By a unanimous vote, the Planning Commission of the City of Half Moon Bay on February 8 approved permits for the construction of the Coastside Adult Community Center, a joint project of Senior Coastsiders and the Coastside Adult Day Health Center.
 
The center will house current and expanded services that the two Half Moon Bay organizations will offer to the area’s growing population of seniors and disabled adults. The 23,000-square-foot building will be located on 1.4 acres of now vacant land at the corner of Main Street and Arnold Way in Half Moon Bay, adjacent to the Lesley Gardens senior residence. 

Beach Blvd in Pacifica, which is three blocks closer to the ocean than it was a century ago, continues to be battered by waves that seem to be getting closer all the time. Julia Scott has a disquieting article in the County Times about the imperative to build on the coast:

The length of Beach Boulevard is fortified by concrete sea walls bolstered by heavy rocks that line the beach, but recent events have proved once again how vulnerable the system is when faced with the ceaseless, heavy, pounding tides. Last week, city workers finished filling a 30-foot-wide sinkhole that developed under the sidewalk of Beach Boulevard when the sea wall was breached, giving the ocean access to layers of sand and soil behind it.

Residents of Beach Boulevard now make a habit of leaving their garage doors partially open so the pressure of the water washing into their driveways doesn’t break them open.

The Pacifica Planning Commission has approved a nine-unit condominium building with underground parking on Beach Blvd. The developer is adding to the existing sea wall and installing pumps in the garage.

There are some contradictory quotes from Pacifica’s director of public works. He says of a dozen homes on unstable dunes the city has had to buy: "That whole area should be a sand dune. The decision to develop it was made in 1906." But of developments 2007, he says,  "I don’t think you should restrict building. You just have to provide means to address these things. You can raise your foundation up or put your driveway on a side street. You design around it."

More than 100 supporters of Coastside Gourmet Coffee come to the Half Moon Bay City Council meeting Tuesday night to speak on behalf of the embattled coffee shop that may be evicted to make way for a Peet’s Coffee.  To keep things manageable, six people, including shop owner Raman Bechar, spoke on behalf of the shop. The primary theme was the importance of the shop to its patrons and the fear that local businesses will continue to be replaced by chain outlets.

Landlord Maher Shami made a surprise appearance at the meeting. Shami said that he can’t make his mortgage payments without more rent, but that he has discontinued his negotiations with Peet’s and has given Behar until Feb 15 to make an offer to pay a higher rent and upgrade the shop.

The County Times has a good account of the meeting by Julia Scott.

We will post the remainder of the city council meeting later.

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The next meeting of the California Coastal Commission, Feb 14 to 16 in San Diego [agenda], will be webcast live and gavel-to-gavel at http://www.cal-span.org

The public will also be able to download and view past meetings, which will be archived on the website. All meeting coverage will be gavel to gavel each day, but an advanced indexing system will allow viewers to go directly to items of interest, skip to the final vote or view the staff report.

The commission will hear an appeal of a permit to construct desalination test wells on San Simeon State Beach, a permit for a volleyball tournament in Hermosa Beach, an appeal of a cell phone tower on Trinidad Head in Humboldt County, numerous seawall applications and an annual permit review for off road vehicles use at Oceano Dunes, and dozens of other items.

There is an archive of selected meetings on the site as well.

Click to read the press release.

Senior Coastsiders  will be presenting the plan for their new building, the Coastside Adult Community Center, to the Half Moon Bay Planning Commission on Thursday, February 8 at 7pm.  Senior Coastsiders will provide transportation to the meeting, which will take place at the Community/Senior Center located at 535 Kelly Avenue, Half Moon Bay, Call 726.9056 for a transportation reservation.

In this first installment of his new video column,  Neil Merrilees: Right Here In the Middle, Neil explains how neither side of the development divide is addressing our community’s planning crisis. It is available in two video formats: A small Flash format version for older computers or slower connections, and a larger version in Quicktime format for newer computers and faster connections. | Quicktime | Flash |

Since our last post about the sale of property on Cabrillo Highway to Coastside County Water District (CCWD) director Ken Coverdell, a couple of additional details have emerged about the value of the property, how it was sold, and the review process.

According to the purchase agreement [pdf] betwen the city and Coverdell, the property was last sold in 1982 at a price of $100,500. The current price, negotiated between Half Moon Bay and Coverdell, is $180,000. During the HMB Planning Commission meeting of last week two members cited nearby, similar-sized properties advertised to the public in the range $275,000 to $350,000. Coverdell is quoted in the County Times as saying that he was unable to sell his adjacent parcel for $150,000 because the land is zoned for visitor-serving commercial development, not residential. Ken Coverdell is the owner of the Half Moon Day landscaping firm Blue Sky Design.

The deal between the City and Coverdell was negotiated by the prior City Council in June of 2005 in a closed session. It was to expire on July 13, 2006, but was extended by the current city council. This property was the subject of another closed-door session on December 20, 2005 attended by then-Mayor Marina Fraser, current Mayor Naomi Patridge, David Gorn (since replaced by John Muller), Jim Grady, and Bonnie McClung. According to minutes of that meeting the price and terms of payment for the property are still under negotiation [pdf].

The Planning Commission’s efforts to look into the circumstances of the sale may be in vain. The resolution passed by a 4-3 vote last Thursday failed to include a deadline for city staff. Without an explicit deadline the resolution, and city staff’s obligation to respond to the questions of the Planning Commission, expires after forty days.

Coastsider had the only camera at the commission meeting, which is one of the most dramatic local board meetings we have seen in some time.

Full meeting (1 hour) | Quicktime | Flash |

Highlights (about 10 min) | Quicktime | Flash |

As is well known, the City of Half Moon Bay suffers a severe deficiency of parks and playing fields for our youth and adults. Why, then, would our City Council adopt a stance that works against the Boy’s and Girl’s Club? Let me explain.

According to the local paper, the majority on the current council proposes to reinterpret the Pacific Ridge Settlement Agreement to eliminate the highway widening/traffic signal at Terrace Avenue—which would also extend the westside frontage road to connect with that intersection.  That extension would have provided signalized access to westside residents, farmers, the Sewer Plant, the projected Boys and Girls Club, and the projected parksite.  If this reinterpretation is pulled off then the decades old struggle, supposedly supported by some members of this current city council, to have the Boy’s and Girl’s Club and playing fields located near the sewer plant is either just about to become a dead issue, or someone is planning to stick the taxpayers with the bill.

Why? Because the 1997 Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) for the Boy’s and Girl’s Club and playing fields, at this location, stated that it could not be approved without a Highway 1 signalized intersection to handle the increased traffic. There was other deficiencies in the DEIR that might have been resolved but not the lack of a traffic light.

The question of the lack of a signalized intersection for the Boy’s and Girl’s Club was almost about to be eliminated because access to Highway 1 would be accomplished with the Terrace Avenue widening/signalization/extension.

I’m very concerned that this kind of isolated decision making, this reactive no recognition of consequences, is, sadly, the order of the day.

John Lynch
Frenchman’s Creek

Who knew? I looked at the January 11th Planning Commission (PC) Agenda prior to the meeting. There were two items on it; both had staff recommendations for postponement to a future PC meeting. It should have been a 15 minute meeting (Pledge of Allegiance, couple of light hearted jokes, attention to each item, and adjournment), leaving everyone time for a beer after the meeting before going home. I decided not to go. Little did I know.

Although I don’t condone the berating of our Planning Director by two of our PC Commissioners, where instead Robert’s Rules of Order, decorum in debate, should have prevailed, they exposed more than a few very important points. I commented on these at the January 25th PC meeting. I’d like to share those concerns with a broader audience.

First, the Planning Director works for the City Manager, who serves at the pleasure of the City Council. He does not work for the PC. He is there as a resource, and to help guide the PC; that’s it, period! In addition, the Chair of the PC is charged with maintaining order at the meetings; he did not. Our Planning Director did nothing knowingly wrong and civility and respect is a required component at all public meetings.
 
I was present at the City Council meeting a year ago when the Administrative CDP process was discussed. The purpose was clear to everyone. It was intended as a means of reducing the PC workload. That might include replacing a sidewalk in one’s front yard, or perhaps replacing a balcony, or building a dog house in one’s back yard. I don’t recall a $22 Million project, in the center of town, being part of the deal. I think it’s fair to say that the Administrative CDP process needs clarification and hopefully will get that attention shortly, as a result of this action. That’s a good thing.

The sale of land by the city of Half Moon Bay to an elected water district director has set off a controversy in the city’s planning commission.

In April 2005, in a closed session, the City Council agreed to sell a lot on Highway 1, just north of the former Ono Grill [Google map], to Ken Coverdell, the owner of an adjacent lot. Coverdell is a director the County Coastside Water District (CCWD). Coverdell plans to merge the two lots in order to build an undisclosed visitor-serving project. The sale came before the planning commission because the city still hasn’t completed the sale, which it must do before Coverdell can apply for a permit.

Planning Commissioner Kevin Lansing has raised concerns that the selling price of $180,000 was significantly less than the property is worth.  Citing advertisements for similar property in the most recent Half Moon Bay Review, some commissioners suggested that value was closer to $275,000 to $300,000. Lansing was also concerned that the city agreed to pay half the closing costs for the sale when the usual practice is for the buyer to pay.

Several questions were raised at the meeting that remain to be answered. City staff contend that the planning commission has no right to question a sale that was decided by the city council and that because the decision was made in a closed session, the city doesn’t have to reveal how it came to a price.

In one dramatic moment, after a motion was seconded and just before the mattter came to a vote, city staff produced a letter from the city attorney that it offered to share with the commission during a recess on as privileged basis.

The plannning commission voted to continue the item, with direction to staff to bring back evidence to show whether the City had received fair value for the property and whether the land had been offered in a way that would allow other members of the public a chance to make an offer. The motion passed 4 to 3. Voting yes: Kevin Lansing, Jack McCarthy, Linda Poncini, Doug Snow. Voting No: Thomas Roman, Patric Johnsson, Jeff Allis

This is not a simple partisan squabble of the type that the Coastside is used to.  The deal was made by the previous city council majority (council members Mike Ferreira, Jim Grady, Marina Fraser, and David Gorn were in the closed meeting) to Coverdell, a CCWD director and political ally of the current city council majority.  Lansing was nominated to the planning commission by David Gorn.