City attorney says, though unlikely, eminent domain would not be out of the questioning in establishing new trails.
By Knowles Adkisson / The Malibu Times
Property owners protested an updated citywide trails map before the Malibu Planning Commission at its meeting last week, saying the map’s new trail alignments will impose on their privacy and make their property more difficult to sell if subsequent buyers find the trails objectionable.
City officials stressed that the new trail alignments were only approximate locations of trails it might want to build in the future, and that new ones could not be built across someone’s property without the consent of the landowner.
The updated Trails Master Plan is the product of efforts by a trails ad hoc committee established by the city council in 1999.
Property owners submitted written requests that five trails be either moved or deleted entirely from the map. Malibu resident and architect Ed Niles objected to a trail that bisects his property in West Malibu.
“I don’t want somebody, my future family, my children, whatever happens in my life on this property, I don’t want them burdened with an imaginary line that somehow, someway will find its way into our lives by either some methodology of extortion or whatever you want to call it,” Niles said.
But Don Schmitz, who has chaired the trails committee since its inception in 1999, repeated that the trails system was a “wish list” for future trails and the city had no power to impose the trails on unwilling landowners.
“It should be completely clear to everyone and completely unambiguous that this trails map has absolutely no effect on your underlying property rights whatsoever,” Schmitz said.
Assistant City Attorney Gregg Kovacevich could not say that eminent domain would not be invoked in cases of high priority trails, but did say that the use of eminent domain is highly rare. Kovacevich said that when the city wants to build a trail in the future, it would offer development incentives, such as permission to build a larger foundation for a house, to property owners in exchange for easements across their property. Kovacevich reiterated that no land would be appropriated from private property owners against their wishes.
“[The map] really has no meaning beyond that other than letting people know we do have a plan,” Kovacevich said. “These are approximate locations, we would like it, but we’re only going to get it if the underlying property owner gives it to us.”
The commission agreed to remove a segment of the trail objected to by Niles, but kept others in place, including the Escondido Connector trail, which was contested by several property owners, including one who is building a house directly in the path of the proposed trail. City officials assured the audience that no trails would be built through someone’s house.
Planning Commission Chair John Mazza and the commission generally followed the advice of Schmitz and other trails committee members.
“I want to take what Don and what staff said to heart,” Mazza said. “These are wish lists that they spent 10 years creating, so I’m going to be reluctant to be removing things from the testimony tonight on whether or not somebody thinks this or that.”
The city council will vote on whether to incorporate the map into the Malibu Local Coastal Program (LCP) and the city’s general plan at a future meeting. If the council approves it, it will go to the California Coastal Commission for final approval to be incorporated into the LCP.
Many of the trails are located on land managed by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, Los Angeles County and the National Parks Service. The Trails Master Plan will provide a blueprint, so that when the city or those agencies wish to build trails, they will connect in a coherent system throughout Malibu.