Lawsuit Over Bolsa Chica Decision Is Misguided

* It is ironic that Hearthside Homes, the same developer that has been crying for “closure” on the Bolsa Chica issue for years to anyone who would listen, has chosen to prolong the permitting process by suing the Coastal Commission. (“Bolsa Chica Builder Sues Coastal Panel,” Jan. 13.)

When Hearthside acquired the property on the Bolsa Chica Mesa, it was zoned agricultural. It had every right to pursue entitlements to build, but certainly never any guarantees that these entitlements would be granted. It took a risk and ended up with a permit from the Coastal Commission to build on about 70 acres of the Bolsa Chica Mesa instead of the entire area.

I read the staff report from the Coastal Commission. It is based in science and law. I am confident that the courts will uphold the action of the Coastal Commission and Hearthside will end up with what it has now, but at great expense to the company and its stockholders.

The Bolsa Chica Land Trust and other groups in the community are willing to work with the developer to find funding to purchase the land at a fair market price to preserve the entire mesa. It’s time for Hearthside to work with the community to make this happen. Then all of us can have “closure” on the Bolsa Chica issue.

CONNIE BOARDMAN

Huntington Beach

* Hearthside Homes/Koll suing the Coastal Commission for its unanimous decision to save the Bolsa Chica lower bench from development is ludicrous. The entire 1,700 acres of Bolsa Chica should be saved as a biodiversity park for generations to come. After many years of controversy, all but 65 acres of the Bolsa Chica is now saved.

There is no taking here. The Coastal Commission’s decision saved the lower bench with the scientific evidence that the wetlands cannot survive without enough foraging for the raptors to exist. This Bolsa Chica is one ecosystem.

Quit suing and sell is my advice to Signal-Landmark.

EILEEN MURPHY

Huntington Beach

* I was surprised and disappointed to read that Hearthside Homes is suing the Coastal Commission over the commission’s decision on Bolsa Chica. The decision to let Hearthside build all of its 1,235 homes on the upper bench is well within the coastal act. I hope that no housing units are ever built on Bolsa Chica. What we need most in Orange County is some breathing room so we don’t feel like a bunch of sardines stuffed into a can. Save it, don’t pave it!

CHRIS HEGGE

Laguna Beach

* Bolsa Chica has become “The Never-Ending Story” of environmental issues. Developers continue to play the “property rights” card, as if this concept preempts all other considerations.

We’ll have more houses, but with already over-burdened infrastructures such as sewer and storm drain systems, what’s left of our few islands of original ecosystems will have vanished. We’ll soon reach a point where children have only asphalt to inspire their perceptions of nature. As for those of us who grew up in Southern California, we’ll be left with vague memories of “the way we were.”

ROGER VON BUTOW

Clean Water Now! Coalition

Laguna Beach

* Regarding the lawsuit filed by Hearthside Homes and Signal Landmark over the decision of the Coastal Commission, I would like to set the record straight and do away with the half-truths that apparently are a part of the developers’ lawsuit.

It is true that one of the deputy directors of the Department of Fish and Game claimed that housing on the Bolsa Chica Mesa would rid the mesa of raptors and would therefore protect the birds inhabiting the wetlands. However, this argument contradicted the panel of experts on the subject, one of whom is a part of the Department of Fish and Game. These experts all had been approved by Hearthside Homes. The argument also contradicted all of the science presented on the subject by the Coastal Commission biologist and many other authorities.

Actually if housing takes up much of the mesa, it will drive the hawks and other raptors to scavenge in the wetlands and so destroy those birds who nest there. No, housing on the Mesa does not help the wetlands.

NANCY DONAVEN

Huntington Beach