Council agenda was full of environmental issues

VIC LEIPZIG AND LOU MURRAY

A glance at this week’s City Council agenda gives a wonderful

indication of how far our town has come in recognizing the need to

protect its environment. Six separate and unrelated agenda items that

are clearly environmental were up for council action last Monday

night.

This column “goes to bed” each week prior to Monday evening, so we

can’t tell you the exciting outcome on these issues, but that doesn’t

mean we can’t offer our opinions.

1. Item E-3. Transfer of Beach Boulevard wetlands to the

Huntington Beach Wetlands Conservancy.

The restored wetlands on the west side of Beach Boulevard by the

Hyatt Hotel are owned by the city. The Robert Mayer Corporation and

Pacific Coast Homes restored them, creating a freshwater marsh to

treat the runoff from the new development in that area. The proposal

is to now transfer ownership of this parcel to the Huntington Beach

Wetlands Conservancy.

The Wetlands Conservancy is a very successful local group -- Vic

was one of its founders -- that has done a great job restoring

Talbert Marsh and other local projects. Acquiring this parcel adds

one more piece of the puzzle as it attempts to acquire and restore

all of the coastal salt marsh that remains between Beach Boulevard

and the Santa Ana River.

2. Item E-9. Parking lot in Central Park next to Shipley Nature

Center.

This is an item close to Louann’s heart. Over the 30 years of its

existence, the Shipley Nature Center has never had the public

recognition that it deserves, in part because it’s a long walk from

the nearest parking area, and in part because of poor signage. Both

of these problems will be resolved when the city and the Friends of

Shipley Nature Center collaborate to jointly build a gravel parking

area just south of Shipley on the west side of Goldenwest Street.

This lot would be covered in gravel, not paved with asphalt, in

order to capture rainwater for groundwater recharge. The area around

the lot and between parking rows would be landscaped with California

native plants, thus providing a better quality habitat than the

weed-choked area that currently exists there.

3. Item E-15. Adoption of Urban Runoff Management Plan

This is a plan that Vic has worked on as a citizen member of a

city committee. The plan sets out goals for the city’s effort to

control pollution of the beach and other waterways. It has been a

long time coming and is badly needed. This may be the single most

important item on the council’s agenda.

4. Item G-2b. Ordinance against killing wild birds.

Two years ago, this column helped publicize the fatal impact

Avitrol, a pesticide that targets wild birds, was having on bird life

near the Huntington Equestrian Center. The council responded

responsibly and banned the use of that particular pesticide. The

action proposed under G-2b would extend that earlier action and

prohibit any killing of wild birds.

Vic and Lou are at odds on this one. Lou supports it, but Vic

thinks there may be justifiable reasons to kill some wild birds

(especially pigeons) under some circumstances. Pigeons are wild, but

are not native wildlife.

5. Item H-1. Replacement of street trees in Downtown.

Streets and sidewalks in most of Huntington Beach are designed in

such way that planter areas are just too small for trees. The city

routinely has to cut down street trees that reach any significant

size because of the damage done to too-closely-spaced curbs and

gutters.

The Main Street commercial area is no exception. The city and the

downtown merchants had a plan to replace the Main Street trees and

split the costs. Monday night, the Council was to discuss whether or

not to pick up more than its original share of the cost.

Environmental issues, just like all others, can get bogged down in

endless discussions about who’s going to pick up the tab.

6. Item H-2a. Opposition to a freeway in the Santa Ana River.

Vic actually finds some appeal in the idea of extending the 57

freeway down the Santa Ana riverbed as far as the 405. But it has all

the earmarks of a pipedream that will never get built. Lou believes

it would cause massive environmental problems and is adamantly

opposed to running a highway through the Santa Ana riverbed. If it

were actually in the riverbed, the road wouldn’t be usable during

times of flooding. If it were constructed above the riverbed, the

road would shade the watercourse with negative impacts on what little

native vegetation struggles to survive and negative impact on access

to the riverbed by waterfowl and shorebirds.

Either way, car exhaust and dripping oil would cause horrible

pollution of the waterway. Vic thinks those problems might possibly

be mitigated, but he also feels that every dollar spent studying this

unrealistic concept is a dollar less for more practical traffic

solutions.

It is a very positive sign of the times that our community is

dealing with so many environmental issues. Finally, we are taking

responsibility for the impact society has on the environment and are

looking at ways to deal with them. At the very least, considering

these issues in an open forum fosters discussion, and causes people

to think more critically about what we are doing to this planet that

we live on, especially right here at home in Huntington Beach.

* VIC LEIPZIG and LOU MURRAY are Huntington Beach residents and

environmentalists. They can be reached at [email protected].