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Spring/Summer 2003
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Environmental Dissension Continues to
By Tom SheltonControversy over new conservation regulations related to setbacks from the rivers and streams of Napa County has polarized our community. The broad continuum of opinion stretches from extreme property rights advocates to those who believe limited property takings are a legitimate governmental response to difficult environmental issues. As positions along this continuum have hardened it has become increasingly difficult to form the political consensus needed to strengthen the conservation regulations that may well improve the odds of removing the Napa River from the impaired waterways list. As an impaired waterway, the Napa River faces increasing federal scrutiny under the authority of the Clean Water Act of 1973. For more than three decades federal authorities have concentrated on point source pollution (pollutants that flow directly from pipes). Today, point source pollution is well understood and federal focus is appropriately directed toward non-point source pollution, which includes sedimentation. It is widely presumed in Napa County that sedimentation is a limiting factor that inhibits the general health of the Napa River. This presumption is currently being tested through the phase II study of the Napa River’s total maximum daily load (TMDL). In anticipation of increased federal scrutiny, Napa County supervisors convened the Watershed Task Force in 1999. The purpose for the Task Force was to develop a blueprint for strengthened environmental regulations and to provide a framework for the political consensus needed to turn the Task Force blueprint into a regulatory reality. To the great credit of the Task Force participants, progress toward needed regulatory improvements was achieved and, in particular, there appeared to be broad consensus around new development standards for setbacks from streams and rivers. Left open was the more controversial subject of setback standards for vineyard replants and existing residences. Armed with the final report of the Watershed Task Force, in 2002 Napa County supervisors appointed a Watershed Task Force Oversight Committee to work with County planners to turn the Task Force recommendations into the language of a new County ordinance. More than one year and hundreds of thousands of dollars later, the envisioned ordinance is very far from reality. The first act of dissension appeared before the ink was dry on the first report of the Watershed Task Force. In 1999, the Sierra Club sponsored a lawsuit against the County of Napa questioning the discretionary authority of County planners to approve erosion control plans under the 1991 Hillside Ordinance. Napa County found itself in the ‘Catch-22’ position of falling under the scrutiny of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) by virtue of developing in 1991 a proactive environmental regulation to control hillside development.1 In this charged atmosphere, the Watershed Oversight Committee began the task of drafting a new conservation ordinance. Within a few weeks of their organizational meeting the Oversight Committee learned that a group of environmental activists, including one member of the Committee itself, had joined together to sponsor the Timber Harvest Initiative, which would mandate streams and river setbacks far in excess of those arrived at by the Watershed Task Force and under consideration by the Oversight Committee. Sponsors of the initiative claimed for their rationale the slow progress County officials were making toward the drafting of new conservation regulations. This, of course, ignored the fact that these same initiative sponsors were responsible for the Sierra Club lawsuit which burdened the regulatory development process with additional CEQA requirements that would take years of environmental study to complete. In an attempt to demonstrate good faith, the Oversight Com-mittee recommended to the Board of Supervisors an "interim ordinance" that would define stream and river setbacks as developed by the Watershed Task Force. This, the Oversight Committee believed, would eliminate the need for the Timber Harvest Initiative, provide some relief to hopelessly delayed project applicants, and provide renewed support for completion of an ordinance envisioned by the Task Force. After all, they believed there was strong political consensus for the new development setback recommendations contained in the final Task Force Report. When the Board of Supervisors met in the fall of 2002 to discuss the proposed "interim ordinance," it became very clear that any consensus that may have existed had completely evaporated. Following a call to action by local realtors, more than 500 people jammed the Board of Supervisors chambers under the erroneous impression that the interim ordinance would deprive them of their rights as property owners. It is fair to say that few of the protesters, including the organizers, had read the ordinance to which they were now so fiercely opposed. Predictably, the Supervisors folded their hands and continued the discussion pending further staff analysis and study. Finally, after several postponements, an interim ordinance was passed by the Board of Supervisors on April 8, 2003. The ordinance contains a blanket exemption for residential property use that may prove to be problematic. Debate continues around the Timber Harvest Initiative, which is scheduled for the March, 2004 election. Organized opposition to the initiative will likely place a competing initiative on the same ballot. Meanwhile, frustrated land owners have begun to coalesce around a “Just Say No” campaign to any changes to the existing 1991 Hillside Ordinance. From my perspective, Napa County would be well served to adopt a plan that reflects the spirit of consensus envisioned with the Watershed Task Force process. This plan would provide for more restrictive setbacks for new vineyard development, protection for existing vineyard assets, an element of parity between new agricultural and residential land use, increased protection of hillside resources, strict enforcement capability, and incentives for voluntary land stewardship efforts. The framework for such a plan exists and enjoys tentative support of a broad coalition that includes agricultural, political, and business leaders in Napa County. Our current task is to turn that tentative support into a political will to defeat the Timber Harvest Initiative and to move substantially toward a plan that will improve the prospects for the Napa River and the Napa Valley community at large. 1. CEQA guidelines serve an important environmental purpose and are not necessarily onerous for responsible landowners. CEQA, however, affords a very low threshold of evidence for any person or group who seeks to block or delay land development. Essentially, a vineyard development that meets all Napa County requirements for a negative declaration of environmental impact is still subject to challenge under CEQA, and landowners may be required to complete a lengthy and expensive environmental impact report. The landowner may also face the additional burden of studying the cumulative impact of the project as it relates to all known or anticipated land development in Napa County; a study for which standards are not fully understood. Consequently, CEQA provides extraordinary power to a small group of extremists who are fundamentally opposed to agriculture in Napa County. In fact, the Sierra Club lawsuit has resulted in a virtual moratorium on new vineyard development in Napa County and may impact the future ability of vineyard owners to routinely replant existing non-productive or diseased vineyards. |
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