Why is Coastal Commission rehearing Shea project?
In October 2011, the California Coastal Commission denied Shea Homes CDP to build 111 homes on 26 acres of the Bolsa Chica wetlands located at Graham and Slater in Huntington Beach.
After the finding, the Shea Home sued the Coastal Commission for $55 million.
A settlement was reached and the same project is to be reheard.
Why?
Nothing has changed. It is still a historic wetland, and there is ponding on the site currently. The Bolsa Chica Land Trust has led the fight to save this upper wetland area from this housing development since 2000.
Why is this proposed housing project not a good fit for this area?
In order to mitigate for liquefaction and settlement hazards Shea will over-excavate 481,670 cubic yards of soil and import 260,000 cubic yards of fill.
They need to dig eight dewatering wells to depths of 55 feet and also need to use sump pumps, shallow wells to dewater this historic wetland.
The proposed houses have to be placed on pads elevated from 4-9 feet above grade.
The Land Trust believes:
This project endangers surrounding neighborhoods. Similarly, the benefits of this project have been overstated by the applicant to the community relative to the flood insurance to the surrounding houses.
The Coastal Commission hearing will be held in Huntington Beach on Wedesday, June 13 at the City Council Chambers.
For more information, call Connie Boardman at (714) 335-9943 or 714-846-1001.
Flossie Horgan,
Executive Director
Bolsa Chica Land Trust
Re: Coastal Commission
This is in response to Les Cohen’s remarkable claim that the California electorate voted in Proposition 20 to create a Coastal Commission to be an obstacle to coastal cities development. (“Letters to the Editor,” Sun Newspapers, Thursday, May 31.) Sun Assistant Editor Charles M. Kelly’s observation that the Coastal Commission was indeed an obstacle to coastal development (“State Coastal Commission is often an obstacle to development in coastal cities,” Sun Newspapers, Thursday, May 17) was correct and the Prop 20 initiative had nothing whatsoever to do about stopping coastal development.
Peter Douglas, the promoter and propagandist of Prop 20, claimed the rich were buying up the ocean front properties in California in an effort to keep Californians from any access to the ocean beaches.
He claimed an agency must be created to make sure public beaches remained open to the public.
It didn’t matter that there had been no sale of public beaches to anyone, let alone the rich, which would keep anyone from access to the beaches.
All tide lands (between the high tide and low tides) belong to the state: us and no one can be denied access to their property. (Real estate common law.)
It was strictly a scare tactic that Douglas used to pass his dream of a giant all-powerful agency that could control all the property between the ocean and the first landward thoroughfare—a hugely large, rich and powerful entity.
He was successful in creating his own powerful fiefdom that he ran as its executive director since its creation in 1972 until he retired this year.
The commission since its inception has been controlled by the most arrogant, private property-hating, distrustful, overzealous, and anti-development political hacks.
The Coastal Commission under Peter Douglas became the most detested of all state agencies. The commission has been an obstacle to any development between the ocean and the major through road that parallels the ocean.
That means the Coastal Commission dictates how many seats the Legend Restaurant can have on Second Street in Belmont Shore.
They demand the city of Seal Beach hire an environmental consultant to do a study before the city could repair their pier that the city owned before there was a Coastal Commission.
I attended dozens of Coastal Commission meeting from Eureka to San Diego. They always put a matter they didn’t like on a meeting agenda hundreds of miles from the principal’s address.
I witnessed many times Douglas, surrounded by his staff and commissioners, laughing and making jokes about the poor applicant who was given a hard time and had been denied an application for development.
I am very disappointed that anyone with an ounce of respect for our Constitution and private property rights would give any respect to such a disreputable and nasty bunch of egocentric bureaucratic land thieves as the Coastal Commission.
If you think I’m unduly harsh about the Coastal Commission, I challenge you to attend their meetings, listen to how they disrespect the rights of property owners, and hang around after the meeting and listen to how they talk about who had to appear before them and what they did to the poor slob.
And above all I am ashamed of how ignorant and immature I was as a voter in 1972.
I didn’t read the fine print of propositions or initiatives then as I do now. So like all the other uninformed voters in 1972, I voted yes on prop 20. I’ll never live it down!
Bruce Smith, Seal Beach Leisure World
President Emeritus, Los Angeles County
Business and Welfare Commission
The opinions expressed in Letters to the Editor are not necessarily those of the Sun. The Sun welcomes Letters to the Editor. Letters should be 300 words maximum. Letters should be e-mailed, signed by the author and include the author’s address and phone number (the latter two are for verification, not publication). The Sun reserves the right to accept, edit, or reject letters for any reason. Unless otherwise indicated, all letters sent to the Sun are understood to be intended for publication. E-mail letters to: dennis@sunnews.org.
