Montara resident April Vargas was named Democratic Volunteer of the Year from Region 4 during the State Democratic Party Convention held in Sacramento from April 24-26. Region 4 includes San Mateo and San Francisco Counties. Vargas is a local business owner,  community organizer and former elected official who currently serves as Controller of the San Mateo County Democratic Central Committee. She was Congressional District 12 Coordinator of Obama for America during the primary and general elections and was an elected Obama delegate to the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver.

"We congratulate April as the recipient of this award and and thank her for her exceptional service to our local Democratic Party," said San Mateo County Democratic Party Chair David Burruto.  "Her outstanding leadership, effective community organizing skills and dedication to the values of the Democratic Party make her a role model for Democratic activists everywhere. We are fortunate that she calls San Mateo County home."

In his April 27 opinion piece on Coastsider, Ken King makes several false statements about Sharp Park, the restoration proposal for the land, and the bill introduced by Supervisor Mirkarimi to kick-start that proposal.

Every environmentalist has demanded that scientific studies be conducted before any decision about Sharp Park’s future is made, including decisions about Sharp Park’s illicitly built and crumbling sea wall.  The Mirkarimi bill expressly requires, based on the best scientific evidence available, that a restoration study be conducted along with alternatives that retain or redesign the golf course.  The bill will force these studies to be integrated into the EIR process referenced by Mr. King, but it will modify that process to ensure that restoration alternatives are considered along with existing alternatives that keep things largely as they are.  Mr. King has steadfastly opposed restoration studies, because for political and personal reasons he doesn’t want the status quo to change.

But the status quo cannot be maintained.  The golf course loses too much money, it causes too much harm to the environment, and it exposes the surrounding community to flooding risks that will be exacerbated by climate change.  In the face of these liabilities, subsidizing golf in San Mateo County for as little as $12 a round while San Francisco makes drastic cuts to basic city services simply cannot continue.

Mr. King proposes a simplistic solution: raise prices.  But if Sharp Park raises prices, fewer golfers will play there and the course’s deficit will increase.  The Bay Area already supplies 6 million more rounds of golf than golfers demand, driving golf prices downward precisely when Mr. King claims we should raise them.  Moreover, the National Golf Foundation found that golfers at Sharp Park have very little loyalty to the course and play there primarily because it is cheap. Because of this, San Francisco’s Budget Analyst concluded that Sharp Park cannot reduce its deficit by simply raising prices: golfers will just take their game elsewhere.  

This story was originally posted as a comment on the story about the Sharp Park Golf Course restoration debate

The financial excuse that San Francisco loses money and has to carry Sharp Park is disingenuous by intention and deliberately misleading. San Francisco Supervisor Mirkarimi, the legislation’s sponsor, has himself said he doubts the accuracy of the figures cited by proponents and thinks that whatever gap there may be is mere "chump change". Given Sharp Park has the lowest greens’ fees among San Francisco’s golf courses, or even in the surrounding area, a modest hike disposes of that argument. But why do that when it serves as an excuse for those intent on accomplishing their own estimable goals? 

Goal one of the Center for Biological Diversity and affiliated groups is to restore the area to its original pristine condition for all of the stated purposes outlined by Mr. Plater. Definitely laudable. But take a moment and consider his description of how the entire area was massively filled in, and then later buffered by the addition of an enormous seawall - a 20-foot high berm stretching along the entire width of the golf course at least a half-mile long. To "restore" the area would involve removing hundreds, maybe thousands of semi trucks full of fill, this in an area containing endangered species. Who, we might wonder, would be the permitting authority for this activity? 

There’s more. Laguna Salada, the fresh water lagoon snaking around the edge of the golf course receives the runoff from the entire golf course when it’s watered or raining. The berm between the lagoon and ocean keeps it all from draining, allowing only excess overflow to reach the ocean. This freshwater environment provides breeding habitat for the Red legged frog that in turn provides a food source for the San Francisco garter snake. The restoration folks want the berm breached in order to take us back to the pre-1930s when the lagoon was a brackish, read that as saline, estuary. With global warming raising sea levels three feet by the end of the century, if not faster, there go the frogs and the snakes that rely on them. 

Something seems strangely amiss here with the bio fans pushing so hard in face of the problems and contradictions inherent in this enterprise. Maybe restoration would be a net benefit to the species of concern regardless, but how could we determine that beforehand? The answer of course is to do an Environmental Impact Report that studies all of the possible alternatives, including doing nothing at all, then make the best decision. It so happens that San Francisco’s Planning Department is preparing to do just that, but this process would take one or two years to conduct, and our biological friends are in too much of a hurry and too wowed by their own Big Idea to want to hear anything scientific that might contradict their own romantic and well-intentioned project. There’s momentum now, so keep on pushing and worry about the details after they accomplish their mission. 

Mr. Plater is an environmental lawyer and college professor with an enviable record suing entities on behalf of threatened species. Supervisor Mirkarimi is looking for a way out of continued nuisance lawsuits from people like Mr. Plater, so one can hardly fault him for trying to remove San Francisco from potential legal liability for Federal violations. However, it’s plain to see that neither side is so much concerned about the species in question as with getting what they want. None of this ought to be considered without condoning and paying for a thorough and complete EIR that will shed light on whether restoration in any form at all will benefit the animals and improve the overall environment or not. 

We know one thing, and that is the frogs and snakes coexisted at Sharp Park for the last seventy+ years. We also know that critter protection improved substantially in recent years as the golf course was enjoined to change its practices. Ending the golf course or substantially altering it as restorationists propose may be a great idea, or it could prove hellish for the animals - remember what they say about the road to hell? The point is that we don’t know, and neither do they. 

The problem in a nutshell is that there’s no science underlying any of this, only out there as an eventual goal, the science education center, etc. Should these folks succeed in pulling this off without an EIR, I hope that there will still be something left to study there one day

We’ve set up a wiki page to summarize news and background information about the Big Wave development. Any Coastsider user who can post without pre-moderation can create or edit information on our wiki, and you’re invited to help us keep the page complete and up to date.

The San Mateo County League for Coastside Protection greatly appreciates and thanks Senator Leland Yee and Assemblymember Jerry Hill for their efforts (AB/SB 650) on behalf of Half Moon Bay’s residents in trying to craft a solution to the city’s financial problems due to its ill-considered Beachwood settlement agreement. Besides expressing appreciation, we would like to offer a few ideas we think would help move their bill beyond the mounting opposition from various individuals and groups.
 
The most obvious problem stems from our legislators’ good intention in trying to obtain $10 million for the city with as few strings attached as possible. This could only occur absent an appraisal of the land’s worth, a nonstarter with the park and environmental folks: they object that this presents a potential abuse of Proposition 84 park bond funds, and we agree that this is problematic. However, there is another way to go that should garner less opposition from this quarter, and that is by reverting back to the funding source for Senator Yee’s previous bill, SB 863, which relied on Proposition 1C housing/park funds.
 
SB 863 foundered last year because of opposition from housing advocates who objected to the funds going solely to park development. They might well have become allies if housing, particularly lower-cost housing, was proposed on some of the property. Currently the city is updating its housing element and like much of the San Francisco Bay area, seeks to improve the potential for affordable housing. In 2001, the California Coastal Commission approved a Coastal Development Permit for houses on the southwestern portion of Beachwood where there are no wetlands. The city has an opportunity to close ranks and solve several problems at once.
 
We support limited building in non-resource areas on the Beachwood property as a way to accommodate an objective appraisal process – it is not conscionable that the property be acquired for more than it is worth, and its worth should be fairly determined by an independent agency, such as SB 863 anticipated in designating the Coastal Conservancy, the state agency that specializes in coastal property acquisition and administration. Finally, we believe that SB 863 correctly anticipated the city’s financial needs regarding park acquisition and development.

Respectfully submitted,

Dana Kimsey
Co-Chair, SMC League for Coastside Protection

Supervisor Rich Gordon will be keeping his monthly Coastside office hours Wednesday, April 22 from 10am until noon at the Sheriff’s Substation in Moss Beach.

The website of the Pillar Ridge manufactured home community has set up an informational website about the proposed Big Wave office complex.  Pillar Ridge is the closest neighborhood to the Big Wave site.

The Midcoast Community Council is holding a Coastal Trails meeting, Wednesday, May 13.

The MCC is particularly interested in connecting various existing Coastside trails, trails in development and future trails to form one interconnecting trail system. 

Trails provide demonstrated benefits to individuals and communities, health and fitness, active transportation, economic development and environmental stewardship.

Trails:

• Increase transportation options and reduce auto travel.
• Offer opportunities to observe, learn about and care for the environment.
• Offer economic benefits such as increased tourism and increased property values.
• Provide opportunities for solitude, passive and active recreation, including promoting fitness through healthy exercise.

The goal of the meeting is to inform and update the Coastside community about trail progress, trail funding, trail mapping, provide resources for community involvement and to discuss the current and future Coastside Trail System.  Guests speakers include County Parks Director Dave Holland, GGNRA, POST and others.  

Seton Coastside, 600 Marine Blvd, Moss Beach

Sabrina Brennan

This question for Mary will become even more pertinent if a bill proposed by Rep. Rosa DeLauro, CT (R) makes it through congress. It may only be a coincidence that DeLauro’s husband, pollster Stanley Greenberg, happened to have Monsanto as his client 10 years ago, but the wording in some sections of the bill just smells like a fermenting nightmare.

The bill? H.R. 875.

Sec 3 (14) FOOD PRODUCTION FACILITY- The term ‘food production facility’ means any farm, ranch, orchard, vineyard, aquaculture facility, or confined animal-feeding operation.

Relative to the above section, a “small business concern”, as mentioned in Sec. 201 (c)(12), is defined according to the Small Business Act, Sec. 3(a), as having gross receipts over $750,000. Many smaller farms (particularly a farm “grossing” only $750K, would fall under the umbrella of having to conform to the restrictions and guidelines contained in this bill that only a large commercial agricultural concern could easily adopt.

Sec 101 (b)(5)(C) development of consistent and science-based standards for safe food (emphasis added)

Who decides what standards are science-based? If the benchmark is set by Monsanto’s GMO and pesticide standards, nothing short of eliminating organic and biodynamic farming will be acceptable.

Half Moon Bay needs a miracle if it’s going to avoid a crushing debt of $18 million to pay off its Beachwood settlement. The city needs to convince two-thirds of the state legislature to give it $10 million in parks bond money, in a year when our legislators really should be paying attention to more important matters.  The good news is that the city has the support of its state senator and its assemblyman.

The bad news is that the city does not have the support of the property rights zealots who play an outsize role in Coastside politics—particularly with the current city council majority.

At Tuesday’s Half Moon Bay City Council meeting, Senator Leland Yee and Assemblyman Jerry Hill demonstrated they understood the significance of AB- and SB-650 by showing up for a Half Moon Bay City Council meeting and speaking on its behalf. This is something only one citizen bothered to do.

However, one wanna-be city council member and a cluster of property rightists rose to condemn the plan, armed with only two talking points:

• If the city were to change its definition of wetlands, it could "build the homes we need".
• Houses produce tax revenues, and parks do not.

There is no evidence that the city can solve its problems by redefining the meaning of "wetlands". The city attorney has said that if it were possible, they would have done it last April, instead of settling for $18 million. Does anyone believe that if it were possible, this city council majority would not have done it?

Moreover, no serious person believes that houses produce more revenue than costs for any city.

Anybody who cares about the future of Half Moon Bay and the Coastside as a community recognizes that any workable solution to this problem is going to involve bringing the community together and sharing the pain. And it’s reasonable for citizens to wait until they know more about the details and implications of AB/SB 650 before deciding whether to support it.

But in their irrational, reflexive opposition to a flawed but honest compromise to save the city from a crushing debt, the Coastside’s defenders of property rights have shown us their single-mindedness.  They would rather see the city crushed than see a wetland go undeveloped.