning to civilization when they become adult heirs of Rama.
The one person connecting these two episodes is Sita, who spent both periods in exile, first with her husband and then with her sons. Her willingness to be in nature, even during hardship, exceeds that of any other figure.
There almost seems to be a connection between this strong foundational figure of Indian literature living in nature with the many strong women that founded the nature conservation groups here in the Bay Area. Other connections between Ramayana and Bay Area nature include a positive attitude to animals - a monkey king and his army fight alongside Rama to retrieve the kidnapped Sita from demons. Even vultures, commonly sighted here but not looked on that fondly in European culture, are represented in Ramayana by the vulture demi-god Jatayu, who fights the demon Ravana to prevent Sita's kidnapping from their forest home. Failing to stop the abduction and mortally wounded, Jatayu survives long enough to tell the frantic Rama the direction to search for his wife. Someone from this cultural background might not be disappointed to learn the big bird they see flying is a vulture instead of a hawk.
Sita even ties into the environmental concern with agriculture as much as nature. According to the myth, she was found as a baby in a plowed field, a daughter of the Mother Earth Goddess Bhuma Devi.
The Bay Area's ethnic diversity will help strengthen its environmental commitment. The obvious enjoyment among Indian families for our local natural open spaces helps verify this, as does the wisdom of myths and legends from a diversity of cultural backgrounds.
Lots to be done, but we'll be working hard to do it.
Bonus blogging - new information's out showing the earthquake hazard of building in floodplains of major streams: "If a major earthquake rattles the South Bay, the sandy soils alongside San Jose's two largest rivers pose the highest risks to modern businesses and homes in Santa Clara County, according to new seismic maps by the U.S. Geological Survey. The maps reveal the hidden danger along San Jose's ancestral Guadalupe River and Coyote Creek flood plains...."
Still more reasons to keep those floodplains natural and open, whenever possible.
A very good project undertaken by Patagonia: Freedom to Roam, a project to "create, restore, and protect wildways or corridors between habitats so animals can survive."
We at the Committee have done extensive work to protect local wildlife corridors, both the crucially-threatened one in Coyote Valley and others throughout the South Bay and South Valley. While Patagonia's project map focuses on national-scale corridors, local ones are just as important.
(Not sure how useful this will be, but Lennie and I testified at today's San Mateo Planning Commission about Stanford's inadequate Sustainable Development Study. Attached below are my notes, improved somewhat so others might understand them. I think we had some success persuading the Commission and maybe staff. -Brian)
Primary disagreement with staff - 25 year limitation on analyzing sustainability
Question is whether this fully complies with what Stfd promised, and if not whether SM county should be interested in promoting compliance
Not just a check-off box - Stanford MUST submit an adequate plan to continue new development
Two problems with the non-compliance – nowhere in the permit plan or admin record was the study limited to a restricted time frame – a lot of info suggests otherwise
Second, that by definition you can't do an adequate sustainability study while limiting it to a short time frame like 25 years
No definition was included – page 94
Here's a def they could use: "A sustainable process or condition is one that can be maintained indefinitely without progressive diminution of valued qualities inside or outside the system in which the process operates or the condition prevails."
No criteria for measurement, analysis, or conclusions re sustainability
Just one example of effects on SM County – traffic impacts from development post-2035
Can you analyze beyond 2035 - yes, two examples
Not sure about your process – I suggest you recommend letter not go forward as written
Analogy - Alpine Road sidewalk expansion also failed to meet Stanford's original promise
Encouraged by Joe Stagner's reference to planning to 2050
(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.
I recently came across the Livable Streets Network, an online community of smart-growth activism. They could be thought of as being just across the fence from CGF - we work to fight bad growth in the form of sprawl, and they work to get smart growth in the form of livable cities. Both efforts work hand-in-hand. There are some cross-cutting issues as well, so I'll be adding them to our links list on the right side of this blog.
One nice aspect of our office on Bayshore Road is it's sufficiently close to the Baylands that I can get out on occasional walks. One day recently I had a burrito lunch walk, ending up on a wooden platform extending a little ways over the water at high tide. Everywhere under the shallow surface were snails, slowly moving about.
Seeing snails was nothing new, but this time I stayed in one place long enough to see something different. The seemingly-random, slow snail movement was actually converging on a submerged tidal channel, where a higher concentration of snails were already moving downstream - thousands of snails as far as I could see, in some kind of migration.
I don't really know what was going on. It was shortly after high tide, so the snails may have just been moving to keep below water level. Or maybe it was a real seasonal migration of some type. Still, I felt lucky to have this mini-revelation of a natural process going on in a place I had been to dozens of times before.
Another reason to keep in mind the value of easily-visited, local open space, giving us a chance for revelations that we don't see in our first visit.
(An earlier post summarizes information showing the Stanford Sustainable Development Study was meant to cover the foreseeable future for at least 99 years. Below is an email we sent to the Palo Alto City Council along with the summary info. -Brian)
Dear Palo Alto City Council Members,
Sometime early next year, you will have the chance to comment on the draft Stanford Sustainable Development Study, which must be approved by Santa Clara County before Stanford can apply for the second million square feet of development. The draft submitted by Stanford violates the Stanford Community Plan because it describes planning for buildout only ten years past the existing, 25-year restriction on expansion beyond the Academic Growth Boundary. The Community Plan calls for a description of the "maximum planned buildout potential" that has always been understood to apply to the foreseeable future far beyond the additional ten years proposed by Stanford. The City of Palo Alto made this its own official policy in 1999, and we ask you to strongly reaffirm this position when the issue comes before the City Council.
To understand the planning horizon contemplated in December 2000 for the Stanford Sustainable Development Study, the Committee for Green Foothills has done a preliminary review of documents that formed the origin of the Stanford GUP requirement for the Study. The first attachment is our summary and is reprinted at the bottom of this email; the subsequent four documents contain one or more additional sources.
All the relevant sources that we found support the idea that the planning horizon for the Study is either permanent or at least for 99 years, which we equate with planning for the foreseeable future. We found no support in the record for the Stanford's contention that the Study was meant to have a planning horizon that extended only 10 years past the 25-year limit protecting the Academic Growth Boundary.
We would be happy to answer any questions.
Sincerely, Brian Schmidt
Brian Schmidt Legislative Advocate, Committee for Green Foothills
(The following document on the Stanford Sustainable Development Study was sent to multiple government officials today. -Brian)
Excerpts of statements in the administrative record for the December 2000 Stanford GUP that are related to the planning horizon for the Stanford Sustainable Development Study
City of Palo Alto recommendations of 10/12/99, reaffirmed 10/25/99 and 10/28/99:
Vision for Long-Term Build-out of StanfordUniversity
·The Community Plan should include a long-term vision, beyond the 10-year scope of the Plan, for the ultimate build-out of the University.While it is recognized that this vision would not be as detailed as the ten-year Plan regarding Stanford's potential development, it would be helpful I providing insight into the University's future evolution.
Note:the call for "vision" for "ultimate build-out" was expressly reaffirmed in the later City documents.The ten-year reference for the current Plan was based on an expected fast buildout under the Stanford GUP."Ultimate build-out" excludes Stanford's suggestion that Study only covers 10 years more than the Academic Growth Boundary protection to the year 2025.
City of Menlo Park recommendations of 10/21/99, reaffirmed by the City on 1/5/00:
The Community Plan should have both a total and permanent limitation, or cap, on building square footage and population with the understanding that it does not give Stanford the right to extend the limits beyond the cap.
Note:Menlo Park felt the permanent cap should be both mandatory and part of the Stanford GUP, so interpreting the Study to only add ten years of planning would not support the City's comments.
Written statement by Supervisor Joe Simitian of 10/24/00:
During the past 18 months some members of the public have proposed that we use this GUP and Community Plan process to establish a "cap" on the University's maximum development potential, "buildout" as it's often referred to....I am not inclined to propose that our Board establish a permanent cap or attempt to define at this point the ultimate buildout of the campus.
I am inclined to think, however that it would be irresponsible to simply ignore the need for a clearer notion about the ultimate capacity of Stanford lands and a clearer vision of what such a plan might entail. For that reason I'm inclined to suggest to my colleagues that the Conditions of Approval for the GUP include a condition requiring that Stanford undertake a Buildout Study regarding the buildout potential of StanfordUniversity on all unincorporated lands within Santa ClaraCounty.
Note:Here the then-Supervisor Simitian made synonymous the terms "cap," "maximum development potential," "ultimate capacity of Stanford lands," and "Buildout Study". The Buildout Study was later renamed the Sustainable Development Study.
Statements by Supervisors Simitian and Beall at the Stanford GUP hearing of 11/27/00:
Sup. Simitian:….I had proposed one tool, the use of Clustering Credits which to understate the case dramatically was not well-received by the University…. The question then is how do we deal with this issue of finding a real plan to prevent sprawl that is acceptable and manageable for all the parties involved, and what I would suggest is that…prior to the second million square feet of academic facilities being constructed and permits being issued, that the University be obliged to prepare a Sustainable Development Plan which would address these issues to the satisfaction of the Board….[I]t would in effect say okay, apparently Supervisor Simitian's suggestion for dealing with the issue of sprawl was something the University found unacceptable but now we'll give it to the University and give them the chance to say here's how they'd like to address the issues of sprawl….
Sup. Simitian:….Why don't we just indicate for the record that those five items [including Sustainable Develoment Study] are in lieu of the Clustering Credit language which was submitted originally in the Community Plan….
Sup. Beall:I think the general idea of clustering is something we're not abandoning….
Sup. Simitian:Right, I, whether or not clustering or rather clustering credits live to see another day is an open question, and it's certainly something that can be looked at in the Sustainable Development Study that Supervisor Beall and I have both referenced….
(Emphasis added.)
Note:Clustering credits had been proposed by environmental groups to give Stanford the ability to develop a certain amount in the core campus in return for permanent Foothills protection, while Supervisor Simitian proposed them for 99-year protection.There would be no point in considering them in the Study if the Study's planning horizon is only 10 years longer than the Academic Growth Boundary Protection that was being proposed at the time.
The Committee for Green Foothills has all the relevant documents and transcripts.We found nothing in any of the documents we studied to support the idea that the Study was meant to have a planning horizon short of permanent or 99-year time frame, which we would consider comparable to planning for the foreseeable future.Stanford's attempt to reduce the scope of the Study can only be done, if at all, through a General Use Permit amendment, and not through non-compliance.
Please contact Brian Schmidt (650) 968-7243 with any questions.
CGF Intern Laurel Smith and I have been researching how the Stanford Sustainable Development Study became a requirement in the 2000 General Use Permit, which will hopefully help shed light on the question of whether the "maximum buildout potential" meant "maximum buildout potential" or if it meant "maximum buildout up until some relatively short period in the future, and then all bets are off."
First thing we've found so far is a statement by then-Supervisor Joe Simitian on 10/24/08 on County letterhead:
During the past 18 months some members of the public have proposed that we use this GUP and Community Plan process to establish a "cap" on the University's maximum development potential, "buildout" as it's often referred to....I am not inclined to to propose that our Board establish a permanent cap or attempt to define at this point the ultimate buildout of the campus.
I am inclined to think, however that it would be irresponsible to simply ignore the need for a clearer notion about the ultimate capacity of of Stanford lands and a clearer vision of what such a plan might entail. For that reason I'm inclined to suggest to my colleagues that the Conditions of Approval for the GUP include a condition requiring that Stanford undertake a Buildout Study regarding the buildout potential of Stanford University on all unincorporated lands within Santa Clara County.
So from the beginning, "cap" = "maximum development potential" = "ultimate capacity of Stanford lands" = "Buildout Study". The Buildout Study was later renamed the Sustainable Development Study.
The next thing we found in November 2000 was tying the Buildout Study to the Compact Urban Growth standard that would've limited growth beyond the Academic Growth Boundary for 99 years. That time period limitation later shrank to 25 years.
Still later, November 22, 2000, then-Supervisor Beall proposed the new name, "Sustainable Development Study" that broadened the scope of the Study somewhat. While somewhat unclear from the document I've got, he may also have inserted the Community Plan language "it would be infeasible to accommodate an additional 200,000 square feet annually in perpetuity, in is unclear how much additional development is appropriate." This is a statement about the foreseeable future with no end date. The Study is supposed to address the question of "how much additional development is appropriate" without an end date.
The final change follows a letter from just-elected-to-the-Assembly Joe Simitian, requesting the term "maximum buildout potential for all fo Stanford's unincorporated land" be placed in the Stanford Community Plan, explaining that the concept was part of the conditions for the General Use Permit. The term went in.
Nothing suggests the idea ever restricted the vision from the original idea of determining the ulitmate capacity of the land for the forseeable future.
(CGF submitted this letter last week regarding the Stanford Sustainable Development Study. -Brian)
November 20, 2008
Santa Clara County Planning Commission
Re: Comments on the Sustainable Development Study for Stanford University
Dear Commission Members;
The Committee for Green Foothills (CGF) appreciates the opportunity to comment on the Stanford Sustainable Development Study (Study). While the process used to reach this point has had significant flaws due to the secrecy in its preparation and the failure to involve the broader community from beginning principles, the draft represents a good first effort in covering part of what was supposed to be done with the Study. In particular, Stanford's own acknowledgment that millions of square feet of additional development could occur within the Academic Growth Boundary without expansion into the foothills is a step toward sustainable buildout that preserves open space. The discussion in Chapter 5 of a wider array of environmental strategies also adds to its value.
The fundamental flaw with the Study, however, is the artificial planning horizon of 2035, a restriction that violates the Community Plan and destroys the Study's usefulness. This flaw must be corrected, probably through action by the County. The Stanford Community Plan (SCP) states the Study must "identify the maximum planned buildout potential" and all areas of potential development. SCP-GD 12. The Study seems deliberately written to avoid quoting this language, often quoting or paraphrasing language before and after the term "maximum buildout potential" while failing to use the term anywhere other than a text box on page 18. The term should be the subtitle on the document's front cover.
No time constraint or planning horizon was included in the Community Plan or in the discussion of the Community Plan and General Use Permit. Because the environmental community had advocated permanent protection of lands beyond the Academic Growth Boundary, the Study requirement made sense as a compromise imposed by the Supervisors and accepted by Stanford – the foothills would not be permanently protected, but a non-binding study showing what areas are likely to remain undeveloped would be delineated. This attempt to not even make a non-binding acknowledgment of those areas fits into an unfortunate pattern of commitments by Stanford for permission for millions of square feet of development, followed by a ridiculously cramped interpretation of those agreements.
The fact that the Study does not look beyond 2035 even reduces its value for the next 25 years. We have no doubt that an adequate Sustainability Study would emphasize that Stanford will need open space indefinitely, that the need will increase as development increases on the core campus, that impacts on surrounding communities from Stanford's growth further justifies open space protection, and that concentrating development on the core campus is more sustainable than spreading it over undeveloped open space. Given that an adequate study would assume no development in the foothills, only by assessing the total level of development that is likely to occur in the core campus could the study also assess how the proposed development in the next 25 years fits into that context. If the development discussed in the draft Study uses almost all the square footage that could be sustainably built in the core campus, then it is likely not sustainable because it leaves little room for later growth. In other words, the draft Study fails to measure full buildout as required past 2035, and also fails to adequately measure sustainability before 2035.
An additional flaw in the Study is a failure to define the parameters of sustainable development in order to determine whether the discussed buildout is sustainable. The section titled "Sustainability Defined" on page 94 fails to include a definition of sustainability. This is unsurprising in a way, because any reasonable definition would not say that sustainable development can ignore any consequence occurring after 2035.
A better draft Study should have a definition of sustainable development; application of the definition to developing parameters for Stanford; a constraints analysis that includes value of open space, resource limits, and relationship of development to surrounding communities; and a scenario range that would weigh potential buildout levels to the sustainability parameters. The task of the County should be to transform the current draft into what the Study should be.
There are many specific comments that CGF has on an adequate Study, but these comments focus on the broader principles of content and process that need to change as we move forward. Fortunately, there is plenty of time. There appears to be no likelihood that Stanford would apply for development beyond the one-million feet ceiling anytime in 2009, with Stanford publicly signaling that it will pull back on new capital projects. In addition, CGF and Supervisor Kniss have called for work to begin on the Study over seven years ago, so any remote chance of delay to Stanford construction projects come down to Stanford's choice of timing to work on the Study.
On process, there should be a series of on-campus and off-campus workshops to develop criteria for the second draft of the Study. These workshops should be led by a County-chosen consultant at Stanford's expense, a provision that Stanford has agreed to. See SCP-GD (i) 3. The organizations mentioned in Study Chapter 5 should be engaged publicly and to the full extent those organizations wish, as opposed to quiet discussions with selected individuals. Elected student, faculty, and alumni association governments should be consulted. The second draft should then be constructed by the County's consultant, with the assistance of Stanford. A projected deadline of summer 2009 for the second draft and fall 2009 for the final version would be appropriate
Specific commentary on content could also be submitted as the workshops and second draft are developed. This first draft is an excellent start. CGF will be happy to submit comments during that process, and can also submit specific comments on improvements for the current draft that could be used in the second draft.
We look forward to participating in a process that protects the local environment and fulfills Stanford's obligation to the community that Stanford agreed to in the Stanford Community Plan.
The effects on our work of protecting open space from sprawl would likely be mixed. On the positive side, the charge would increase incentives to live in the city or near to public transit, which would reduce sprawl. On the other hand, one of our major problems with sprawl is from monster mansion developers, who could probably care less about the charge's cost but appreciate the reduced traffic.
Overall, I suspect the pros outweigh the cons for open space, and strongly outweigh the cons on climate change issues. We haven't looked at the issue closely though, but may need to in the near future.
Stanford's long-promised, draft Sustainable Development Study is available here. While I haven't had the time to take a good look at it, there's an immediately-obvious flaw - it's supposed to "identify the maximum buildout potential and all areas of potential development" but fails to do that, instead describing what buildout is expected only through 2035.
This issue alone is going to take a lot of work to get right. We'll have to take a close look at the rest.
(A version of this post appeared in the Summer 2008 Green Footnotes. -Brian)
Proposed San Martin Incorporation: a reasonable purpose, wrong approach, and terrible execution
Heading south from San Jose, Monterey Highway and Santa Theresa Boulevard lets people see much of Santa Clara County that's not visible from Highway 101. The open fields, fruit stands, and greenhouses of Coyote Valley transform abruptly into the residential development of Morgan Hill. Leaving that city of fifty thousand people, a gradual transition back to farmland eventually arrives at the eighty thousand people of Gilroy, and then further south to still more farmland all the way to the county line at the Pajaro River, north of Hollister.
There's one exception though to the farmland between Morgan Hill and Gilroy. Half way in between is San Martin Avenue, the heart of the unincorporated town of San Martin with about five thousand people living there. Committee for Green Foothills has worked to protect this area, most recently fighting the expansion of San Martin Airport that is not meant to serve the local area but just to provide more corporate jet capacity for northern Santa Clara County.
The central part of San Martin can properly be called a town, with relatively dense development, stores, and even a Caltrain station. With a community identity and history of opposition to bad county planning in past years, some San Martin residents have proposed incorporating their town so they can take over land use planning. This purpose is reasonable although one could equally reasonably oppose it, since they propose none of the city services that usually accompany incorporation.
The real problem lies with the approach then taken by incorporation proponents, that every acre lying between the Morgan Hill, Gilroy, and their respective planning areas (called Spheres of Influence) should become part of San Martin. This turns normal city planning on its head – normally, cities are supposed to encompass the areas that are mostly developed, and only expand outward to bring in rural lands when the city's future growth requires the land. While at least some San Martin incorporation proponents expect to do a better job of protecting open space than the County has, they cannot control the future city, and a real risk of wholesale loss of thousands of acres of farmland could happen with any vote of the future city council.
Then where things have gone terribly wrong is with the execution of the process for determining whether San Martin will incorporate. This problem has nothing to with San Martin residents but everything to do with the agency that is supposed to oversee the process, Santa Clara County Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO). This agency is required by County policy and state law to protect the environment but has refused advice of its staff, its lawyer, a second team of lawyers, and and an environmental consultant. The advice revolved around shrinking the size of the proposed city, but on a series of consistent 3-2 votes, the LAFCO Commission has refused to do it job.
The situation became so serious that for the first time in Committee for Green Foothills' 46-year history, our Board of Directors passed a No Confidence Motion in Santa Clara County LAFCO. We can only hope the agencies responsible for appointments to LAFCO take notice of this situation, and take appropriate action to fix it.
A useful list I received about the schedules for General Plan updates in Santa Clara County - something good to keep in mind.
-Brian
General Plan Updates – Santa Clara County Cities
listed by City, Next Scheduled Update, and Plan Elements To Be Updated Campbell 2008 Housing (Other elements not scheduled) Cupertino ? None scheduled. (Comprehensive update in 2005) Gilroy 2015-17 Comprehensive Los Altos 2008 Housing (Comprehensive not scheduled) Los Altos Hills 2008 (at council now) Land Use Los Gatos 2010 (just underway) Comprehensive Milpitas 2009 Housing (Comprehensive not scheduled) Monte Sereno 2008 (at council now) Comprehensive Morgan Hill 2011 (approx) Comprehensive Mountain View 2009-10 just underway Comprehensive Palo Alto 2010 just underway Housing, add Sustainability, update all other elements San Jose 2008 Comprehensive Santa Clara 2009 Comprehensive Saratoga 2008 Housing (Comprehensive not scheduled) Sunnyvale 2008 Parks & Recreation (2008), Land Use & Transportation (2009), Housing (2009-10), Santa Clara County ? Comprehensive not scheduled Stanford University ? Comprehensive not scheduled
First, we had a wonderful Nature's Inspiration event on Sunday, celebrating Lennie Roberts' 30 years of service. Lots of people, beautiful setting, very nice things that were said - it couldn't be better.
More at the link....
In addition, last week the Santa Clara County Supervisors told County staff to begin a residential Green Building ordinance that will promote water conservation, native plants, energy savings, a lot of other approaches that fall in line with CGF's mandate of protecting open space and natural resources. The Supervisors supported CGF's position of requiring increasing amounts of "Build It Green" requirements for larger residences starting at 3,000 square feet, an incentive for reducing the number of monster mansions blighting our hillsides. We'll be closely watching the ultimate zoning ordinance.
We sent out an Urgent Alert to supporters over the weekend, asking them to contact the Bush Administration and announce their opposition to proposed rules that would weaken the Endangered Species Act. We contacted the Interior Department as well, and wrote the following.
The Committee for Green Foothills represents over a thousand families in Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties in its mission of protecting open space and natural resources in those counties. We at the Committee oppose the proposed revisions to Section 7 consultations. These revisions will reduce the use of valuable expertise and bias evaluation of endangered species impacts against their actual import, as the action agencies will be inclined to downplay environmental impacts. For the above reasons, we oppose the proposed rule revisions.
Below is a copy of the Urgent Alert:
The endangered species of the Bay Area and of the rest of the country need your help. In its last months in office, the Bush Administration proposes to dramatically weaken the Endangered Species Act by letting federal agencies considering actions that harm species avoid consultation and oversight from with expert wildlife agencies. This reverses 30 years of federal regulation designed to restrain federal agencies whose mission and political culture is focused on other things besides protecting species. Please use the website below to submit a comment opposing the proposed changes. Comments must be submitted by Monday, September 15, to be considered.
What's Happening
The Interior Department has proposed the change to limit "Section 7" consultations between federal agencies considering an action ("action agencies") and the expert wildlife agencies (the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service).
Why This is Important
Contrary to Administration claims, the action agencies do not have the same level of expertise about effects on endangered species as the wildlife agencies. In addition, the action agencies inevitably prioritize achieving their main missions over endangered species so they will often interpret evidence in such a way as to reduce its significance. Locking out the agencies with the most expertise and the most interest in protecting species will mean more species will fall through the cracks.
What You Can Do
In another change to previous policy, the Interior Department refuses to accept emailed comments on its proposed rule, but it will accept comments submitted on a government website. Tell them you oppose the proposed new rule and that the Endangered Species Act should be strengthened, not weakened.
You will need to fill out the submitter information at the top of the web page, and then at the bottom of the page you can inform them of your comment opposing the proposed rule.
For more information, see the Sierra Club's Take Action webpage:
(The following is a guest blog post written by CGF Intern Laurel Smith. We hope to follow up on these issues in the coming months. -Brian)
For the past 14 years NASA has controlled Moffett Field and kept it within federal jurisdiction, thus subjecting all new development to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). NASA requires 7 million dollars each year to maintain the site, and rents space to agenda-fitting private businesses to carry the cash inflow. One such qualified business is Google, who is willing and able to dish out $3.7 million a year for a plot of Moffett land. Google and NASA began their relationship three years ago when the NASA Research Park was establishing new partnerships; today the two superpowers have a very strong bond as they collaborate on revolutionary projects such as Google Earth.
In June, NASA got Google’s signature on a 40-year lease that has the option of being extended up to 90 years. See NASA’s press release here. The lease grants 42.2 acres of “underdeveloped” land to the company, which will be used to build 1.2 million square feet of office space. Google already has 2 million square feet of office space in the area, and constitutes the biggest employer in Mountain View. The project will bring 4,000 new people to the city, and with that comes employee housing, fitness facilities, dining rooms, conference halls, childcare centers, and the potential for a bridge over Stevens Creek.
The project has been undertaken by William McDonough + Partners, an architecture firm known for their environmental sustainability. Construction will include 13 buildings, and will take place in 3 phases, starting in 2013, and following with stages in 2018 and 2022. All construction and permits will be overseen by NASA, who is acting as a city would if the project were taking place within municipal boundaries. NASA will be responsible for approving the design, and completing regular inspections of the project. Google will also be building parking garages, and outdoor recreation facilities and parks for all of NASA’s inhabitants to use. Further, the project will require basic amenities such as roads and a sewage system, which on their own take a heavy toll on the land and existing environment.
Primary concerns regarding this project are issues of environmental welfare, housing, transportation, and taxation. (See a great article from San Francisco Gate here.) Northern Santa Clara County currently has more jobs than available housing, and this imbalance can only tip further with the new Google campus. With 4,000 new employees in the area, speculation arises as to where everyone will live, what the new population will contribute to traffic, and what role the new roads and sewage systems will have on the fragile ecosystem. Google will be constructing and running the whole operation in what they claim to be a cutting-edge, environmentally sound way, but this may not be the most earth friendly option.
What Google seems to have overlooked is that there are millions of square feet of unoccupied and available office space within miles of the planned construction site. Just minutes past the Moffett exit along highway 237, one can’t help but notice the abundance of vacant office buildings decorated with “For Lease” and “For Sale” signs. These empty structures could easily be modified to suit the needs of Google, but instead the company has chosen to create anew. The company could spare itself the millions of dollars in Moffett rent, development costs, and mitigation efforts by purchasing the already existing space where roads, plumbing, and basic infrastructure are already in place. Such locations could then be maintained in the greenest way possible, and could be used to preserve Google’s progressive image. We might not be in a position to stop Google from pursuing the establishment of this new campus, but we can certainly put pressure on the company. Hopefully this will lead Google to mitigate more than is required by NEPA, and to thoughtfully consider a fuller realm of options in its future endeavors.
Just a quick note - we learned today that Judge Nichols ruled in our favor on a lawsuit over Los Gatos' decision approving a development that harms Los Gatos Creek. Great news!
Yesterday someone pointed out to me a problem with counting parkland purchases as mitigation for road impacts that I hadn't thought of before: the Habitat Plan treats the amount of road impacts as a fixed quantity (somewhat simplified but accurate enough for these purposes), when in fact it could be higher or lower. If the County Roads Department uses parkland to count as mitigation for road impacts rather than paying for it from the Roads budget, it has just lost any incentive it has to minimize the impacts. In other words, we'll get far more impacts than would otherwise be the case. True, those impacts will be mitigated, but that's inadequate for two reasons: first, mitigation isn't as good as avoiding impacts, and second, the mitigation has the effect of eliminating a net benefit of more endangered habitat.
Let's walk through two cost scenarios as an example, where the County Roads Department has to choose between widening a road into endangered habitat riparian zone on one side, or encroaching into a hillside on the other:
Scenario 1: Costs of widening a road into riparian zone: Construction and non-habitat costs: $1.0 million Habitat mitigation cost: $0.5 million Total: $1.5 million
Scenario 2: Costs of widening a road into a hillside: Construction and non-habitat costs: $1.1 million Habitat mitigation cost: none Total: $1.1 million
The rational choice if the Roads Department considered (meaning, "had to pay for") all costs would be Scenario 2. But if the Roads Department just gets free credit for land purchased by the Parks Department, then Scenario 2 looks more expensive to it, and it will choose Scenario 1 instead. I was fumbling toward this idea when I repeatedly told the County that it's bad policy to shift costs between departments, but this points it out really well.
So what's the likely County response? If I were them, I'd point to toothless and unenforceable provisions in the Habitat Plan that say "where economically feasible, impacts should be avoided" and claim that meant something. I expect they believe that to be true in the abstract, but when it gets down to the specifics of each budget, the real choice will always default to Scenario 1.
(More reasons here for why using Parks Charter Fund is a bad idea.) -Brian
(Below is a display we used in a so-far-unsuccessful effort to get the County Roads Department to keep its hands off of the Parks Charter fund. -Brian)
Reasons why the Roads Fund, not the Parks Charter Fund, should pay for roads impacts
1.Parks Fund meant to be a net benefit, but used as a mitigation means the environment is no better off
2.Better management principle is to reduce cross-subsidies, in this case using Parks funding to subsidize road development.
3.Using Parks funding may interfere with the future selection of parkland in order to maximize mitigation of roads impacts.
Alternative:
Parks Dept. pays for park impacts
Roads Dept. pays for road impacts
Parks can purchase recreational use on lands bought by Roads Dept.
On Tuesday, the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors decided to pilfer $14 million from the Santa Clara County Parks Charter funds to pay for non-park-related expenses. This is a dangerous precedent and goes against the will of the voters. The Parks Charter Fund was passed specifically by the voters, since 1972, to set aside funds to buy and maintain county parks and nothing else. But the supervisors (Pete McHugh, Don Gage and Ken Yeager - for; Blanca Alvarado and Liz Kniss - against) decided to use those funds to pay for obligations incurred by the county roads department to meet their mitigation obligation under the proposed county habitat plan. This is irresponsible, and the decision should be rescinded immediately.
Craige Edgerton Member, Stakeholders Group Santa Clara Valley Habitat Conservation Plan/Natural Community Conservation Plan
Yesterday I went to a Planning Commission hearing to oppose a project for 26,000 square foot covered horse arena and barn on a 14 acre property that also has 6,000 square feet of residential development on it. This seemed to me to be a terrible precedent for massive development that would be used to push permits for monster mansions.
That was the main point I brought up, although it was rejected by County staff and the commission, both swearing up and down that it's not a precedent for other development. Hopefully they'll remember that when the time comes.
The other point though was about the environmental document from 2007 that they were using. It said the total development including the residence was 26,000 feet, not the 32,000 feet now being considered. I argued they couldn't use the document if the project had been expanded.
After some confusion among staff, they said that the project hadn't been changed, it always had been 32,000 square feet, and it was just the calculation of footage in the document that was wrong. Personally, I'm not all that happy with sloppiness or consider it meaningless, especially when it's a 25% underestimate. Too bad the Planning Commission didn't care.
This happens all the time. We'll just have to keep fighting.
Palo Alto Weekly has a great article here about how a trail from Skyline to the Bay is all but constructed. The only missing part runs through Stanford. That part should have been constructed years ago - Stanford agreed to do it, but has since backed out. We'll keep working on them though.
A blow is struck by judicial activism on behalf of a misguided minority of landowners in a recent California Supreme Court decision overriding the majority of voters in a Santa Clara County Open Space Authority election (decision here). Worse still, this decision will make future funding of open space purchases by any California government agency more difficult, although not impossible. We at CGF participated in a "Friend of the Court" brief on behalf of the Open Space Authority, and are sorry things didn't go the right way.
The background is that California law since Proposition 13 has allowed a simple majority of voters to decrease tax rates but requires a two-thirds supermajority to increase "special taxes" (taxes not just meant for general public benefit purposes). A "special assessment," however, is different from a "special tax" in that it provides a special benefit to specific properties, and doesn't require a two-thirds vote. The entire legal battle is over what constitutes a "special assessment."
Proposition 218, passed in 1996, tightened the legal requirements for special assessments in ways that remained poorly defined (probably to keep voters from anticipating specific problems and voting against the measure). As the Supreme Court notes, Prop. 218 created a paradox whereby a "special district" must constitute all the parcels that receive a special benefit from the assessment, but it also says that if the benefit reaches every parcel in the district then it isn't a "special benefit" but rather a general benefit that needs a supermajority to pass.
The Supreme Court dealt with this paradox by saying that if parcels receive "direct advantages" from the benefit, like proximity to a park, then it's a special benefit even if conferred on all parcels in the district. So far, so good. But then the Court spends the remainder of the opinion ignoring what it just said. The Open Space Authority had justified the assessment by describing the direct advantages all parcels in the district will receive, such as better views and improved access to public recreation. The Court ignores this and says because these benefits reach everyone, they aren't special benefits and fall under Prop. 218 proscriptions.
So why would the Supreme Court behave so strangely? The likely reason is that Prop. 218 was itself a voter reaction to a previous Supreme Court ruling that allowed expansive uses of special districts. The Court is aware that initiative propositions are the only mechanisms that voters have to overrule it, so the Court felt obligated to overreact to the Open Space Authority's special assessment, something that resembled a standard property assessment.
Short of changing Propositions 218 or 13, this decision is the last word on this issue, and an assessment like the Open Space Authority's will require a two-thirds supermajority. However, somewhat different special assessments may still be possible. An assessment that set up a priority acquisition area and assessed more in the immediate vicinity of that area than far away from there, or assessed more when an acquisition is first made, might still be legal. This is something that will have to be tested in the future.
"To direct staff to draft correspondence to San Jose's City Council, Mayor Chuck Reed, the County's Board of Supes, and the City of Mountain View (These are the bodies that have appointed the LAFCO commissioners). Correspondence to cover that we've reviewed the recent action by the Committee for Green Foothills (CGF), and the recent decisions by the LAFCO commission and that we are similarly deeply concerned that the commission's mission to control urban sprawl and protect open space is being seriously undermined and that those who have appointed the commissioners should consider what actions they can take to ensure the Commission performs its mission in the best interests of the the citizens of Santa Clara Co. (or words to that effect)."
We hope that LAFCO and the appointing agencies start to pay attention.
Just reporting in that CGF's Farm Tour went really well on Saturday. Around 40 people attended, we went to four locations (an orchard with cherry tastings, an organic vegetable farm, a cattle ranch, and winery), had lots of great food, and heard the farmers' concerns. Jan Garrod, president of the Santa Clara County Farm Bureau, gave a very nice speech on how the farmers' best allies are the environmentalists. There was one spill on the bus that turned out to be very minor, so everything worked out fine.
We'll do an in-depth report later, but just wanted to get the word out. These events have been a lot of fun as well as extremely educational.
We've just sent in our commitment to be part of the California Rangeland Conservation Coalition, an entity that recognizes the importance of private rangeland for the environment and helps bring ranchers and environmentalists together.
