HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes 02/27/2001P ,, L U City of Petaluma, California
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Q, Petaluma, CA 94952
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DRAFT Planning Commissi ®n Minutes
February 27, 2001 - 7 :00 PM
Commissioners: Present: Barrett, Broad *, Glass, Monteschio, O'Brien, Vieler, Vouri
* Chair
Staff. Mike Moore, Community Development Director
Jan Tolbert, Administrative Secretary
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
PUBLIC COMMENT: Susan Zanotti - 1420 Sarkesian; Representing Eastside Neighborhood
Alliance — thanks for listening to concerns regarding Salvation Army — requested more time (past
March 27 meeting).
DIRECTOR'S REPORT: Work Program for completion of EIR and General Plan; reminder —
workshops with Tom Jacobsen
COMMISSIONER'S REPORT: Commissioner Vieler — (to Mike Moore) — What about other
issues in Specific Plan area regarding Basin Street? How can this be accomplished/agendized for
action? Mike Moore — Listed on March 5 "' City Council Agenda (listed more generally -
discussing with City Attorney); not specific to Basin Street application at this time.
Commissioner Vieler — City Council specifically agreed how this was to be agendized/discussed.
CORRESPONDENCE: None.
APPEAL STATEMENT: Was read.
LEGAL RECOURSE STATEMENT: Was read.
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29 NEW BUSINESS
30 PUBLIC HEARINGS
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32 I. CBD Project Area Amendment EIR: Plamzing commission review of the second
33 amendment to the Redevelopment Plan for the Central Business District
34 Redevelopment Project and review and comment on the redevelopment plan
35 amendment Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR).
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II. Lafferty Ranch Park. Proposed General Plan text and Land Use map amendments
and related Final Environmental Impact Report (FEIR) relating to the future use of
the Lafferty Ranch site as a public park per the goals, objectives, policies and actions
recommended in the Lafferty Ranch Draft Management Plan.
(The following are verbatim Minutes supplied by the Lafferty Park Project Manager's Office.)
Pamela Tuft Gave presentation of the project.
I would like to introduce Leonard Charles, of Leonard Charles and Associates and he'll
summarize the Final.
Leonard Charles Thank you. Good evening. On the Draft EIR we received 40 letters from
35 different individuals, 8 of which were public agencies; the other 27 were individuals or groups.
As you see, there is all lot of comments there. There is actually probably another 500 pages of
stuff that was turned in that is on file that was reports and stuff that were already public record so
they are not included in there. There's about 2,000 pages of material that were submitted.
Probably the primary thing that changed in there, you'll notice, is that since the time the Draft
EIR was put out, Sudden Oak Death Syndrome was found on Lafferty Ranch. We had one of the
State's experts go out and map the presence of Sudden Oak Death Syndrome in there and its in
your map there and Master Response. One, it is widespread. There were some comments that
Lafferty shouldn't be open to public use because there is some indications that foot traffic might
spread Sudden Oak Death Syndrome and, in fact, that's not the case and, in particular, since it is
already on this site, it will spread to whatever trees that are susceptible, whether there are humans
there or not, since there is wildlife running all over the site.
The second issue that was brought up about this Sudden Oak Death Syndrome, is that perhaps it
caused a more significant fire hazard and was looked at in the Draft EIR. Again, we had two
experts who are both on the Sudden Oak Death Syndrome State Task Force look at that, including
our Fire Ecologist and that effect is not that significant, though we have amended one of the
mitigation measures. One of the aspects of the Draft Management Plan to call for some additional
prescribed burning at the woodland edge and /or mechanical treatment, if prescribed burning is
going to happen in the near future and I won't go into the whole discussion, unless you ask me a
specific question, but basically, the end result of that was is that it wouldn't substantially increase
the fire hazard on the site and that there are methods of dealing with it. And in any case, the
impact of increased fire risk on the site has already been identified as a significant impact in the
Draft Environmental Impact Report, although I would note that it's still not expected, even if a
fire does start on Lafferty Ranch and escapes the property, they would become a major fire.
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1 There were also a number of comments about virtually every other issue on the Draft EIR by
2 some people who thought that the impact hadn't been addressed adequately, to make it as
3 significant as the commenter might of thought and those have all been responded to. On the other
4 hand', though there were people who thought that it overemphasized the impact, and again, those
5 have all been responded to. So basically, the Final EIR does have some additional, revised and
6 amended mitigations in the front. I believe there is 13, most of which are fairly minor. The
7 conclusions of the Final EIR are the same as they as they were in the Draft. That there are three
8 significant impacts: increased fire risk, impacts from grazing on Steelhead and Yellow - Legged
9 Frogs and traffic safety impact on Sonoma Mountain Road. And the conclusions remain the same,
10 as does the environmentally superior alternative, which is the reduced use if it's not a no project
11 alternative.
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13 So with that I should have questions right now open to public hearing.
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15 Chairman Broad Any Commission questions for Mr. Charles at this point in time?
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17 Pamela A Tuft We ask for the record anyone testifying on this to clearly state their name
18 and address for the record. If you wouldn't mind so that we can keep accurate information to
19 forward onto the Council. Thank you.
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21 Chairman Broad Thank you. I will go ahead and open up the public hearing and anyone
22 wishing to speak on this item, please come forward. State your name and address clearly, please.
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24 PUBLIC HEARING OPEN
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26 Les Perry /703 2nd Street Santa Rosa CA 94952 Good evening Mr. Chairman, members of
27 the Commission, I am the attorney for the Sonoma Mountain Conservancy. The Conservancy is a
28 group of landowners and residents in the area of Sonoma Mountain. It is an organization that has
29 been dedicated to the preservation of rural and agricultural quality of the Sonoma Mountain area.
30 It is obviously not news that this organization has been involved with the Lafferty Ranch project
31 for a long time from the beginning and we will continue to be so.
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33 There is not enough time, I think allotted in this evening, to discuss all of the critical
34 environmental issues that have been raised in this matter. Hope that they have all been addressed
35 by us in the comments to the Draft Environmental Impact Report. Hope that you have had an
36 opportunity to appreciate some of those issues that have been raised. Some of which, actually,
37 have been resolved as a result of the discussion in the environmental review. There are, however,
38 two that my clients asked me to address specifically tonight that are of critical importance to
39 them; one you have already heard about to some extent.
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41 That first issue is the discovery of Sudden Oak Death Syndrome on the Lafferty property after
42 publication of circulation of the Draft Envirorinental Impact Report. It is our position that, that
43 presents significant new information, raises issues of mitigation measures that are required - -all of
44 which lead to the need to recirculate an environmental document, at least on that issue, at least a
45 (could not understand) environmental review on that document on that issue. There is, in fact, a
46 body of evidence contrary to what is found in the Final Environmental Impact Report in the
47 Master Response. There is a body of credible evidence, some of which is cited here that the death
48 rate from Sudden Oak Death Syndrome far exceeds the 5% or 10% mentioned in the Final EIR --
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as much as 80 %. There is again substantial evidence in the record that this virus is spread by
hikers. It has been found most prevalent in areas that are most heavily accessed by the public.
There is substantial evidence again cited by us in comments that we made to both of those issues,
all of which require the airing of that issue in a formal environmental document, which this has
not. The EIR chooses to ignore this issue. It does so at the peril of Lafferty Ranch. It certainly
does so at the peril of the adequacy of the environmental review.
The other critical issue that we have monitored from the beginning that requires a frank and open
discussion here, as other places, is that of road safety. The manner in which road safety has been
handled is inadequate from the perspective of adequate environmental review, and perhaps more
importantly, it is inadequate from a public policy perspective. By further introduction, I fear that
anything I say or my group says is going to be viewed with skepticism or simply dismissed, and
as tempting as that might be, it would be a mistake to treat this issue in that manner as it relates to
road safety. It is an issue that has been with this project from the very beginning and I would like
to, in order to emphasize that and emphasize the objectivity of this, take you back to 1992 when
the issue of Lafferty Ranch was first raised. Your own City staff, when asked to look at the
prospects of having Lafferty Ranch as a public assess facility, wrote a staff report steering the
City away from that conclusion and one of the main basis for doing that, and I quote is, "access to
Lafferty Ranch is via Sonoma Mountain Road, the road is narrow with blind sections of roadway
and extremely steep grades, due to the severe elevation change." At the same time, way back in
1992, the County Public Works Department stead on the same issue, and again this is a time
before this became a political hot button when opinions could be readily dismissed, based upon
political affiliation. The County Public Works Department said for safety and monetary reasons
the Sonoma County Public Works Department is concerned about this proposal which will
encourage increased vehicular traffic. The County Public Works Department does not
recommend the opening of this parcel of land to public access, unless the impact on or to the
roadway is remediated by bringing it up to current standards, with .grade drainage facilities and
alignment.
Now the point is that they're just as attractive as this project may be. There are just some places
where a project is inappropriate. At least inappropriate without undertaking the necessary and
recommended infrastructure improvements. It's like most things in life. There are lots of things
out there that I would like to have but can't afford, but I don't have the right or the ability to just
go out and take it when I can't pay for it and that's the path this project is proceeding down now.
Wanting something, having it clear that there is a cost to that and not being prepared to pay that
cost. That is the infrastructure improvements. Again, these are not cited objective opinions that
date way back on this issue and it's real on the road. There is a reality here that generates these
concerns. They are not make weight arguments. When the original Draft EIR came out talking
about road safety, my clients were convinced that the number of accidents and the severity of
accidents were being dramatically underreported. So they took it upon themselves to monitor for
approximately a year and take pictures to the extent they.could of accidents that were occurring
on the Sonoma Mountain Road and we submitted the results of that over a thirteen -month period.
They are in the Final EIR and I believe that there are something like 17 accidents over a thirteen-
month period. That is an extraordinary number of accidents on a very short stretch of road. Many
of those pictures reveal very, very serious life threatening accidents. That evidence is dismissed in
the Final EIR as saying well if it is underreported here, it is probably underreported on all roads;
therefore, it is all equal. It is nothing of the sort. What is demonstrates is you are, and we are,
faced with a truly special, unique situation on Sonoma Mountain Road. There are no other roads
like it anywhere in the County and there are reasons for all this. There is a combination of grade,
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I inadequate site distances, narrow widths, no shoulders and very, very restricted site distances that
2 all converge to make this a truly unique and extraordinarily dangerous situation. And it is more
3 so, I think, because of the deceptive nature of the road. I am sure most of you have been up there.
4 I have been up there many times. It's deceptive how steep it is. It is deceptive how short the cite
5 distances are and that explains, I believe, we believe, why you see so many accidents and why its
6 not fair to simply dismiss that by saying well there are other roads in County that don't meet "
7 ASHTO Standards "; therefore, we don't have to fuss with Sonoma Mountain Road. That, I
8 submit, is an unfair and short-sided public policy perspective. It is, I believe, inappropriate to
9 approve a public project in the face of that kind of evidence without making the necessary repairs
10 and certainly inappropriate, to make a statement of overriding consideration when you are facing
11 this kind of very real, dangerous situation. I submit that the decision the City is faced with is the
12 same decision the City of Santa Rosa, in the Santa Rosa School District made a couple of years
13 ago when they approved and opened Elsie Allen High School in the face of much of the same
14 evidence that you have in front of you -- unsafe roads without spending the money necessary to
15 accommodate that issue and the young man was killed as a result. These are very real issues. To
16 say there simply going to be dealt with later is not sound public policy. Fortunately, I believe
17 lessons are learned. Just in the paper, a couple of days ago, there is an article about Piner - Olivet
18 School District in Santa Rosa where they were unable to open until somebody stepped up and
19 came up with the money to create walkways around there school and they were committed not to
20 open until that money was found, either by the School District or by the City.
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22 That brings me finally to two specific points on the inadequacy of the environmental review as it
23 relates to this issue and that is that it is incorrect legally to attempt to advocate responsibility for
24 this road by suggesting, as the EIR does, that as a County road and is the County responsibility
25 we don't know what the County would want; therefore, we can't address the mitigation. This is
26 simply not true. There is a specific government code section that grants to this City the right to
27 control, maintain, improve and condemn, frankly, land between boundaries and parks that wants
28 to have outside jurisdiction. That is the statute upon which the City will rely to get access to the
29 property across Dr. Bettman property and Mr. Pfendler's property. That same statute that allows
30 the City to do that, gives the City clear authority to undertake these mitigations measures so it is
31 not adequate to say it is in somebody else's jurisdiction, and, in fact, is in your jurisdiction,
32 should you choose to open up a park.
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34 The second technical flaw in the environmental review, as it relates to this issue, is this notion
35 that because allegedly we can't afford, it's infeasible to - mitigate this impact down to a level of
36 insignificance. We can't do all of that - -it is just too expensive so we're not going to do any of it
37 and that is the posture that it is in. Where there is the EIR as presented, as saying because we
38 can't do it all, were not going to do any of it. We are ready to open up this park without a firm
39 commitment to adopt feasible mitigation measures. This is certainly not possible. All the road
40 improvements are infeasible, but that is the posture this is in and I submit to you that I've never
41 seen any jurisdiction attempt to make that kind of an end run around CEQA's obligations- -
42 CEQA's instruction to you that all feasible mitigation measures have to be adopted before you
43 can approve a project and I submit to you that, that does not pass legal muster. So based upon
44 that, I respectfully request that you not certify the EIR as presented, and you certainly not
45 recommend approval of the project without specifically addressing, especially the road safety
46 issues. I appreciate the opportunity to meet you all face -to -face and comment on these issues.
47 Thank you.
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49 Chairman Broad Thank you Mr. Perry. Anyone else wishing to speak on this item?
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Larry Modell /1705 Brompton Street, Petaluma, CA 94954: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, I
am a strong supporter of this park. I have been for many years. It is long overdue and I think it
will provide a great benefit to all the people in this town and in this valley for many years to
come.
The specific comment that I had tonight is not on the EIR but on the General Plan Amendment
that's proposed and specifically, it appears that a new category of parks is being created to hold
this Lafferty Park because nothing else apparently fits currently and this new category is to be
called Habitat Preserve. My question is why choose a name which to many people might suggest
a lower level of public access than is being proposed for Lafferty. It seems like that opens up
another area of vulnerability unnecessarily and I would suggest an alternative category name- -
something like Open Space Park. That's the name that they used in the County's Draft Outdoor
Recreation Plan for parks that are similar to Lafferty that are minimally developed, allow full
public access but very little development otherwise, just trails and trailhead facilities. So, what
I'm asking for, I suppose, is if we could get some clarification from staff as is there some
compelling reason to call this Habitat Preserve and, if not, perhaps it could be changed to
something like Open Space Park. Thank you.
Chairman Broad Thank you Mr. Modell. Anyone else wishing to speak on this item? Mr.
Hagen.
Bruce Hagen /145 Grevillia Drive, Petaluma, CA 94952: Good evening Commissioners, I am
currently Chairman of the Recreation, Music and Parks Commission, which last Wednesday
adopted a Resolution supporting the efforts of a local group to proceed and raise funds for this
park and also recommends to the City Council approve the EIR and the project. I think a copy of
that is in the record. I don't have copies to pass out tonight. What I have here is my draft, but
wanted to call attention to that. The group unanimously supports this park and the support of the
EIR the first time it came around. Supports it even more the second time and wants to see us go
ahead with that.
I wanted to also draw your attention here to some photographs that I was fortunate enough to be
able to take a couple of days ago and I think maybe (could not understand) has enough pictures of
them and I will pass them up to you. Those pictures were taken during the six inches of snow that
we had up there about a week ago. I do agree with Larry, the Open Space Park is a better
designation. This is probably the fourth time I've had to bring this up at the Park and Rec.
Commission. meetings and Lafferty Access Committee that Habitat Preserve speaks of something
that is privately owned, that is off limits to general public availability and doesn't fit with the
City's plan for this park.
I also wanted to talk a little about the context of this because I think that, first of all, I wanted to
thank Pamela and Leonard and his organization again for the fine job and all the work they have
done on this. Here are the first two volumes here. Not to long ago I was on Lafferty with Fran
Brigmann, who is the General Manager of the Marin Open Space District. You probably heard
this before, Robert has brought it up a couple of times, and she confirmed it with me that Marin
has probably 10 to 20 times the acreage that Petaluma or that Sonoma County has, certainly the
acreage of this project. All of that has been set into public access without an EIR of any kind- -
quite a bit of it. I have an article that's part of the record here that talks about variety of.
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endangered species, narrow roads. All the issues that have been raised by the Conservancy were
in effect down there. They are insignificant issues by any measure. Probably don't have to tell
you, but I want to say it again for the record because it is starting to really bother me, that the
level of scrutiny the City is having to put into this, is part of a strategy to kill a project flat out and
simple. You've heard it before, it needs to be said, it needs to be understood. When we develop
this kind of EIR and it is accepted by all the three major agencies; Parks and Rec., Planning
Commission and City Council and we get comments on that EIR that generate another couple of
inches of stuff. I have to tell you that when I first got involved with this back in 1995, 1 looked at
the first brief that was sent by a law firm called Pedit (sp) and Martin hired by somebody on
Sonoma Mountain. It was about 16 pages long and I looked at it and I thought, oh my gosh, it is
really a mistake to have a park on Lafferty with all these problems and it was kind of scary and it
set me back and as I read these things and studied it more and dug into it, I found out that most of
these were bogus and, in fact, if they weren't bogus, they were a matter of degree, like the road- -
how dangerous is the road? Well, it's very dangerous - -keep off the mountain. But that's what
they've been doing all along is trying to inundate the City to scare the people away. You read this
stuff and you think this place is truly is different than all these places in Marin, in the East Bay, in
Santa Clara County where they have developed parks and open space like this, have opened them
up year round to the public without registration, without supervision. But you look at this stuff,
and you look at the attorneys that come in here and talk to us, and you think, by God, they must
have something on the ball - -look at all the stuff they produced. Well its just a lot of paper to get
in the way of what the people need and what the people want and what we aught to be doing here.
I want to quote a couple examples and I hope you bear with me here because this is probably the
last chance that I am going to get to do this. A fellow named Granger Hunt, I believe, he's been a
wildlife advisor biologist hired by Mr. Pfendler and perhaps the Conservancy and claiming that
there is sensitive eagle habitat on Lafferty. The illusion was made in the beginning that there are
actually eagle nests on Lafferty - -you can't take tours up there. We found out, subsequently, there
were no eagle nests. The eagles could someday build nests there. People can co- occupy the land
with eagles but he writes in this latest comment, page 116 of this volume "why not consider
preserving Lafferty Ranch as a wildlife sanctuary, rather than a thoroughfare of human foot
traffic." So, to this person and perhaps a lot of others, Lafferty Ranch does not represent the
opportunities to go up and walk in the snow or be with nature. It's simply a thoroughfare of
human foot traffic and if that's the assessment that they make of this, it is no wonder they don't
think there should be a statement of overriding public benefit for a thoroughfare of human foot
traffic. That's not the experience that I, nor anybody else, who's been up has had.
Another comment and ..let's see. I had these marked and it slipped out. Here we go. John's name
and one of the neighbors up there. By the way, I should tell you this story to, that the.. you
wonder what is it that the Sonoma Mountain Conservancy wants? Well there is a lot of people
who signed on the Sonoma Mountain Conservancy and they want to be safe, they want all the
things that we have provided for in this EIR and the many mitigations that are in there - -the water
tank, rerouting the trails so that they don't come close to the neighbor's property, all the efforts
that we've made to mend fences literally and figuratively are in the plan. There is a few people,
they want something different, and what it is, is this - -I was at the County Outdoor Recreation
Plan hearings in Santa Rosa about two years ago and had the opportunity to talk with John
Saemann and Al Bettman, Dr. Bettman, out in front of facility and said you know we're going to
bring law abiding people up in there just like Oak Hill Park, if you followed that issue. You get
people who are good with their dogs, they look out, they clean up and they help enforce the rules,
they help keep people law abiding. We're going to be bringing these people up there and were
going to be watching out for law breakers and litterers and fire starters and all that - -why wouldn't
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you want that? And he said well I agree with that, they told me, that's just fine, what we want is,
we want a gate at the bottom of Sonoma Mountain Road and we want to have limited access to
the people who live there and people who have permission from the people who live there. So, I
think its got to be really clear that what they are looking for is not preservation of the wildlife up
there and non of these other things, it's to put a gate at the bottom and have a private estate. Now
that's fine, I think, that is something a lot of people would like. I don't think they deserve it. I
don't think they we should give up on this long effort to give them that, but that indeed is there
goal.
Another thing to draw into question all this stuff, and I think Leonard Charles and the staff have
done a really great job of addressing these criticisms, point, by point, by point. It's a bewildering
read to have to go through all of this stuff, but you can see that it is all a lot of smoke. If they
were that concerned about these issues, why for instance, would one of the neighbors build an
eight -foot high cyclone fence around the entire border? When I was up there, with Ms. Brigmann,
she pointed out this would be considered a hazard to wildlife. If the concern was about wildlife,
why was that fence built? If the concern was about eagles, when I was up there recently, and in
fact, got a letter from the Sonoma Mountain Conservancy threatening to take action against the
City because we were causing a risk to the fragile eco- structure of Lafferty. One of the risks was
that we would be disturbing the eagles. I had people go up, we got to the top, we were quiet, we
broke into small groups, all the mitigations that are called for in the plan. We were coming up
over a rise and all of a sudden heard a rifle shot and whoa, I wonder if it is deer season so another
rifle shot and, Matt Maguire will attest to this, as will the seven or eight other people that were up
there - -then all of a sudden it sounded like Vietnam. There were semi - automatic rifle fire that went
on for about 20 rounds. We came up over the rise and it just turned out to be one of the neighbors
target practice or something. We said hi and they asked us what we were doing. We told them
what, they said fine and that was it. This is at a time when the eagles were supposedly nesting. A
week later we get a letter from their attorney saying that we were posing a threat to the eagles
nesting. So another great example of BS. That is what this stuff is.
Another example to is the cows. Now we're comparing the environmental impact with a no cow
situation and infact cows were grazing on this property for a long time. There is plenty of
evidence that the damage that cattle have done up there and I am not against cattle grazing. I think
cattle grazing is fine. I drink milk and all that sort of stuff but to claim that the hikers up are going
to cause all this damage and their so concerned about that damage, yet for years they had no
problem with the rifle shooting and the cows walking around the creek and walking on the stream
banks and causing it to cave in. Again, the whole purpose of all this stuff is to put a gate in at the
bottom. That's the whole purpose of it and to here these complaints and charges that this thing is
so grossly inadequate is just part of the strategy.
One other note, that I think that I will say before I go, the 1992, I went back and looked at the
record of information in 1992 and saw the letters that were written by the City and the County
staff and it brings to mind my days on Capital Hill. I used to work for Senator Bob Packwood,
before he became infamous, and it was quite common for influential members of congress, if they
happened to be chairs of certain committees, to have influence over agencies and get agency
members to write letters that would support a piece of legislation that they wanted to have passed
for political reasons. I was involved in even writing some of those letters for those agencies to the
Department of Agriculture for a service, and it was true enough they would bend in a certain
direction. They weren't actually lying or jeopardizing their job, but they would really make it
look like what Mr. Packwood or any other member of congress would want it to look like and
I that's precisely what happened back then. There was no support politically for Lafferty at that
2 point. Lafferty was unknown. People were starting to find out about it. The opponents of this park
3 came out soon and strong and they made a very strong effort to keep people from seeing Lafferty.
4 At the same time, influence was placed through County government, elected and appointed
5 officials to paint a very grim picture of this park and that's been going on all the this time, right to
6 the point where we have all of these comments here. That's where that stuff came from and if you
7 go back and if you get a different set of people to look at that stuff, they will give you a different
8 answer, as we've come up with. So, I think the bottom line here is this is an extraordinary piece
9 of work. It's extraordinary because it's way more thorough than it needed to be. It's more than
10 adequate and it's about a piece of property that the people of this community, not just Petaluma,
11 but South County and Northern Marin need to have. As others have pointed out, we're about half
12 of what of the accessible open space that we're supposed to have for the County General Plan and
13 that's about half or a quarter compared to our neighbors in the South ( Marin, East Bay, Peninsula
14 and so on). I urge you, this isn't something that we can just kind of glide on. This isn't something
15 we say yea this is ok and we're going to put it out there. If we want to have Lafferty as a place
16 where we can hike whenever we want, whenever it's safe, not come down to City Hall and sign
17 up, not be supervised by somebody from whomever, but as so many people found out when the
18 air is clear, when I need a break from work, I want to get into my car, I want to drive up there and
19 walk up to the top. That's the kind of experience we need to have here and we need to push for
20 this. We need to push it in this Committee, we need to push it at the City Council, we need to get
21 support from the Community, all across the Community to show that this is a project. It's beyond
22 the case of politics. I think that Mike would agree and some of the people in the past, this used to
23 be an issue of trying of to capture the City Council majority and it's no longer that. It is now
24 simply a matter of do we need this park for the people of Petaluma and are we going to let a few
25 people stop us? I would like you all to support this tonight and not just vote for it but lobby for it,
26 speak out in public for it, talk to your friends and members of the Community and make this thing
27 happen. Thank you.
28
29 Chairman Broad Thank you Mr. Hagen. Mr. Ramirez
30
31 Robert Ramirez /611 West Street Petaluma, 94952: I first got started with Lafferty Ranch in
32 1971 and so some of you have heard this story and some you haven't so I will be brief. I was a
33 junior at Petaluma High School and that was our Ecology project in a class called Ecology. Mr.
34 Eisrich was a teacher and I think he still at Petaluma High. Did he retire? (audience -about 2 years
35 ago). I see him once in a while at the 24 hour relay, but that's too bad. I'm going to have to look
36 him up. I might need him now. But me and that class, which was about 20 -30 kids, did the first
37 Environmental Impact Report. It is on public record. It's in the Environmental Impact Report and
38 we built a trail. The trail is still there. We actually designed a master plan for subsequent trails.
39 The plan was to have the next year's class continue on where we left off. Course, being in High
40 School you have a very short-term attention span so that is what we did that semester and then I
41 went on to the rest of my life. I don't know when the ball was dropped but it never got continued.
42 I do know that, up until somewhere in the late 80's, they were still doing field trips up there
43 because I had a nephew that had gone up there. It wasn't until in the tours that were promoted, I
44 believe 1995, it was when Matt Maguire was first on the Council and some other people —Jane
45 Hamilton and they finally got a City tour up there. That's when they got back up there and have
46 been hearing about this thing and couldn't figure out what all the noise was about. What is this?
47 When I got up there I basically remembered a park and it all came back to me. I didn't know why
48 but later more information came. I got to look at my Environmental hrrpact Report and read it and
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there it was, my name, and I realized oh yea, that is what Joe and I did. We were up there just
having a good time trying to meet girls, really, but at the same time we were out in the outdoors
learning about it. Because we didn't know, you know. It was great. We learned a lot about the
outdoors and built a trail and put something in document. At that point we had Sonoma State
University as an advisor. Park Rangers from the Point Reyes National Seashore worked on the
project, as well as a local historian here, Mr. Walker, who was very active and was one of the
school principals that died many years ago that encouraged kids to get out in the outdoors and
learn about nature. So that brings me to here. So here I am. Five years later I thought this was
going to be easy. I was out here to build a park. You know a park. That be simple right. Just
gonna go up there and hike but unfortunately, we had some people up there that decided that they
wanted the park for themselves and that's what this is about and I will truly hope that you will see
this. This group, the Conservancy, who we don't really know who they really are because they
will not say who,they are. But there's a group out there and we know there is a few of them seem
to come forward, say they are trying to preserve a piece of land. However, what they are really
trying to do is preserve their neighborhood. They've decided that we are not worthy to be in their
neighborhood- -the people in Petaluma. Who is worthy to be up there are people that are their
friends, their relatives, people they hire to clean their homes, people they hire to work on their
gardens, people they hire to work on their farms. But for some reason everybody else, especially a
hiker because those hikers are just horrible people - -they shouldn't be up there.
They talk about the traffic, ok and Councilmember O'Brien this is a California drivers license and
I've looked on this thing a million times now and no where on this thing says that I am restricted,
that I am allowed to drive every road in California except Sonoma Mountain Road. Now this is
the most dangerous road in the world, we've heard -- they've put it in letters. But for some reason
California has not found that fit to point that out, but if I live on Sonoma Mountain Road I
somehow understand how to navigate that road, but nobody else can. All of a sudden, if anybody
drives up.there, especially a hiker, we don't know how to drive. Ok, so let's just close the park
because everyone's gonna die on there way up to hike or on the way down -- whatever it might be.
This is some of the ridiculous stuff they talk about. They talk about improving the road, ok. They
want to make it to ASHTO Standards. We don't have any roads to ASHTO Standards in the
County for parks. We barely have roads to ASHTO Standards that are non -park roads, ok. But
they want to do this. Ok, let's just say we do it. I have no problem with that, frankly. Let's all
share the road. We've got about, I think about 40 feet of frontage -- that's usually how you do it
based on your frontage. Let's improve the whole road. They don't want to improve the road. They
could do it through road assessment district if they're so concerned about the danger in people's
live -- they're not. It's just something else to throw out there. We didn't need to do that If you
even go along with the idea of it, your basically damming every other future park in this County
to this type of thing. Fortunately, our esteemed Planning Department, under the supervision of
Pamela Tuft, has done an awesome job of trying to respond to these reams of, well you saw them,
Bruce had them. It is unbelievable. Mr. Perry would like you to believe that he's here for your
benefit. That he's here to look out for us and that he's just doing the right thing. Mr. Perry is the
enemy, everybody. He is the enemy. He is hired by the Conservancy to do a job. It's only to bad
that we didn't have the money to be on our side, because if he was on our side he would have the
reverse comments. That's what he is supposed to do - -he's an attorney. He was paid to say you are
to block this situation -- figure it out. I don't care how you do it. Be an obstacle, try to make a fool
out of the City, try to make a fool out of our engineer, Mr. Charles. Take every argument that he
has, twist it around, turn it upside down, confuse it, delay it and that's what they've done, ok.
Fortunately, we have come back and figured out a way to say look, you know, we've figured it
out, ok. We've basically put down all mitigation measures that is reasonable and sometimes more
10
I than reasonable, frankly, and we're going to handle this. We can't prevent a fire on Lafferty. I
2 can't' prevent fully a fire happening in my house, nor my neighbor's house. I just have to believe
3 my neighbors gonna do some safe practice in his life and that he's not going to burn his house
4 down and he's gonna cast mine on fire. It's just how the real world works, ok. Not to. mention, if I
5 were going to be in a fire, I'd love to live in Peter Pfendler's house. I feel pretty darn safe. He's
6 got a 1,000 acres around him. The chances of that fire hitting his house is probably pretty remote-
7 -like me hitting the lottery. The Cheda property (could not understand) there is no risk there.
8 We're actually putting in a 20,000 gallon holding tank. That is more water than anybody has on a
9 hill on any property. I guess if I felt that they were sincere about this, than I would say why don't
10 you do this on your own properties? Why is it that you guys ride motorcycles, dirt bikes, (could
11 not understand), horses, cattle grazing, erosion problems, drainage issues? You do all this on your
12 property - -we don't go there and say hey stop that, ok. We don't worry about the golden eagles
13 that are flying over their property. We don't go over and tell them about that, because they are. If
14 by Peter Pfendler's own admission, it's in his notes, that him and Connie have a little journal
15 when they watch the birds on the hill. Get a chance to read it - -it's pretty entertaining. They have a
16 little journal showing where they watch the bird. They go out and they're planting their flowers
17 one day and they see the bird and they happen to have their watch and it's 10:15- -saw the bird fly
18 over, oh it's 10:12 he stopped from his flight and waved at us. You know and then we saw him on
19 the perch. It's funriy because this bird still flies over Saemann's and Cheda, everybody else's
20 property, but never seems to land on their properties, except there a few times he lands on a pole
21 near Saemann's property. He lands on a fence sort of near Cheda's. He sorta flew over the barn of
22 Peter's house but they never seem to stop except at Lafferty. Interesting how that works, you
23 know, but that's there little journal, ok.
24
25 I think the name of a Habitat is a trap. I think people much wiser than I have brought that to you.
26 This preserve is a trap - -it's a park. It's not going to be really any different than Mt. Tamalpais.
27 Well it will be different. It will be the most heavily restricted park ever in the history of parks. I
28 was on the Access Committee. I fought all the time with my members because we didn't get to do
29 anything. We don't get to have horseback riding. We don't get to have mountain bikes. We don't
30 get to have dogs, ok. We have to hike this little path and we almost have like a little markers
31 where to hold onto or something, you know, because we're supposed to go here. I mean it's what
32 we've created is for the public benefit of the neighbors, this very limited use, restricted, hiking
33 park. I am asking you not to endorse it. It's the best we've got. Where you guys are at this point is
34 trying to think about, that you are not only making a decisions for this park for yourselves, but
35 your making a choice of this park for future, future generations and I'm serious about that. There
36 is no land in this area available for another park, ok. Without giving up huge compromise to
37 housing - -this is it. This is the only piece of land left on Sonoma Mountain Road that we're going
38 probably have with this type of potential. Last year, this month closed escrow on a piece of
39 property up the street from Lafferty, across from Peter Pfendler 80 acres for $1,050,000 - -80
40 acres, we have 277 acres. They can build one house there and they have no water and they have a
41 spring -fed pond. That's the market value. We almost sold it four years ago for $675,000. There is
42 no other land up there. If you let this go and even think about quitting because when you approve
43 it tonight, which I'm praying you will, like Bruce said, you guys have to continue to fight with us
44 because they're going to be throwing things (could not understand) at you. We've spent $600,000
45 of whatever it might be. To me that's pennies. It's sad that we did it because all we did is put
46 money basically in their pockets. Had they taken the same money, we would have been up there
47 already with our trails built, our water storage system in, our parking lot done. It would have been
48 done. If we spent another $1,000,000 up there, it will be a good deal. It'll still be one. of the
49 cheapest parks we'll ever own. The Parks and Recreation Committee can tell you that. Find out
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what a park, Kenilworth Park, Walnut Park what they own to maintain- -what do they cost_ to
build. How could you put a price on it right now if you said we're going to sell it, you know.
What price would you put on that - -you couldn't it's priceless. That's how parks are. This is one
of those also.
The (could not understand) have been mitigated fire - -we can only do so much to a fire. They've
made all the requested mitigation factors - -it could happen, ok, it could happen. A child can fall
off of a swing in a park and break its arm. That's the risk we take for that child having to have fun
in a park. We don't close all the parks. We don't say a kids going to slip in the sandbox or
something. We still have the park. It's just a risk that goes along with it. The overriding public
benefit is worth the risk and that's what we have to take here.
Mr. Perry brought up something that I thought was pretty, pretty tacky. He talked about the child
killed up in Santa Rosa, Elsie Allen High School, because the School District neglected to build a
proper road and so maybe that will happen to us. I don't know. I guess it is possible. I guess
anything is possible. I might drive home tonight and get killed on a perfectly ASHTO approved
road with ASHTO approved lighting and I might get side - swiped by a drunk driver, or I might
just lose control and die, ok. Some people in this town may rejoice for all I know. It may happen
to you. My point is there is risk in everything and that's just life and I want this park to be open,
not for me. I'm not making it just for me. I'm willing to share the park with the neighbors up
there. They just don't seem to want to share it with me. I have no problem with them coming to
the park. I'll hike right with them. If Peter wants to go for a hike, fine - -go for a hike. For some
reason he doesn't want to hike with me. There is something inherently wrong with that - -can you
get that? Me and everybody in the City. You guys are the only things standing between that
happening. You're the beginning of it right here and I really hope you guys will hang in there for
all the years that all the people have fought this war, if you want to compare it to something,
because you know it's in your hands. We're not going to give up but you guys are going to have
to be the next push on to the City Council, on to the Budget Committees and whatever might be
next.
Thank you very much and appreciate all your hard work as being Commissioners. I no this is a
tough job. A lot of late hours. I wouldn't do it. Thank you very much.
Chairman Broad Thank you Mr. Ramirez. Patricia Tuttle Brown
Patricia Tuttle Brown /513 Petaluma Boulevard South: What I wanted to say, first of all
my daughter was going to speak but it is 9:00 and we put her to bed and she wanted me to tell you
about how wonderful. Mr. O'Brien already heard this, but at the Council meeting during public
comment, but how amazing it was to go up on February 12` and see the snow, and for me, as a
parent, my parents took me up, once in my life to see the snow on Sonoma Mountain and I was
determined to take my daughter up to see the snow and she may never see it again in her life and
it snowed on Lafferty. I first got involved with Lafferty in 1992 because I had this feeling that it
was a beautiful, incredible, wonderful place, once I saw it. Now that snow has been added to the
fact that it is a place where we can experience the elements, it makes it even more precious in my
mind. What I wanted to say, after Mr. Perry got finished to you was, first of all he left. He's a
hired gun so your dealing with hired guns vs. people who are here in this late hour because we
really feel we want to speak from the heart about something we want to give you the courage to
do, which is to certify the EIR. He's wrong. Lafferty Ranch was a "hot potato" in 1992 and when
12
I this EIR was just coming up and when we were all asked if we wanted to give comments, I
2 submitted a letter with 88 attachments to it because I've been keeping a document, a journal from
3 the newspapers and other stuff that's about 14 volumes long of all the articles that have come out
4 since Lafferty emerged on (tape was cut ofj) stuff like that. So if you go back to 1992 and he said
5 oh well we were listened to in 1992 and it wasn't a "hot potato" wasn't true. 1992 the headlines
6 from 11/15/1992, were Lafferty neighbors seek rezone of Lafferty Ranch and it is quoted out of
7 the paper. Petaluma's hopes for public access to Lafferty Ranch have hit a snag because
8 neighboring residents on Sonoma Mountain have asked County officials to rezone the City -
9 owned property to block most types of visits. This was unknown to the City Council at that time,
10 that the County newly formed Sonoma Mountain Conservancy had gone behind the City's back
11 to rezone the property and that's a very important fact because, as other people have pointed out,
12 those kind of tricks have been going on since the very beginning, and indeed the very next
13 document I have in this set of attachments that I sent, they succeeded and their recommendation
14 was to change Sonoma Mountain Specific Plan text describing the regional parks side at Lafferty
15 Ranch to limit use to supervised field trips or other educational endeavors. This is just one
16 example of what we are up against. And so, what I would like to say is, I just want to give you the
17 courage, because you are important, this body right here is important next step to pass this on. To
18 have the courage to not be scared about Sudden Oak Death or road safety. Road safety, in my
19 opinion, is ridiculous. This road does not need to be up to ASHTO Standards. The day that it
20 snowed the City of Petaluma could have, if all of these people weren't fighting desperately to
21 keep us off there. We could have had busses that went up there and took people. We could have
22 prevented traffic jams by having City busses go up to our park, which is what I hope we can do in
23 the next 10 years, if it snows again. So, I'm here to give you courage because it's a long battle
24 and it's been going on for many years and you are just the next step in it and I thank you for
25 doing that.
26
27 Chairman Broad Thank you. Is there anyone else wishing to speak on this item?
28
29 Patricia .Jadith /3272 Adobe Road: I was a member of the Lafferty Committee and I am a
30 direct land owner next to Lafferty. You just heard it said that all the City has planned for with this
31 park, Well, if you think that what you have in your E1R is what these people want, there sits Mr.
32 Leonard that threw his hands up, at one of our meetings, when he said I was hired to do probably
33 what is done. These people wanted tents for overnight. I was with one of the members of the
34 Committee up there on a subcommittee meeting. You could have your tent here and you could
35 have your tent here. These are just all things that, after Mr. Leonard settled down and the
36 Committee settled down, he will admit that he has once already before the Planning Commission.
37 He said he did it. That they wanted so much, he says that I was hired to do this. I wasn't hired to
38 plan for BBQ's, overnight stays, stargazing. This is in all their future plans and they're planning
39 and if I'm understood right, or remember right, that he said that you could do this in future EIR's
40 or whatever it takes to do it I don't know, this is all new to me. But this is all in the future and this
41 is what is scary as far as I am concerned. We have had a neighbor already with a trespasser and
42 had a knife drawn on him. This is already without any park. I'm not saying the park is good or
ZD
43 bad. I'm just telling you things that we have had up there already. So they do have a lot of plans
44 for the fixture and the if the City of Petaluma can take care of all of this and I think maybe that's
45 where some of the traffic comes in. I don't know all of this, this is'not mine. I am just telling you
46 what these people have in mind for the future. It is only the beginning. The door is just opening.
47 This is for you to make up your mind how far you want to go with this. Thank you.
48
13
1 Chairman Broad Thank you.
2
3 Gabe Kearney My name is Gabe Kearney. I don't talk much in public at these kind of
4 meetings so I will try to make it quick, in respect to the time. I just want to address a couple of
5 issues. One that was addressed by Mr. Perry earlier in the evening, the Sudden Oak Death
6 Syndrome. I just wanted to state that it has not been found to have an increase rate of spreading,
7 when human contact is involved. I am more than willing to get all that documentation for you and
8 show it to you, but what he's saying is false, it's not true, don't believe it.
9
10 Another thing, cows on Lafferty will cause no more impact on the creek than those cows on the
11 ranches along the creek for the rest of the mountain. I think you'll agree with me I'm just
12 reiterating these facts just cause they were brought up earlier.
13
14 I just wanted to share with you my plans for the future because I am one of the younger
15 generations that would like to access this park in the future. I, at one point, would like to take my
16 nephews and my niece up there to show them this beautiful gem on top of the mountain. I would
17 like the High School students, the Junior High students, the Elementary School students to be able
18 to go up there to see the ecological systems that Mr. Ramirez has stated that he did when he was a
19 student. I think that everyone should have that opportunity. Everyone in Petaluma should have
20 that opportunity. I think that what this comes down to, in its basic form, is "not in my backyard."
21 The people on Sonoma Mountain don't want this in their backyard but I don't think that the small
22 amount of people opposed have the right to keep 50 some odd thousand people in Petaluma from
23 seeing this park at one time in their life. I don't think we're going to have this mad rush as they
24 would put it. In their letters apposing, I think that having access to is not going to create the
25 stampede of foot traffic that would warrant the precautions that they're asking for. And with that I
26 draw to a close. Thanks.
27
28 Chairman Broad Thank you. Is there anyone else wishing to speak on this item? Mr.
29 Mobley.
30
31 Mr. Mobley /143 Acorn Drive, Petaluma, CA 94952: Good morning, I'm glad I made it in time.
32 I was at another meeting so excuse my lateness. I'm also on the Parks and Rec. Commission. I
33 was also co -chair to Lafferty Access Committee and I believe that we have done a great service to
34 this Community and effort that we went forth in getting this plan together. I believe that Leonard
35 Charles was the right consultant. I think that he addressed all the issues and I think it's really
36 reprehensible that we've had to spend over $600,000 on this plan when we should have been able.
37 to build this park a lot sooner. I think to put it off and to make mitigations to this would only
38 serve the interest of a few. I think we need to stay to course. I do believe it is an excellent plan. I
39 do believe some of the assumptions are just assumptions and just that. I do believe if they're not
40 requiring ASHTO Standards to all the other roads in all the other parks in Sonoma County, why
41 should we have to adhere to those standards on this road. I think accidents are caused by people
42 dong stupid things. You could have an accident anywhere and I think we really need to realize
43 that just because you approve the plan, doesn't mean that we're going to develop this park in a
44 year. It's going to take - -we're going to have to phase it in, we're going to have to find the money
45 for it and I do believe that this is the right course and we need to stay to course. I think if you vote
46 against this or vote for mitigations, I think all we're asking for is a withdrawn, protracted battle
47 that's just going to exacerbate everybody's patience and I think we really need to look at how we
48 serve the community. I think this park is needed. I think we have done a disservice by the Open
14
I Space District and the money they spent for trying to open up Moon Park. I think we ended up
2 being the losers and I think we need to be the winners now and I think I would really like to see it
3 stay to course. I think it is really important. I think the money we spent has been well spent and 1
4 think we deserve a chance to visit Lafferty without any restrictions. Thank you.
5
6 Chairman Broad Thank you Mr. Mobley. Mr. Kortum.
7
8 Mr. Kortum /540 Pacific Avenue Santa Rosa, 95404 I think you all know the politics of this
9 issue that has been around a long, long time. The County politics, the road politics, etc. That the
10 original document was probably quite adequate, but now that it's twice as thick, I think, you're
11 very safe in approving it and it should be approved. Pass it on to the City Council. It is a very
12 thorough document. I think that the attorney sitting here probably is charging $250.00 an hour is
13 symbolic of the whole Lafferty affair. If he such an expert on roads, he called Sudden Oak Death
14 a virus, it's not, it's a fungus. Doesn't sound very thorough to me. And the fact that he is still
15 harking on the roads is very interesting. He didn't go into other aspects of this thing and to call
16 that the worst road in Sonoma County is just not true and there are a lot of people outside this
17 City that use Lafferty, including myself and it's a County responsibility. It is because politics got
18 in the way of the County taking responsibility is no reason for Petaluma not to go ahead with this
19 project, put continuous pressure on the County, which is in the road business and responsible for
20 that road so please pass this and let's carry on. Thank you.
21
22 Chairman Broad Thank you. Is there anyone else wishing to speak on this item?
23
24 .Janice Cader- Thompson /732 Carlsbad Court, 94954 (Councilmember speaking as a
25 citizen of Petaluma): Thank you. I actually wasn't going to speak because I'll be making my
26 comments in I assume 30 days but I just wanted to bring some institutional knowledge that
27 Lafferty Ranch had been used in the past by City Officials, City employees and by residents of
28 this Community, as a hunting area and I just want this Commission to know it has never been the
29 preserve that people never used and it's just important to know that information. Thank you.
30
31 Chairman Broad Thank You. Is there anyone else wishing to speak on this item? I will go
32 ahead and close the public hearing and would anyone on the Commission like to ask any
33 questions of either staff or our consultant before we discuss this item? Commissioner Voun.
34
35 PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED
36
37 Commissioner Vouri: (To Pamela Tuft) Pamela, could you address the issue of naming the
38 land use as Habitat Preserve vs. other suggested designations such as Open Space Park or Passive
39 Use Park?
40
41 Pamela Tuft Let me start out by saying I apologize for my flippant answer. I made it up.
42
43 Commissioner Vouri I appreciate your honesty.
44
45 Pamela Tuft When you look at the General Plan, we don't have a whole lot of
46 classifications - -we have neighborhood parks, we have community parks. I didn't want to call it a
47 Regional Park, even though it will serve as a Regional Park because that's not the business that
15
I Petaluma's typically in. There was a great deal of issue, very early on, about the habitat, the
2 quality of the habitat, the quality of the plant life and the wild life. The intent, of both the citizens
3 group and the City, has always been to preserve the quality of the site. To me as a planner, with
4 an environmental background, it made sense to me. It's not something I own, or has to be, if the
5 Planning Commission would like to recommend it to be an Opens Space Park, that's fine. It's
6 whatever works. We just wanted to differentiate it from a very active type of use. That this is a
7 beautiful site to observe habitat, the views and the wildlife. Does that make sense? Ok. Thank
8 you.
9
10 Chairman Broad I have another question for you while you're still there. Can you respond
11 to the issue regarding how the park will be used?
12
13 Pamela Tuft The park usage, as proposed, is very passive in my opinion. Leonard can get
14 into the more details but I know I won't be able to take my dog, certainly can't take my horse so
15 if one chooses to go up there, one will hike around. I guess you could probably jog up the hills, if
16 you were in good enough shape.
17
18 Someone in the Audience Wheelchairs?
19
20 Pamela Tuft: There is wheelchair access in the lower portion of it.
21
22 Chairman Broad Specifically, I guess I am asking about the suggestion that this is opening
23 the door to an onslaught of much more intensive uses.
24
25 Pamela Tuft If you thought activating and reviewing the environmental review for passive
26 park was intense, I can't imagine what it is going to be like if we try amend the project to greatly
27 enhance or expand the intensification of use. I wasn't project planner for the EIR, back when the
28 Lafferty Access Committee was meeting so I can't give you any historical perspective on the
29 discussions about campfires and tents. I'm just not.
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31 Chairman Broad I'm not looking for that but process wise, therefore, to change the use
32 from what is being specifically proposed.
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34 Pamela Tuft: We'd be back right where we are now. It would require additional
35 environmental review because those would be changed conditions of operations and it would
36 require substantial change of the mitigation measures that are presented as part of this project so
37 we would be back with additional environmental review. To what scope or scale, I can't tell you
38 until we define whatever was going to be proposed at some future date, but that's not been
39 discussed during the two years I've been managing the EIR.
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41 Chairman Broad Any other questions for Ms. Tuft? Yes, Commissioner Vieler.
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43 Commissioner Vieler When Les Perry was talking earlier and he spoke of the journaling
44 that the neighbors had done, with regards to something like 17 accidents, I think he said, within a
45 little over a year period of time, was any effort to determine the nature, the age groups, you know,
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any kind of demographics with regards to who were involved in those accidents - -was anything of
that nature done?
Pamela Tuft Yes, we did. The Traffic Engineer did a great deal analysis on cause of
accidents, and I don't know if Leonard can quote them off the top of his head. I'm not a traffic
engineer, but a lot of it was due to lateness of hour, alcohol use and I believe, by far, the greater
percentage of them were operator error.
Commissioner Vieler The reason. I ask, I'd like collaboration on this, is that I know that
I've read several newspaper articles, with regards to traffic accidents that have occurred on
Sonoma Mountain Road and involving teenagers, fatalities, drinking, hot rodding, things like that
and I just wondered if the 17 accidents had perhaps looked at the profiles with regards to a person
going to hike as opposed to a person drinking at 11 PM or 1 AM in the morning and racing down
the road?
Pamela Tuft We did study that and certainly the park will be closed at 11:00 at night so park
use won't have an impact to those types of activities, but I can relate a particular incident - -I've
only been up to Lafferty a half a dozen times, but on one of those times, as we drove up to the site
we passed a carload of teenage boys with alcohol. We were very official looking, being in a City
car, and the trip was very, very quick. We were not hiking it. I just had to go up and do
something. On the way back they were packing up their stuff and leaving and so we had kind of
ruined their party. One could take the position that an increased surveillance increases presence of
an adult; or just usage, will discourage the clustering and informal partying, parking, and drinking
that could go on. It is common knowledge that is a site for high school kids to go after school
with a six -pack. I have teenage children.
27 Chairman Broad Any other questions? Thank you.
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29 Pamela Tuft Thank you.
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31 Chairman Broad Any questions for Mr. Charles or Mr. White, the attorney on the review? I
32 have a question for Mr. White. Unfortunately, Mr. Perry, as has already been mentioned, has
33 already left so he won't get to hear your response to this but I wanted to ask you about a couple of
34 points he made. He questioned the adequacy of the EIR in two areas. One related to the way
35 Sudden Oak Death was treated and the way the EIR was circulated and secondly related to the
36 roadway and the mitigation or lack, as he termed it the lack of mitigation measures for the
37 roadway or partial mitigation measures. Could you comment in those areas in terms of the
38 adequacy of the document?
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40 Bill White Sure. We've reviewed the document. We find that it is more than adequate than
41 what is required under CEQA. With respect to the Sudden Oak Death Syndrome, the standard for
42 recirculation. after a Draft EIR has been released to the public, is whether or not there's substantial
43 new information that deprives the public from commenting on a new, significant impact or on an
44 impact, a significant impact that's already been identified but which the new information
45 indicates it's severity will be substantially increased. The information on sods is new information.
46 It's riot something that was in the EIR, prior to the time it was circulated. However, we analyzed
47 the information, we had someone look at sods on the site, we had experts look at both the fire
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I impacts and the impacts of possible spread and in both cases we found that the new information
2 doesn't indicate there would be a new significant impact or that the severity of the significant
3 impacts, for example, fire has already been identified as a significant impact. The severity of that
4 impact would not be substantially increased by the new information, so for that reason, it was
5 concluded that recirculation was unnecessary. In addition, there were additional or revised
6 mitigation measures that would further insure that these issues raised by sods would be addressed.
7 For example, additional fire fuel treatments were recommended just to ensure that if it does
8 become a unforeseen problem, there will be measures in place that will address the increase fire
9 hazard.
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11 Chairman Broad And with respect to his concerns on the roadway?
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13 Bill White On the roadway improvements, again, road safety was already identified as a
14 significant impact so he had several concerns with respect to the roadway and I won't go through
15 all of them.
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17 Chairman Broad Specifically, as far as his question about the lack, as he termed it, partial
18 mitigations.
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20 Bill White The EIR actually identifies measures that could mitigate the road safety impacts. It
21 concludes that those measures can't be relied upon by the City to mitigate the impacts to a less
22 than significant level. The reason is that the City really has no control over a road improvement
23 program on a County road. So even if the City was in favor of doing all the road improvements,
24 which may or may not be in favor of, it cannot rely on that fact to conclude that this impact is less
25 than significant; therefore, the EIR was forced to conclude that, that impact would remain
26 significant. Non the less, those mitigations measures have been identified in the EIR. The EIR
27 spells out what is necessary to bring the road up to ASHTO Standards. In fact, it has a very
28 detailed analysis of the segment -by- segment. There is something like 76 segments between
29 Adobe Road and the entrance to the park and it indicates exactly what would need to be done to
30 improve the road and gives an actual prioritization of each one of those segments. There is a full
31 disclosure of information in the EIR with respect to what has to happen to improve the road but
32 again, because it is a County road there is nothing the City can do about it. The City can choose to
33 work with the County and the EIR recommends that the City does work with the County. That's
34 about all the City commit to.
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36 I guess I will get into one other issue that was raised by Mr. Perry, which is this issue of
37 condemnation. He suggested that the City does have the power to basically condemn Sonoma
38 Mountain Road, make it a City road and then can go ahead and do these improvements and
39 maintain it themselves. Well, that is just not the case. The City does have the power under State
40 Statute to condemn the road in order to obtain access to it's park and if it does need to do that, it
41 will do that for that small segment between Sonoma Mountain Road and the entrance to the park.
42 It's not clear, at this point, whether that will actually be necessary, but that is an available tool in
43 that case. The comments on the EIR stated essentially, you know, Mr. Perry's interpretation of the
44 law is that the City automatically obtains jurisdiction over all the County roads between City
45 limits and the park and that is simply not the case. If the City was to condemn a road because it
46 needed access and then it was to become a City road for that purpose, then yes, it would have
47 jurisdiction to maintain and repair, etc., but there is no indication that it has the power to condemn
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I pieces of a County road and then assume maintenance jurisdiction over those pieces or to make
2 repairs for mitigation purposes for a City project.
3. Chairman Broad Thank you. Any other questions for Mr. White? Thank you. If there are no
4 other questions, then let's go ahead and get comments from individual Commissioners on the
5 Final EIR and the project itself. Commissioner Barrett.
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7 Commissioner Barrett I'm amazed at how much paper was generated by the Final EIR. I
8 remember our meeting with the Park and Recreation Committee and the Planning and the City
9 Council when we went over the Draft EIR and I was pretty convinced, at that time, that a very
10 through job had been done and again, I want to thank Pamela Tuft and Mr. Leonard and all the
11 people who did all the work to get it to where its been over this very long haul. So I just I don't
ZD
12 have any comments other than I wish we would just go ahead and approve it.
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14 Chairman Broad Thank you. Commissioner Vieler.
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16 Commissioner Vieler I also support this EIR. I'd like to see it move forward to the City
17 Council. It's been a long time coming and I really don't have anything else to say.
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19 Chairman Broad Commissioner Vouri.
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21 Commissioner Vouri Mr. Chairman, I thought I was going to be pretty happy sitting up
22 here tonight, haven't participated officially in the Lafferty process before this Final EIR. I
23 welcome this opportunity to help push it on its way but I'm actually overcome with sadness.
24 Lafferty is a very deep and old wound in our City, in our Community body and I'm pained to see
25 this dragged on through the civil process. We need to heal. This wound is one of our arms and
26 we've got to heal this old would so that we can move on to healing the larger rift that is in this
27 community and begin to work together as a community. I don't have any comments on the Draft
28 EIR itself and I will be voting for it.
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30 Chairman Broad Thank you. Commissioner Glass.
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32 Commissioner Glass First of all, Mr. Modell expressed a wish that it be called an Open
33 Space Park. I want to make sure that we do that. I don't want any wiggle room here or any
34 misconfusion in any way. The burden here, it's important to know, right in the very beginning, is
3.5 this EIR process. I've got it highlighted so you see about where it is on the page there. It says that
36 the Planning Commission and the City Council certified as being legally adequate. That is the
37 charge. Are we legally adequate? If this isn't legally adequate then I don't know what is because
38 this is an embarrassment. If the people on Sonoma Mountain want to go through an EIR every
39 time that they buy an automobile. I think that's where we're headed. If we just use common sense
40 here and logic. I'm happy that the lady, I didn't catch her name, came down to this process
41 tonight and she can find out her greatest fear is not gonna happen. That it would it take another
42 complete process before this park changed in any way, shape or form. I'm wondering about that
43 habitat for the eagle and how helicopters landing affects eagles because what's good for the goose
44 is good for the gander. You just can't have it both ways. So I'm ready to vote for it. It's legally
45 adequate. I have no problem making that determination. I'm only embarrassed that it took this
46 level, this length of time, this amount of paper work and I understand why it did and I'm sorry for
47 it.
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Chairman Broad Commissioner Monteschio.
Commissioner Monteschio I'm also ready to vote for it and I really don't have any
other comments.
Chairman Broad Commissioner O'Brien.
Commissioner O'Brien Thank you Mr. Chairman. First off, Ms. Tuft, I would like to
complement you on the scope and volume of work and the long hours that you put in to get this
process. You know, as Commissioner Glass said, we have to make sure that this is legally
adequate and I think it more than supercedes adequate. I am ready to vote for it.
Chairman Broad Thank you. I also want to compliment staff and all the consultants that
were involved with this including many of the consultants who did work on this as part of the EIR
but who are not here. Tonight I think it is clearly in an exhaustive document and something that
can sit on the shelves among probably the most thoroughly reviewed projects in something, I
don't know quite know what. Biotechnology pilot plants involving toxic materials on Freeway 80
that have had EIR's that aren't nearly to the size of this one, so as my fellow commission
members said, the scope of this and the amount of effort that went into it, is pretty much mind
boggling for establishing a park and having said that I'm ready to vote to move this ahead. Both
for the Final EIR and for the General Plan Amendment and the project.
Commissioner Glass Mr. Chairman could we ask if we have consensus on that Lafferty
be referred to as an Open Space Park?
Chairman Broad That's fine as long as staff didn't have any problem with that change.
Commissioner O'Brien Unless Ms. Tuft can make up a better name.
Chairman Broad Would someone like to make a motion?
Commissioner Barrett I move that we accept the Final EIR for Lafferty Ranch Park Open
Space Park as presented.
Commissioner Monteschio I will second it.
Chairman {Broad And just to clarify that includes both item #1 and #2 in the staff report
recommendations. Ok, we have a motion and a second. Are we hooked up for voting? Ok lets
have a vote. - .
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A motion was made by Commissioner Barrett and seconded by Commissioner Monteschio to
approve the Final Environmental Impact Report for Lafferty Ranch Open Space Park as presented
and to include both items 1 and 2 in the staff report.
Commissioner Barrett: Yes
Commissioner Broad: Yes
Commissioner Glass: Yes
Commissioner Monteschio: Yes
Commissioner O'Brien: Yes
Commissioner Vieler: Yes
Commissioner Vouri: Yes
Chairman Broad And thank you also to all the members of the community who have
worked so hard towards this end as well.
COMMISSION B USINESS
III. General Plan Workbook 1987 — 2005 Goals, Objectives and Policies Evaluation
Workbook: Planning Commission review and discussion of applicability /inapplicability
of existing policies to Petaluma General Plan 2000 — 2020.
IV. LIAISON REPOR'T'S:
City Council
SPARC
Petaluma Bicycle Advisory Committee
Tree Advisory Committee
Adjournment:
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