HMB mayor, attorney say Coastal Commission staff is lying to legislature

In a press release introducing a new "truthsquad" web page,  Half Moon Bay Mayor Bonnie McClung and the city’s attorney Lanny Davis say that the Coastal Commission staff is lying to the legislature:

"The Commission staff has every right to oppose this legislation based on the facts, but the City cannot allow these false statements to go unchallenged," Mayor McClung said. "Once it became clear that the staff was misrepresenting its own history with the Beachwood property in an attempt to stop legislation that is vital to our City’s future, I knew we had to set the record straight."
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"Because the Commission staff continues to consistently and repeatedly make misleading statements, despite multiple corrections by the City, I can only conclude the staff is intentionally misleading and spreading knowingly false statements to members of the Legislature," said Lanny Davis, an attorney for Half Moon Bay and partner at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe. "When the legislators discover the truth, they will resent being misled by the Coastal Commission, a public commission that has already lost credibility on this issue."

Emphasis added. Click to read the full press release.

Half Moon Bay Mayor Unveils Truth Squad To Rebut False and Misleading Statements by Opponents of Special Rescue Legislation

Mayor Launches Effort with Letter to California Legislators in Response to Ongoing Misinformation Campaign by California Coastal Commission Staff

HALF MOON BAY, Calif.—(BUSINESS WIRE)—Half Moon Bay Mayor Bonnie McClung announced today that the City would launch a truth squad campaign to respond to false or misleading statements made by opponents of AB 1991. A special City web page, www.half-moon-bay.ca.us/truthsquad, will track false or misleading claims made by opponents of AB 1991 and provide the facts to rebut them.

Mayor McClung initiated the truth-squad page in response to a flyer distributed by California Coastal Commission staff members that contained numerous inaccuracies. "The Commission staff has every right to oppose this legislation based on the facts, but the City cannot allow these false statements to go unchallenged," Mayor McClung said. "Once it became clear that the staff was misrepresenting its own history with the Beachwood property in an attempt to stop legislation that is vital to our City’s future, I knew we had to set the record straight."

The Mayor was referring to a document sent to members of the California Legislature by Coastal Commission staff claiming that the man-made wetlands on the majority of Beachwood were "disturbed but naturally occurring wetlands that had always been there" and that the City "ignore[ed] wetlands that they failed to delineate because they used the wrong standard" when they approved a subdivision plan for Beachwood in 1990. This claim is contradicted by two prior Commission actions: 1) in 1983, the Commission approved a Coastal Development Permit allowing the City to undertake grading and drainage improvements on Beachwood without identifying any wetland resources on the property, despite the fact that the report contained a specific discussion of wetland resources; 2) in 1991, just one year after the City approved the subdivision plan for Beachwood without finding any wetlands on the property, a finding criticized today by the Commission staff, the Commission itself approved a permit to place 32,000 cubic feet of dirt onto Beachwood.

Under California law, this approval would have been illegal if wetlands had existed on the property at the time. Additionally, the Yamagiwa v. City of Half Moon Bay federal court opinion in November 2007 found that "the evidence is overwhelming that there were no wetlands on Beachwood outside its southeast corner," prior to the grading and drainage improvements approved by the Commission in 1983.

"Because the Commission staff continues to consistently and repeatedly make misleading statements, despite multiple corrections by the City, I can only conclude the staff is intentionally misleading and spreading knowingly false statements to members of the Legislature," said Lanny Davis, an attorney for Half Moon Bay and partner at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe. "When the legislators discover the truth, they will resent being misled by the Coastal Commission, a public commission that has already lost credibility on this issue."