Golf Course Would Make His Day

If Clint Eastwood gets his way at this Tuesday’s county board meeting--and there is no reason to think he won’t--one of the more pristine mountains overlooking this seaside tourist village will be topped with an 18-hole golf course, fitness and equestrian center and a scattering of million-dollar-plus houses, Eastwood’s among them.

Canada Woods would be the Monterey Peninsula’s 19th golf course, and it would overlook all others. Those poor duffers hacking away at Pebble Beach, Spyglass and Cypress Point never shanked a drive in such rare native grasses or contemplated such a view, clear up the coast to Santa Cruz.

All 18 holes would be more or less the private reserve of Eastwood and his friends. “There’s not another course like it in the world,” said Alan Williams, the project’s developer. “I certainly haven’t played as many places as Clint, but it’s very unique. He’s very excited about it.”

Critics say that Monterey County planners and elected officials, awed by Eastwood’s immense celebrity and wealth, have failed to raise a number of troubling questions about the project’s impacts on water supplies and rare vegetation and wildlife.

And state officials concede that Eastwood’s permit to take water from the overworked Carmel River was awarded in record time after the actor--and former mayor of Carmel--showed up in Sacramento, shook hands with water board executives and staff and signed autographs for starry-eyed secretaries.

“From Day One, this guy’s gotten special treatment,” said one state Water Quality Control Board official. “We were told to work on his permit first and foremost. It’s a real stinker.”

The project’s biggest booster is longtime Monterey County Supervisor Sam Karas, a friend of Eastwood and a fellow jazz buff who played Thirsty Thurston in the Academy Award-winning movie “Unforgiven.” Eastwood gave him nine lines and he remembers them all.

On Tuesday, at a special hearing of the Board of Supervisors called to consider Eastwood’s plan, he will cast a vote for his friend.

“I have no reason to excuse myself from the vote,” said the 74-year-old Karas, a big, plain-spoken former wholesale meat dealer. “This is one of the most beautiful areas in the peninsula and I’m willing to entrust it to Mr. Eastwood. He’s a gentleman and a man of his word.”

The hearing was called only to deal with Eastwood’s application for the golf course and 34 houses on a ridge above the Carmel Valley, about five miles inland from Carmel. Had the board waited until its next scheduled meeting--after the first of the year--Karas would be retired. But opponents admit that with or without Karas, Eastwood has the votes.

“We’ve got one of the most important environmental issues facing this county and it’s been flying on a fast track without any questions,” said David Dilworth, a local computer software publisher who opposes the project on environmental grounds. “What’s the rush?”

This precious little village by the sea got in the way of its most famous resident once before, and it got smoked. The year was 1985 and Eastwood wanted to build a large modern retail and office complex in the middle of the quaint downtown. The local burghers were not amused. They made Eastwood swallow a toned-down version of his complex, a decision for which he would make them pay dearly. He ran for mayor in a big-time, big-money campaign such as the town had never seen, swept out the incumbent majority on the City Council, fired the entire planning commission and more or less eased the way for those desiring a more builder-friendly Carmel.

Television crews from Japan, England, Ireland and Australia came to document Mayor Clint. Buses dropped off tourists clutching Instamatics in front of City Hall. The 50-seat council chamber was hardly big enough, so they began holding meetings at the Carmel Women’s Club.

Bob Campbell, himself a transplant from Hollywood who wrote “Man With a Thousand Faces” starring James Cagney and moved to Carmel in the 1970s to pen mystery novels, said Eastwood played a great mayor.

“Clint’s got his glasses halfway down his nose and he’s pounding the gavel and asking what the next agenda item is, and you could see these tourists looking at each other and asking, ‘Is this all there is?’ I found a reporter from the Dublin News walking along the beach one day and I asked her why all the fuss. She said, ‘I’m not sure, but it’s a helluva vacation.’ ”

Before Eastwood put down his mayor’s gavel in 1988, a funny thing happened. His policies spawned an unusually committed opposition who swore that they would never again take preservation for granted. They joined forces with fishermen and environmentalists and others concerned about rampant development and diversions from the Carmel River.

In the past year alone, they have used the initiative process to defeat a gated subdivision and hotel project and an attempt to dam the river a third time. One of their biggest victories was a state ruling that the local water company had illegally planted wells along the Carmel River and nearly killed off the steelhead run.

The mountain that Eastwood has chosen for his vision rises out of the Carmel Valley near a small turn in the river. It is the same oak and Monterey pine-studded grassland--laced by lichen and topped by the red-veined and yellow Carmel stone--that Spanish explorers wrote home about in the 1600s.

Williams, Eastwood’s developer, has counted golden eagles, peacocks, turkeys, boars and bobcats among the wildlife. Who better than Eastwood to preserve more than 80% of this canyon, he said. After all, it was the actor who saved the historic Mission Ranch and donated large swaths of land for open space.

A decade ago, the prior owner of Canada Woods won approval for several hundred home sites. Eastwood decided on a more temperate approach of 88 homes scattered over the 2,000 acres. “What the critics won’t tell you is that this is a preservation effort,” Williams said.

As for the river, the project will have no net effect, he says. It will divert riparian water used on nearby row crops and combine it with recycled water. Environmentalists say they have heard such assurances before, only to watch a subdivision go dry and sink a tap into the river.

“Should the Carmel River be further stressed for another golf course and subdivision?” asked Gillian Taylor of the local Sierra Club. “It doesn’t make sense.”

Those who have watched Eastwood exercise his considerable charm and been at the receiving end of his legendary glare say it’s hard to underestimate his clout. He has been a confidant and golfing partner of governors and former presidents.

Before Eastwood got state approval to move river water to his canyon in March, he called on a powerful friend, Marc Del Piero. A former Monterey County supervisor, Del Piero is one of the five members of the state water board appointed by Gov. Pete Wilson.

At a meeting in the board’s executive conference room, according to several participants, Del Piero introduced staffers who would be working on the application to Eastwood. “It was ‘Come meet the movie star,’ ” recalled one staffer. “It’s the first time I’ve ever seen that happen and the message was clear: ‘Give this guy what he wants.’ ”

Neither Del Piero nor Eastwood would comment on the meeting. Steve Herrera, chief of environmental review, said he was told to “fast track” Eastwood’s application, and he estimates that the actor saved two years.

“The process was breached,” Herrera said. “I kept learning about what the next step was from Eastwood’s attorney.”

Herrera’s boss, Ed Anton, chief of the division of water rights, said the staff acted properly. “People may perceive that we gave Mr. Eastwood special favors but we treated him like anyone else,” he said. “Obviously he’s got a name and an apparent friendship with Del Piero.”

Eastwood expects to break ground early next year. Residents expect that he will spare no expense to build a showcase. Some wonder why an American icon--who has earned more than $500 million over the span of his 40-year career, collected the highest acting awards and even had his best line stolen by a president--would even play the California development game.

“That to me is one of the great questions,” said novelist Campbell. “No one here can quite figure it out.”