Builder Paves Land Before Paving the Way

Developer New Urban West Inc. built an illegal temporary staging area about half the size of a football field on land planned for a regional park near the Bolsa Chica wetlands, Huntington Beach officials said Thursday.

“What they will have to do is remove the trailer, the fence, the equipment and vacate the site and restore the site to its original condition,” said Mike Strange, a senior planner with the city.

The developer built the 150-by-150-foot staging area at Palm and Seapoint avenues to serve as a field office and storage area for the completion of 53 homes nearby. The land will become part of the 106-acre Harriett M. Wieder Regional Park.

Jim Lockington, project manager with the Santa Monica-based developer, said the company received a permit for the project from the county. He referred further questions to Tom Zanic, vice president of New Urban West, who was unavailable Thursday.

However, Tim Miller, manager of the county’s Department of Harbors, Beaches and Parks, said the permit requires the developer to get necessary city permits.

Strange said New Urban West never applied to the city for the coastal development permit it needed to build the staging area.

The developer would have been turned down because the land is zoned for park, recreational, equestrian, commercial parking or public safety facilities, Strange said.

Activists say this failure to apply for a coastal development permit could have been an attempt to avoid planning restrictions. The permits are key to the state’s landmark Coastal Act that provides for public scrutiny of development on the California shoreline.

Not having the permit “circumvents the public review process and allows a project to proceed that may not be in conformity with coastal laws,” said Susan Jordan, board member of the League for Coastal Protection in Los Angeles.

“This doesn’t happen too often,” she added.

The permit process would have allowed public comment and appeals to the Huntington Beach Planning Commission and City Council and eventually to the California Coastal Commission, she said.

A member of the commission’s staff visited the site Thursday, said Steve Rynas, Orange County area supervisor for the commission’s Long Beach office.

The 22,500-square-foot site is surrounded by a chain-link fence. The grass inside has been covered with gravel. The developer paved a small section from a sidewalk to the lot’s entrance.

Residents say the lot was teeming with wildlife, including great blue herons, white egrets, chicken hawks, owls and other animals, but the developer and the county say it was filled with litter.

Shirley S. Dettloff, a member of the Huntington Beach City Council and the Coastal Commission, said the developer probably will be ordered to restore the land and could be fined.

“In the past, this is a company that has followed all the rules. They’re very familiar with all the coastal regulations,” she said. “I would think anyone who does a lot of development on the coast certainly knows what the requirements are.”