HUNTINGTON BEACH : Bolsa Chica Group Gets Off the Ground

As a blue, green and white hot-air balloon replica of Mother Earth floated high overhead, about 150 Orange County residents gathered at the Bolsa Chica State Ecological Reserve on Sunday, launching a citizens’ effort to prevent a developer from building new homes on land surrounding the wetland.

Sunday’s event marked the official founding of the Bolsa Chica Mesa Land Trust, a citizens group hoping to “acquire, preserve, restore and manage” the area “for the public, for our children, and for our children’s children,” according to President Flossie Horgan. The land trust was formed in response to the Koll Co.’s plan to build more than 4,800 homes on 413 acres of wetland and mesas that surround the state reserve.

“Open space is important,” said Horgan, 42, a Huntington Beach resident. “This is an intensely urbanized Southern California that we live in now. The time has come to rethink our community.”

At the noontime ceremony, Horgan and Juana Mueller, also of Huntington Beach, spoke of Bolsa Chica’s importance as “a unique, whole ecosystem,” and discussed strategies for blocking the development plan.

Then the crowd lined up for an aerial photograph, standing behind a 70-foot banner that read, “Save the Mesa.”

Eighty-five new members joined the land trust at Sunday’s event, which was funded by donations from individuals and local businesses. To raise money, the group will sell bumper stickers that say “Bolsa Chica Mesa: Save It, Don’t Pave It!” as well as copies of the aerial photograph taken.