State Will Try to Block Canyon Development : Environment: Anaheim to face suit over 1,550-home project viewed as threat to cougars, Tecate cypress trees.

The California attorney general plans to file suit today against the city of Anaheim, seeking a court order to overturn approval of a 1,550-house development in Coal Canyon, a lush, rugged area that is home to mountain lions, rare cypress trees and other sensitive animals and plants.

The state rarely sues to change or halt development, but in this case, Department of Fish and Game officials said they felt strongly enough to ask the attorney general to take action. The department alleges that the city has violated the California Environmental Quality Act by ignoring virtually all its recommendations to protect the canyon’s natural resources.

The state’s main concern is that the Hon Development Co. project, named Cypress Canyon, will wipe out cougars in the expansive Chino Hills by cutting off their migration route from the Santa Ana Mountains. The Fish and Game Department also is concerned about the impact on its adjacent, newly acquired ecological preserve--which contains one of only four groves of Tecate cypress remaining in the United States--as well as other wildlife habitat.

Fish and Game officials said they want the city to force Hon Development to redo its environmental impact report and redesign the project. The City Council’s approval came in a 4-0 vote on March 3 after an emotion-packed hearing that lasted several hours.

“We want some means of ensuring the resources are protected--the mountain lions, the Tecate cypress, the Chino Hills in general--and making sure the project is done in an environmentally sound manner,” said Mike Giusti, a Fish and Game biologist. “It can be done, but the developer won’t be able to get everything he wanted.”

Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren notified the City Council in a letter that the state intended to file suit in Orange County Superior Court by its deadline, which is today.

Deputy City Manager Tom Wood said the notice arrived at City Hall late Wednesday. “Until we have had a chance to review that suit, we cannot comment,” he said.

Mayor Fred Hunter and Councilman Irv Pickler did not return phone calls Thursday.

The project would extend Anaheim’s border east to the Riverside County line, which Hon officials say is a logical extension of the city because developments already have been approved on all sides.

Michael Mohler, vice president of Hon Development, based in Laguna Hills, said he is angry about the pending suit, calling it a last-minute attempt to stop a project that has been planned for four years. He said his company had already taken a critical look at natural resources, set aside open space and agreed to make allowances such as removing fencing to give cougars new paths into the hills.

“I’m very unhappy about this (lawsuit), and I’m mystified by it,” Mohler said. “A ton of development in the area has pushed these cats our way, and we came up with a solution by agreeing to create two new crossings. Now we’re being sued.”

Fish and Game officials said it is the first time in four years that the state has sued to halt a development in Southern California using the environmental-quality law. The last case regarded a public dam on the Colorado River; the state won and the project was eventually canceled, said Bruce Eliason, the agency’s regional supervisor of environmental services.

“We’re seeking to enjoin them from continuing with the (Cypress Canyon) project as approved in March. . . . We want them to rethink the alternatives. They have not done a good enough job doing that,” Deputy Atty. Gen. Brian Hembacher said.

“No project” is the state agency’s preferred alternative, but “in lieu of that, scaling it down” could address most concerns, Hembacher said.

In addition to 1,550 homes, the 663-acre development includes an eight-acre commercial area, a school, a fire station and other public buildings.

In the past year, state Fish and Game officials have expressed increasing concern over development in Orange County, saying that city and county officials consistently ignore their recommendations to protect resources.

Of all the areas eyed for development in Orange County, the agency’s biologists say Coal Canyon concerns them the most. The river-fed canyon contains a variety of vanishing ecosystems, including oak woodlands, stream-side willows, natural grasslands and coastal sage scrub.

“We basically got no response (from the city) to our recommendations,” Giusti said. “I never read a document (environmental impact report) as arrogant as this one. They were going to do as they wanted regardless of what we recommended. The bottom line was they felt the economics justify the project.”

Local environmentalists who lobbied against the project criticized council members for accepting money from Hon Development while the project was under consideration. Hon was the largest source of campaign contributions to Anaheim City Council members during the last half of 1991, giving a total of $8,800, according to campaign disclosure reports.

Primarily, state officials want development to occur only on the western part of the property to protect the cougars’ migration route. The state agency also advised the city to require 100-foot buffers along streams and to analyze the cumulative impacts of nearby projects, including Mountain Park, an Irvine Co. development also recently approved by the city.

Last year, Hon Development and the Fish and Game Department struck a deal allowing the state to buy nearly 1,000 acres in Coal Canyon to create a preserve of Tecate cypress trees. At the time, all sides heralded it as a victory, and the state commended Hon Development for its cooperation in selling the land.

The lawsuit, however, will allege that the city is allowing the company to improperly use that property as compensation for the new project. Fish and Game officials say such mitigation is not allowed because the state bought the land for a fair value of $4 million.

“They (Hon Development officials) say the project is 57% open space, but half of that is land the (Fish and Game) department already owns,” Giusti said. “That sale had nothing to do with this development. It was a real estate transaction, but now they are claiming that it is mitigation for their development.”

But Mohler said his company agreed to sell the property at a discounted rate only because it believed that Fish and Game would not stand in the way of the adjacent development. The company, which originally intended to create 18 estate-size custom lots there, says the property was worth about $20 million.

“Last year, they acquired some of our property at a discount and agreed to back the rest of our development,” Mohler said.