Panel OKs Scaled-Down Housing Near Bolsa Chica Wetlands

Amid accusations that officials for Orange County and a major developer had finagled a back room deal, the California Coastal Commission on Thursday endorsed a scaled-down development for the Bolsa Chica area near Huntington Beach that proponents hailed as an end to 30 years of bickering.

In an 11-0 vote with one abstention, the commission approved a plan by the Koll Real Estate Group of Newport Beach that calls for constructing 1,235 homes on Bolsa Chica Mesa and none in the fragile wetlands area--a radical departure from Koll’s earlier plans.

Plans for 900 homes on the wetlands were canceled months ago, and, as Koll officials point out, the total number of homes proposed has shrunk from nearly 6,000 in 1986 to one-fifth that number today. The matter now proceeds to the Orange County Board of Supervisors for a final vote.

In a concession to environmentalists, who represented the more outspoken half of the 86 speakers testifying at the nine-hour meeting, the commission voted to expand a proposed buffer zone around environmentally sensitive Warner Pond from 50 to 100 feet.

“Obviously, we’re very pleased that the commission approved the plan,” said Koll Senior Vice President Lucy Dunn, who noted, however, that the doubling of the buffer around the pond will require the company “to go back in the shop.”

Though not happy with the expanded buffer, Dunn said, “we’ll make sure it’s something we can live with--because our mission is closure. Let’s get those wetlands restored and start building a beautiful village, instead of being in hearings.”

Koll also may find itself in further litigation. Connie Boardman, spokeswoman for the Bolsa Chica Land Trust, which successfully challenged the company on the issues of wetlands development and the proposed filling of the pond in an earlier court ruling, reacted angrily to Thursday’s vote.

Boardman accused the developers and Coastal Commission staff of working together to ensure that the plan would be approved pro forma at Thursday’s meeting, making a sham of the public hearing process.

“It looks like members of the Koll Co., Lucy Dunn in particular, have engaged in back room dealings with state and federal agencies,” Boardman said afterward. “We’ll be talking to our attorneys.”

Dunn said further litigation would be “very sad, the wrong thing to do.”

As for Boardman’s charge that back room dealings took place, Dunn said Orange County, the Coastal Commission and Koll were fellow defendants in a lawsuit and thus empowered to work together to try to comply with a judge’s mandate.

In May, San Diego County Superior Court Judge Judith McConnell ruled that the commission erred in 1996 by approving residential development on the Bolsa Chica wetlands and by agreeing to the filling of Warner Pond.

Based on McConnell’s interpretation--which no one challenged Thursday--the California Coastal Act prohibits residential development in wetland areas, even if developers help facilitate wetland restoration, which Koll had pledged to do.

Both sides said McConnell will have to sign off on Thursday’s ruling as well.

In a controversial vote early last year, Koll had obtained commission approval to proceed with residential development on the wetlands and a surrounding mesa, despite an outpouring of protests against developing one of the state’s largest undisturbed wetlands.

Then, in February, Koll agreed to abandon any plans to build on the wetlands, which were deeded to the State Lands Commission in exchange for $25 million. The wetlands area is now slated to become a public wildlife preserve, with development restricted to the mesa.

A $91-million effort by an army of state and federal agencies is underway to preserve the wetlands. The ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, as part of an agreement with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for expansion of their facilities by building over marine habitat, have agreed to pay a combined $79 million to help finance the Bolsa Chica restoration.

But Boardman said the commission only created more problems with Thursday’s vote.

“They approved something that didn’t have the proper public input,” she said. “They’ve approved changes [by commission staff] that the public was never allowed to address. The judge never included them in her remand, and there’s no way she could have, since the staff made its changes after she remanded it. So we’re stuck in a Catch-22.”

Boardman said the Bolsa Chica Land Trust intends to file an appeal today seeking to save a 7.5-acre eucalyptus grove on the mesa, which environmentalists contend offers nesting grounds to the peregrine falcon and other endangered birds. McConnell earlier had ruled for the developer on that issue.