WATSONVILLE -- The Coastal Commission staff has released a 209 page report recomending denial of the city's application for Local Coastal Program amendments, and suggesting modifications to those amendments they feel will make the proposed new high school consistent with the Coastal Act.
The report is the culmination of months of work by local Coastal Commission staff, and its completion sets the stage for a show down at the commission's March 14 to 17 meeting in Carmel that may determine _ once and for all _ the future of New Millenium High.
The report, made available at the commission's web site _ ceres.ca.gov/coastalcomm/ _ makes a strong case that the entire 139 +/- acre site is Environmentally Sensitive Habitat Area (ESHA) and raises the question of whether it should be developed at all. That argument is supported in the report by the California Department of Fish and Game and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service.
In an apparent juggling act that would preserve sensitive habitats and provide for the district's much needed new high school, the staff report recomends deliniating approximately half of the site _ 67 +/- acres _ as ESHA, allowing approximately 42 acres for school use and the remainder as buffer areas.
The biggest concern for the school district _ which never accounted for the extent of ESHA that the report claims is present _ is the apparent need to relocate school facilities within a specific development area that is markedly different than the one they had planned _ and considerably closer to the airport.
``We're disapointed in the report,'' said John Casey, Superintendent of the Pajaro Valley Unified School District, ``Because, they've pushed us to a part of the site that was disaproved (due to airport safety concerns) in 1987. They haven't enabled us to build a school.''
The district received an acceptable evalutaion for the site in 1992 when state airport safety inspector Daniel Gargas evaluated 11 site indicated on a map provided by the district. The Harkins Slough Rd. site, which the district had sought for a high school since 1987 was shown concentrated in an area adjacent to Harkins Slough Rd.
According to Gargas, those evaluations were based on the site submited and would require a new evaluation should the district seek to construct outside of that area.
The 1992 evaluation and the subsequent extention in 1997 have come under scrutiny in recent weeks due to questionable evaluation procedures, conflicts in airport activity estimates, the loss by the Department of Transportation of documentation supporting the evaluations and the size of the development area submitted for evaluation. That area drawn on the map was considerably smaller than the 55 acres the district had hoped to acquire.
Casey himself doubts that the high school facilities as originally proposed would fit entirely within the area previously evaluated for airport safety. But the new developoment envelope clearly puts those facilities into areas that were not evaluated.
Tami Grove, Coastal Commission Deputy Director, whose name is on the report said they have identified a building envelope that they can approve under conditions of the Coastal Act.
``It includes areas that would be safe under the present aeronautics review,'' she said. ``But it may not allow the exact design they had proposed.''
Most of the modifications made public by the report coincide with those reportedly discussed with city and school district officials in two meetings held in late February. The apparent softening of several of those requirements is a testamony to the intense negotiating that went on then.
Addressing the Coastal Act's needs to protect the coast's visual appeal, design elements were called for that would make the school blend with the existing habitat and agricultural landscape. Those requirements _ suggesting barn-like earth tone exterior finishes, roofs pitched above horizontal and large structures broken down into smaller building elements _ are still in place in the requirements, however, due to possible ``. . . costs and delays to the project . . . no design changes that would entail a new approval from the State Architect are required.''
The draft of modifications also required a finding that,``There is no feasible alternative location''. That requirement remains but due to the potential for delays associated with finding an alternative, the finding now requires only ``that there are no suitable non-agricultural sites available.''
Where the draft suggested that a bridge on Harkins Slough Rd would be required over the west branch of the Struve Slough if the road were to be widened, an environmentally superior option would be allowed, and a possible access road via Airport Blvd is suggested.
According to John Doughty, planning director for the city, ``A road would be worse.''
The Airport Blvd. extension, though mentioned in the district's EIR, was never seriously evaluated and since it would cross private property in the county, it would open up the possibility for further environmental reviews and county LCP issues, he said.
The report makes a strong case for a complete denial of the project due the certain damage to sensitive habitats and the inter-dependence of wetland and upland habitats throughout the entire slough system.
Armed with recommendations from state fish and game and federal wildlife experts and those of Dr. Robert Curry, a University of California wetland biologist, the report suggests that sensitive habitats would be better served if development were not realized there at all.
The report details how the proposed amendments conflict with Coastal Act policy. One of the report's strongest arguments involves the atempt by the city to limit the amount of ESHA recognized as being present at the site. In the proposed amendments, the city's map reduced by approximately 10 acres the area delineated as ESHA on the current commission certified map . The report however, details the presence of a considerably larger area of the Struve Slough than the city recognizes, as well as the presence of Hanson Slough and other wetlands at the west property boundary that were not accounted for.
One wrinkle that the district considered to be resolved is the Commission's identification of prime agricultural land on the site. That issue has been litigated as part of a law suit brought by environmental groups. The district recieved a judjement in their favor, but the matter is currently on appeal.
The conditional use of the land as a public school not withstanding, the modifications recomended in the report are more restrictive than those currently in effect. For a school, 42 acres could be developed with a maximum of 18 acres of impervious coverage, while non school use would limit the development area to only 12 acres.
The current LCP permits agriculture and passive recreation at the proposed site but not a public school. The amendments are required to allow the more intense development there.
Also addressed within the report is the city's need to limit growth and establish urban-rural boundaries. Utility size restrictions and a Utility Prohibition Overlay District is to be created to impede any future utility extension and make future develoment as a result of the high school less likely.
The report seeks to protect adjacent agricultural uses, requires restoration of habitat areas and calls for strict run-off control. Various legal mechanisms will also be required including zoning changes, a binding resolution, easement provisions, and right-to-farm and hold harmless guarantees.
``Particularly in light of all the physical constraints at the site, the city's submittal raised a number of complex issues,'' Grove said. ``We struggled to carefully analyze these and develop recommdations to make the high school posible, consistent with the Coastal Act.
The report also addresses the city's expressed need for a new off-ramp at Harkins Slough Rd. and requires a legally binding agreement prohibiting city annexation west of Highway 1 as one of several conditions.
Read the complete report:
Coastal Commission Web Site
See also: