A William Morris Agency executive is among the three people Gov. Schwarzenegger has appointed to the California Coastal Commission. Meanwhile, the commission’s director will be stepping aside for an unknown amount of time due to an illness.
By Jonathan Friedman/Staff Writer
The California Coastal Commission will welcome three new members at its next meeting on June 9-11 in San Pedro. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger made three of his four appointments to the commission last week. The three Republicans who will replace three Democrats are Stanford Law School director Meg Caldwell, William Morris Agency Executive Vice President Steven Kram and Humboldt County Supervisor Bonnie Neeley. The governor appoints four people to the 12-member commission. The other eight are named by the Assembly and state Senate leaders. But all that could change if the saga of Marine Forest Society vs. California Coastal Commission case concludes in favor of Marine Forest, which is challenging the constitutionality of the state agency.
Neeley, 55, is the only one of the three appointees with previous Coastal Commission experience. She served on the commission from 1988 to 1993. Neeley has been on the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors since 1988. Prior to that, she served as an administrative assistant to the board. Neeley was a member of the California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection from 1993 to 1997. She is currently a member of the Humboldt Bay Harbor Revitalization Board, the County Supervisors Association of California and the National Association of Counties.
Caldwell, 43, is the director of the Environmental and Natural Resources Law and Policy Program at Stanford Law School, a job she began in 1994. She has a history of involvement with environmental and land use law, including a stint as a policy analyst for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Caldwell also served on the planning commission for the city of Saratoga. In addition, she has written a forthcoming publication called “A Citizen’s Guide to California Land Use Law and Local Government Decision Making.”
Kram, 48, is an executive vice president at William Morris Agency Inc., a literary and talent agency. Schwarzenegger was at one time a William Morris client and Kram donated $5,000 to his gubernatorial campaign. Kram joined William Morris in 1988. He previously served as staff attorney, assistant general attorney and general attorney for the ABC for six years. He lives in Los Angeles.
Absent from the June Coastal Commission meeting will be Executive Director Peter Douglas. He announced last month at the session in San Rafael that he had been diagnosed with throat cancer. He said he would begin chemotherapy and radiation treatments this month. Douglas was appointed to his post in 1985. He was one of the authors of the Coastal Act and co-authored Proposition 20, which California voters approved in 1972 to create the Coastal Commission.
While the commission will be without its controversial leader for an unknown amount of time, it waits for a court decision that could radically change the look of the government agency. Arguments for the Marine Forest case are supposed to be heard by the California Supreme Court sometime soon.
The case stems from the Coastal Commission’s demand in 2000 that Marine Forest remove an artificial reef made of tires that it had built off the coast of Newport Beach. Marine Forest then challenged the constitutionality of the commission’s membership because eight of the 12 members are appointed by and can be dismissed by the leaders of the state Legislature. Marine Forest argued this makes the Coastal Commission an agent of the Legislature, even though it enforces and interprets the laws, something that is usually left to the executive and judicial branches of the state government. A Sacramento Superior Court judge ruled in favor of Marine Forest in 2001. The state Court of Appeal upheld the ruling in late 2002.
If the Supreme Court were to rule in favor of Marine Forest, it could affect Malibu’s own battle with the Coastal Commission. Arguments were just heard before the Court of Appeal on May 25 as to whether Malibu residents could vote on the Coastal Commission-drafted Malibu Local Coastal Program. Last year, a Superior Court judge ruled that Malibu residents did not have that right. A decision is expected to come from the Court of Appeal within 90 days after the hearing.