City takes next step on coastal plan

When the California Coastal Commission meets Thursday, it will

discuss a long-overdue land-use plan for coastal Newport Beach, but

city and coastal commission staff members are still at odds on two

key issues.

The land-use plan is half of a state-required local coastal plan

the city has been working on since 2001. It describes what kinds of

development can occur and what resources need to be protected in the

city’s coastal zone.

City officials have been frustrated by how long it’s taken the

commission to respond to their proposals for the plan, particularly

since Newport Beach has racked up $1,000 a month in fines -- now

totaling about $26,000 -- since missing a July 2003 deadline to have

a plan in place.

The city and the commission have gone back and forth with

questions and changes, but as of Monday they still didn’t agree on

how close buildings can be to the edge of certain coastal bluffs and

what to do when it’s unclear whether a piece of land qualifies as a

wetland.

The commission proposed a 25-foot setback for coastal bluffs in

Dover Shores and other parts of the upper bay. But the city argues

that homes are already built on most of those bluffs, and a 25-foot

setback would essentially prohibit new or replacement construction.

Instead, the city suggested the building setback should follow the

line of existing buildings, which would allow a range of setbacks

between 18 and 44 feet from the edge of the bluff.

“Basically what the city is proposing is, what you see is what you

get,” city planning director Patricia Temple said.

The coastal commission itself often allows development within 25

feet of the bluff edge, and what’s there now doesn’t meet the 25-foot

standard, she said.

“There was no coastal act, there were no regulations in this

regard whatsoever, when those subdivisions were approved,” she said.

City and coastal commission staff members also aren’t seeing eye

to eye on how to decide when something’s a wetland and should be

protected. There are three criteria defining wetlands, but sometimes

they’re not clear.

The city wants to write into the plan that in an ambiguous

situation, it can look at regulations from other environmental

agencies, such as the state Department of Fish and Game. “The coastal

staff doesn’t want that kind of latitude,” Temple said.

The commission is required by the coastal act to make a decision

this month, so each side -- city officials and coastal commission

staff -- will make its case Thursday, and the commission will decide.

The Newport Beach City Council will then vote on whether to accept

the commission’s decision.

If the land-use part of the plan is approved this week, the city

then must write regulations to enforce it, and it could take up to a

year to get that approved.

Once a local coastal plan is approved, residents will be able to

apply to the city for development permits they now need to get from

the commission.

“That will save them time and money, plus they will find out all

of their issues up front, because they’ll be dealing with the same

staff” all the way through the process, Assistant City Manager Sharon

Wood said.

QUESTION

Has the Coastal Commission been too slow in approving a land-use

plan for coastal development? Call our Readers Hotline at (714)

966-4664 or send e-mail to [email protected]. f7Please spell

your name and tell us your hometown and phone numbers for

verification purposes only.