Campaign Announced to Stop State Takeover of Local Government Planning Decisions.

Business Editors

Plan is Harbinger for all Coastal Communities; Fire, Agriculture

and Other Interests Decry Unconstitutional, Irresponsible Actions

The California Coastal Commission today moved to extinguish the power of local government and local citizens in coastal communities over land use and development decisions by attempting to impose a Local Coastal Plan (LCP) on a city for the first time in state history.

The Commission proposed LCP, which is riddled with typographical errors and virtually absent scientific analysis, was decried by fire safety officials, agricultural officials, advocates for children, scientists, regional planners, local elected officials and others who support local government control over land use issues, according to Californians for Local Coastal Planning.

A new grassroots group, called Californians for Local Coastal Planning (CLCP), announced that it would begin a statewide educational campaign to inform citizens and elected officials along California's 1,000-mile long coastline of the dangers incumbent in the loss of local control over planning issues. "City council members are elected to serve the people," said CLCP Chairman Barry Haldeman.

"If citizens don't like the decisions of local elected officials we can vote them out of office. The members of the Coastal Commission have a role to play in the protection of coastal resources, but they are not elected by anyone and they certainly are not accountable to local communities for their decisions. It's just wrong to take local control over planning issues away from local government and we plan to fight it in every way we can."

"This is not the Commission I voted for," said Haldeman. "When you have a state commission, located hundreds of miles away from a community making decisions for that community -- with no local knowledge or input -- you have the makings of very poor planning decisions. This proposed LCP is full of unworkable policies."

"This Plan is a direct attack on existing fire protection principles in the Santa Monica Mountains," said Don Wallace, retired Los Angeles Fire Fighters Association President. "Including coastal sage scrub and chaparral in the definition of an ESHA, combined with restrictive brush clearance policies, sets up a confluence of forces that will lead to the increased loss of homes and an increase in death and injury to both citizens and firefighters."

"We need to encourage farming and agricultural activities, not impose policies that make it harder to farm," said Kathleen Burr-Ballesteros, Managing Director of the Los Angeles County Farm Bureau. "This LCP bans planting of non-native plants, except for a very narrow area right around your home. You couldn't plant an apple orchard, or pears or avocados or even roses. But under this LCP you might be able to put up a massive high-rise hotel. These policies are just plain backward."

"Just look at what this state-imposed plan would mean for our children," said Paul Shoop, a local parent. "It calls for the elimination of baseball fields, soccer fields and family gathering spots at Bluffs Park which are used by tens of thousands of families every year. Those wise bureaucrats think we should re-grow coastal sage brush there instead. Since when did anyone decide that coastal sage brush is more important than recreation fields or families gathering spots along the coast?"

"Some Commissioners and staff members claim that our community does not want the public at our beaches," said Haldeman. "First of all we host millions of visitors every year, but more important the coast is spending thousands of tax dollars trying to open narrow alley ways, yet a half mile of pristine coastline in Malibu (Blocker Beach) has been closed to the public for 20 years. Blocker Beach is closed off with a chain link fence due to the conditions the state imposed on the county to open it. If they truly cared about public access they use their money and develop the resources they have."

John Sibert III, former chairman of the National Coastal Resource R&D Institute (NOAA), commented that what the Commission is doing has nothing to do with coastal planning. He said that of the Commission's 380-page plan, only three-fourths of one page has anything to do with coastal protection, the Commission's primary responsibility.

"Having the Coastal Commission dictate local land use and planning decisions is like having a poetry professor fix your car, without ever having seen it and from hundreds of miles away," Sibert said. "I'm not even sure most of the commissioners know what Malibu looks like, since none of the hearings has been in Malibu. What the Commission is doing has nothing to do with coastal planning. It has nothing to do with science, safety, or protection of the coast. And it certainly has nothing to do with common sense."

More information about Californians for Local Coastal Planning is available by calling 310/317-8487, or 949/222-5486.