Eucalyptus near Coral Reef Ave in El Granada will be cut back to reduce the risk of wildfire beginning Monday, May 11. According to San Mateo County Resource Conservation District press release:

Limbs will be removed from eucalyptus trees up to approximately 12 feet.  Trees up to 6 inches in diameter will be removed using chain saws and chipped on site.  Vegetative debris that has accumulated on the ground and could potentially ignite will be piled in safe locations and burned under appropriate weather conditions by Cal Fire crews.  ...  This demonstration project is the first step toward the goal of creating a defensible space within 100 feet of all the homes in this neighborhood.

CalFire identified this area as a priority for fuel reduction because of the forest type and structure, adjacency to homes, and current use patterns by the public.  They recommended this site as an excellent demonstration opportunity because of its safe accessibility and visibility to the surrounding community.

As a demonstration, the project will also test fuel reduction methods. A meeting to discuss the findings will be held when it is complete. The project website, with details, schedule, a site map, and contact info is at http://www.sanmateorcd.org/coralreef.html

The project is a partnership of CalFire, the Cabrillo Unified School District (CUSD), Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST), and the San Mateo County Resource Conservation District (RCD).

If you like your noise long and loud, this has been a great week to live on Cedar Street, Montara.  In addition to the usual power mowers, leaf blowers, unmuffled cars, motorcycles and overflights from HMB Airport that punctuate the silence continuously around here, we’ve been treated to 5 straight hours of power-washer - a neighbor decided they needed to revive a fence.  Plus, we’ve had tree trimmers in the neighborhood for 6 of the last 7 days with the loudest wood chipper I’ve ever heard.  How loud?  This Saturday afternoon, yes, Saturday at 4:30PM, I tried sitting in my living room, all windows closed, using -33db earplugs AND Bose noise reduction headphones, and I could STILL hear the wood chipper!  These guys not only chipped branches - they chipped the entire tree.  Unbelievable noise level.  They drove me out of my house every day this week - I have become very familiar with the "Strand" in Moss Beach.

Do we as the public have any recourse to this cacaphony?  Are there any regulations?

I’m really suspicious as to whether any of these were done with permits.  They are close enough that I should have received notice.  Never happened.

As it is, any realtor claiming Montara is a quiet, peaceful community should be hauled in for false advertising.

Stephen Lowens

Join Coastside Land Trust for a showing of "FLOW: For Love of Water" (90 min), an award-winning documentary investigation into what experts label the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st century: The World Water Crisis.
 

• Official Selection, 2008 Sundance Film Festival
• International Jury Prize, 2008 Mumbai International Film Festival
• Best Documentary, 2008 Vail International Film Festival
• Winner, Best Documentary United Nations Association Film Festival

Thursday, May 7 at 7 pm
Ted Adcock Community Center
535 Kelly Ave, Half Moon Bay

The film will be followed by a panel discussion of coastal water concerns by:
 

• Moderator: Kellyx Nelson, Executive Director, San Mateo County Resource Conservation District 
• Tim Ramirez, Manager of the Natural Resources and Lands Management Division, Water Enterprise for San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, which owns the upper Pilarcitos watershed and which is responsible directly or indirectly for management of many Coastsiders? water sources.
• David Dickson, General Manager of Coastside County Water District (CCWD)
• Gary Warhaftig, President of the Montara/Moss Beach Water Improvement Association. Gary laid the groundwork and worked diligently for deprivatization of Montara’s water. Citizens Utilities purchased water rights in 38 states, and at the time Montara won back the right to their own water, Citizens said that Montara was the only community to do so.

 
This event is free and refreshments will be served.

UPDATE: I-Bank loans can be up to $10 million and for thirty years, at 2/3 of the rate for A-rated municipal bonds. Details after the jump.

AB 650, the bill designed to help the city of Half Moon Bay pay its Beachwood settlement, has been rewritten to be a loan from the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank (aka I-Bank) instead of a grant from park bond funds. The bill now also includes a requirement that the city obtain an independent appraisal of the Beachwood property.

The bill’s sponsor, Assemblyman Jerry Hill, told Coastsider that the structure of the bailout was still "fluid" and that it could ultimately include a cash component as part of the $10 million, and that the term or interest rate of the loan had not been determined.  He said that the bill was restructured as part of the process of getting it out of the Assembly Local Government committee.  However, he declined to characterize the current version of the bill as a placeholder.

According to Assemblyman Hill’s office, the bill was restructured because parks supporters were unhappy with a bill that would short-circuit the established process for awarding parks bond money.

The California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank was created in 1994 "to promote economic revitalization, enable future development, and encourage a healthy climate for jobs in California". It generally makes loans to local governments to finance the construction of infrastructure.

While Half Moon Bay would still be responsible to the state for the $10 million if it were a loan, the city it would no longer have to issue a bond in an uncertain market to pay off the cost of its $18 million settlement.  The city has said that issuing a bond would cost the city about $1.5 million/year.

CORRECTION: In an earlier version of this article, the net revenue for 2008 was shown as positive, rather than negative, due to an editing error.

The opponents of Sharp Park’s golf course constructed a pair of arguments that lead inevitably to their desired conclusion, that this is the right time to restore the original wetlands habitat in order to save the nearby endangered species. The first premise is economic:

"Sharp Park’s deficit is substantial. Sharp Park has lost between $30,000 and $300,000 a year for the past four fiscal years from the golf fund alone. San Francisco’s other golf courses suffer for it, because they must subsidize Sharp Park’s losses, robbing other courses of needed maintenance. But that isn’t all it costs San Francisco to operate Sharp Park: Sharp Park also draws down the capital fund, the open space fund, and the natural areas program fund."

But what if the claim about all the money being lost is false? Does that make a difference to the validity of Plater and SF Supervisor Mirkarimi’s argument against the golf course?

According to the San Francisco Controller’s 2009 report for the last 4 years showing the net result after subtracting Sharp Park’s expenses and overhead from revenue:

The Controller also states that revenues from earned interest, citywide membership fees and non-specific concessions are not allocated to individual courses but to the overall golf fund. For the years shown above the cumulative revenue to that fund was $1,467,755

If we were to allocate just 11% of that number (based on percentage of total golf revenue) to Sharp Park’s results we would increase its cumulative by $161,453 to a new total of $836,731

San Francisco’s Sharp Park golf course operation does not have a financial viability problem. Rather, it has a financial management problem that a small fee increase would help.

Plater’s other premise, that the golf course is bad for the environment and the endangered species may or may not be true, but we can see that he does not want to find out. Supervisor Mirkarimi’s legislative end-run around the Environmental Impact Review process so he can place the golf course in the care of GGNRA doesn’t portend a fair hearing for the existence of the golf course once out of San Francisco and Pacifica’s control.

Why not? In answer let us note that Brent Plater is a prominent volunteer at GGNRA and retains substantial connections there. No need to wonder why he sees Mirkarimi’s legislation as the golden opportunity it is.

Ken King
Half Moon Bay

NOTE: Some folks have been wondering why the beacon at the Pigeon Point Lighthouse has been out recently. We received the following answer from a docent at the lighthouse.

Pigeon Point is still an active aid to navigation but has been operating in backup mode since October 2008. It has been dark during the daytime because the aerobeacon that the Coast Guard has used since 1972 failed. There is a smaller fixed backup light of much reduced intensity that flashes one time every ten seconds, but only when it is dark. You have to be on the ocean side to see the light - it’s not like the rotating aerobeacon that you can normally see up and down the coast for quite a distance (the aerobeacon is rated at 24 miles visibility in the Coast Guard’s Light List).

However, about a week ago, the backup light also stopped lighting! Since I haven’t been at the point at night since the last annual Fresnel Lens lighting in November 2008, I called the hostel to confirm that the backup is lighting and learned that it too has been down for about a week. People from the hostel are going to call to notify the Coast Guard.

The Coast Guard is replacing the aerobeacon with a new one - in fact, both Point Arena and Pigeon Point are slated for replacement beacons because both failed in last year. We (the docents for State Parks) are not sure about when the replacement will take place, but we know it will.

If you look up at the tower from the ocean side, you can see the backup light beneath the now-still aerobeacon. And inside the lantern room, behind the curtains, our original first order Fresnel Lens is still there and we are still able to light that lens, but only on special occasions.

We look forward to seeing Pigeon Point back at full power.

Rob Johnson
Pigeon Point Light Station Docent

who : the people of princeton and artists of the half moon bay area and beyond

what : a neighborhood art walk with indoor/outdoor performance and installations

when : saturday, may 2nd, 6:30pm-10pm with dancing until midnight (and hopefully every two months hereafter)

where : the homes, garages, warehouses, offices, alleyways, streets and boats of princeton-by-the-sea

why : to create and cultivate a diverse artistic community

The journey begins at 6:30pm at 117 Harvard Avenue in the zócalo with an opening ceremony followed by three hours of live music, art installations, video projections, street theater, belly dance, tea service, performance painting, poetry and fire dancing.

The celebration continues with an afterparty featuring global rhythms and drumming. come as an artist, musician, participant or member of the audience and celebrate the peculiarities of princeton-by-the-sea !  donations of canned goods for Coastside Hope and new or used shoes for the Casa de Migrantes in Tijuana, Mexico are encouraged.

Our intention

We hope to create a community event that reflects the unique and peculiar neighborhood that is Princeton, open to all who live, work and wander its streets.  the art walk promotes collaboration between artists, performers, and locals forging new relationships and unique partnerships that will encourage mutual understanding and growth. 

Participants are encouraged to present their art, skill, or space in a non-traditional way, creating a transformative experience that is interactive and extraordinary, one that is temporary in construction but long-lasting in affect, and only able to experienced on the day of the event.  residents, workers, and Coastsiders from all walks of life are invited to join in helping to shape the evolution of the project with the idea that beauty and stength comes with a diversity of people and ideas.

The event is non-commercial in spirit, free and open to the general public with the possibility of viewers purchasing artwork or food/drink by donation, but only as a secondary aspect at any of the venues.

Email: [email protected]

planning group : http://groups.google.com/group/ramblas

facebook event listing : http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=66948714003

Opening day for the 2009 season of the Coastside Farmer’s Market is this Saturday, May 2, in Half Moon Bay.  

The Market’s focus on featuring the broad diversity of coastside produce will be apparent as several new, first generation Coastside growers will join long-time Coastside favorites like Harley Farms, Giusti Farms, Daylight, Tunitas Creek Ranch, Ladybug Farms, Greek Oaks Creek, Coastside Flower Farms & Swanton Berry Farm.  

Among the local delights, expect Napa cherries, organic cheeses and farmstead butter from Sonoma, fresh organic olives, beautiful Coastside spring greens, and rare, globe-type artichokes.  This week: blueberries, raspberries  are not far behind! Pastured local eggs, new crop honey and more will be arriving as the season gets rolling and the weather warms up.

Market Favorites The Zoo Human Project is the season opener for a great bill of local and touring musicians this season.  

The Market opens at 9 AM, runs to 1PM every Saturday at Shoreline Station, located on the northeast side of the intersection of Highway One and Kelly Avenue in Half Moon Bay.

Shortly after performing CPR on a coach who collapsed, Half Moon Bay resident and school nurse Eileen Bowden herself collapsed, reports the Mercury News.

She was dead that evening before the ambulance arrived at Valley Medical Center.

It’s hard for people to fathom the tragic twist of events.

"I’m trying to make sense of it all," said Santa Clara police officer Jake Malae, who also was there to perform CPR on Rahbar. "Here she was, trying to save a life, and then she lost hers. I’m sad for her family, but I’m glad her actions were able to save John."

Rahbar, 41, is recovering at Kaiser-Santa Clara hospital from his mysterious collapse about 4:45 p.m. on the track by the softball field, family and friends said.

The cause of her death was unknown Wednesday.