Makar Residential Project
October 2009 - Makar EIR Comments
The Orange County developer that owns the two agricultural parcels and 25 Naples lots on eastern Gaviota Coast has proposed two massive residential complexes on the two large (64 and 77 acres). The proposal is silent on any development of the Naples lots.
The DEIR can be viewed at http://www.sbcountyplanning.org/projects/06cdh-00038/index.cfm
The public comment period closes on November 3, 2009. Comments may be submitted to Planning and Development Department staff at abell@co.santa-barbara.ca.us.
The project is a luxury housing development on agricultural lands, and is clearly, not an agricultural house. The project is sited too close to the coastal bluff, includes offers to dedicate certain trails but does not include installation of any coastal trails or access to the beach. Development is proposed on highly visible areas adversely affecting agricultural potential and biological resources.
Specific issues for public comment include:
Inappropriate Project for the Highly Constrained Agricultural Parcels
- o The proposed high-end luxury housing compounds are simply inappropriate for the property given its agricultural zoning, highly valued rural aesthetic, unstable geology, as well as the presence of critical wildlife habitats, prime soils, cultural resources, and public access rights.
- o To avoid the Project's numerous Class 1 unavoidable environmental impacts the EIR should identify a conservation alternative that permanently protect all or a portion of the Project site, clustering or relocating proposed development to an appropriate off-site location.
Project Description Omits Adjacent Development
- o In addition to the two lots this Project proposes to develop, the Project applicant owns 25 lots that are part of the adjacent "Naples Townsite."
- o The development of at least ten homes on these 25 Naples lots was contemplated in a settlement agreement with the Coastal Commission and is reasonably foreseeable future development that must be evaluated in the EIR.
- o The annexation of the 25 Naples lots to the Goleta Water District is part of the Project Description, but the DEIR fails to analyze the impacts of developing these additional lots and providing water to them in violation of CEQA.
Public Access: Loss of Existing Public Access to Naples Beach
- o The public has used the Project site to view the ocean from various points and access the beach and Naples surf break for generations. The DEIR incorrectly claims there is a security presence that stop public use, which is not "unauthorized" but is an authorized right that has been gained by prescriptive use. The DEIR recognizes that any impairment of public's use of this established beach access will cause a Class 1 significant and unavoidable environmental impact.
- o It is unacceptable that the DEIR identifies no alternatives or even mitigation measures that would avoid the loss of this established public beach access. The presence of massive houses and residential compounds will chill public use.
- o Additional alternatives and mitigation measures must be developed which avoid this impact and keep the existing beach access available to the public.
- o The County should develop a comprehensive public access program for eastern Gaviota Coast. Collaborative workshops between County planners, the landowner, interested members of public including environmental and recreational advocates, Parks Department staff, the Coastal Commission and key resource agencies are necessary to devise a solution for this site.
Impacts to Biological Resources
- o The Project site is home to numerous endangered and special status species, and the Project will cause significant impacts to these resources including Class 1 unavoidable impacts to white-tailed kites.
- o The EIR must thoroughly study alternatives that avoid these impacts entirely, even if that requires moving the proposed development to the adjacent Naples lots or to another off-site location.
Geologic Impacts: Failure to Adequately Study and Avoid Hazards
- o Excessive Grading - the project proposes far more grading than is appropriate on this site for 2 single family homes.
- o Unstable Soils
- § The DEIR relies on engineered solutions to the Project site's unstable soils and to reduce erosion caused by runoff.
- § It is not clear that the impacts of these engineered solutions were assessed as CEQA requires.
- § Techniques referenced in the DEIR including "overexcavation, scarification, moisture conditioning and compaction" must not be allowed without a thorough impact analysis including study of potential impacts to cultural resources, comprehensive testing for hazardous materials of all potentially disturbed areas, evaluation of impacts to freshwater flows to the ocean.
- o Bluff Retreat
- § The DEIR mentions a recent draft report from the State that predicts a higher level of sea level rise which could damage or destroy the Ocean Estate with currently proposed setbacks.
- § Bluff retreat is a serious issue that needs to be thoroughly studied before development is approved on our coast and the DEIR is wrong to dismiss this report.
- § The Ocean lot should not be built upon and development should be clustered on the inland lot. Permanent conservation of the Ocean lot must be explored as a feasible alternative to the Project.
Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Inadequate Mitigation
- o The County must require mitigation to offset all project-related increases in GHG emissions, including construction, operation and transportation emissions and should require that the Project include solar panels and use all available measures to reduce energy use.
- o The County should require that the homes be made energy neutral.
Cultural Resources: More Study Required
- o A significant Chumash site may be impacted by the Project, but the DEIR does not require adequate study of the potential impacts.
- o Additional cultural resources studies are required, including studies evaluating the resources near the new location of the Coastal Estate under the environmentally superior alternative and for the mitigation required to prevent structures and utility lines from being damaged by the site's unstable soils.
Hazardous Materials: Extent of Contamination and Potential Impacts Unknown
- o The extent of the contamination and other hazards caused by the abandoned oil facility present on the site are not currently known, so the DEIR's classification of Hazardous Materials impacts as Class 2, significant but feasibly mitigated, is premature.
- o Thorough evaluation of existing contamination throughout the Project site and especially within the proposed and alternative building envelopes must occur during the environmental review process.
Visual Resources:
- o Artificial berms involve unnecessary and unacceptable disruption of the natural landscape and conflict with County visual policy. Mitigation measures must clearly prohibit artificial berms and address visual impacts through siting and design.
- o Landscaping must not be relied upon to reduce visual impacts.
- o Before finding visual impacts are capable of being avoided, the EIR needs to establish that visually preferable project alternatives will not cause significant impacts in other regards.
- o The Class I significant unavoidable visual impacts to the Gaviota Coast's nationally significant visual resources and rural character may require an off-site or drastically reduced project alternative.
Agricultural Resources:
- o The proposed luxury housing compounds are inappropriate for agriculturally zoned lands.
- o Any development must be compatible with the rural character of agricultural housing and surrounding agricultural practices.
- o The DEIR must specifically describe the potential agricultural uses that would occur within the proposed agricultural envelopes and analyze all potential impacts caused by those uses, specifically the impacts of extending reclaimed water service for irrigation.
We urge interested members of the public to submit comments and remain involved in this important Gaviota Coast project.
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April 14, 2009 - Success in Court - Annexation Blocked!!
A lawsuit filed by the Gaviota Coast Conservancy and Surfrider Foundation resulted in a April 14, 2009 decision invalidating a 2008 action by the Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO) annexing prime Gaviota Coast parcels into the Goleta Water District (GWD). Without water service, development of the lots is more challenging.
"This is a second significant ruling in two weeks for the Gaviota Coast" explained Gaviota Coast Conservancy President Mike Lunsford. "The laws and policies protecting the Gaviota Coast, mean very little if they are not followed by local decision makers. This decision restores reason and fair play in the permitting process, and puts Orange County developers on notice that this community will not stand by and allow them to play fast and loose with the Gaviota Coast."
Ms. Ellison Folk, lead attorney for the legal team, stated "This decision required analysis of a complex legal and factual setting, but reached the core issues regarding whether the developer, GWD and LAFCO could rely on the incomplete 1998 annexation for a golf course to provide water service for a completely different residential project ten years later. The Court recognized that the new residential project needed a new application for annexation and could not rely on the ten year old incomplete golf course project."
Attorney Marc Chytilo explained: "This case has a long and convoluted history." The two environmental groups first challenged an attempt by the Goleta Water District to annex the parcels in 2007, since the District didn't comply with CEQA by preparing an EIR. To avoid a losing lawsuit, GWD withdrew that project, then arranged to reactivate the 1998 golf course annexation, bypassing CEQA. But the 1998 annexation had never been finalized, as all parties had agreed at that time to merge 25 Naples antiquated lots as a required element of the project, but the merger never happened. The golf course project received full approval from the County and Coastal Commission, but then was stopped when red-legged frogs were discovered on the site. The developer sued the Coastal Commission, who entered into a tolling agreement that contemplated 10 houses on the 25 Naples lots, in addition to two other large agricultural lots with mansions. Only one of these lots had water service, so the developer had to apply to the GWD to annex the rest of the lots to get water service.
In 1998 the planned water service was to be almost exclusively reclaimed water for the golf course, and the developer paid GWD $4.5 million for the District to expand its reclaimed water facilities. When the golf course was stopped, the developer shifted and pursued the residential project that requires all potable water. The developer demanded that the GWD help them with the annexation, or else would demand return of the $4.5 million, even though the money had been spent for infrastructure to deliver reclaimed water for the golf course. In 2008, GWD convinced LAFCO to use the 1998 incomplete annexation as a means to get water for residential development.
Chytilo continued: "Surfrider and the Gaviota Coast Conservancy fought these efforts through a series of lawsuits, and today prevailed. The judge ruled that there had been no annexation, and a new application would have to be filed for Makar's residential development. LAFCO's decision to bend the rules to enable residential developments on prime agricultural soils conflicted with LAFCO's own policies promoting agricultural land preservation and only encouraging residential development within the urban limit line. This ruling upholds the spirit of LAFCO's agricultural lands preservation and urban growth policies." Makar has a development application pending before Santa Barbara County to develop two massive, luxury residential compounds. They also own 25 antiquated "Naples" lots totaling 57 acres that are zoned agricultural. These lots are similar to the lots owned by another Orange County developer, Matt Osgood and known formally as Santa Barbara Ranch (Naples). But now they have no water and face growing community hostility to oversized mansions on the Gaviota Coast's prime agricultural lands. With new board members on the Goleta Water District Board of Directors, at LAFCO and at the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors, the Makar residential project faces an uncertain future.
December 29, 2008 - Developers Rejected!
Petitioners Gaviota Coast Conservancy and Surfrider Foundation prevailed at a hearing in Santa Barbara County Superior Court on December 23. The developer (Irvine-based Makar Properties), Goleta Water District and LAFCO tried to have half of the case dismissed, arguing they did not understand the CEQA claim. Fortunately, the Judge did, and wrote a well-reasoned decision rejecting the effort to have the case partially dismissed.
See the Independent's story on the case by clicking here.
October 3, 2008 - Lawsuit Filed!!
The Gaviota Coast Conservancy and Santa Barbara Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation have filed a lawsuit on October 3, 2008 challenging LAFCO's decision to record the 1998 annexation of Makar's lands, including 25 antiquated Naples lots, into the Goleta Water District. The lawsuit seeks to overturn the annexation.
In the mean time, the County Planning Department is progressing on an EIR for the Makar residential project, involving two massive houses proposed on prime agricultural lands next to highway 101.
Download Comments to EIR Scoping document from the Law Office of Marc Chytilo on behalf of the Gaviota Coast Conservancy. (Download PDF document).
For more information about this project, visit the County of Santa Barbara Planning and Development website project page.
