Development agreement would allow for relocation of two playing fields and parking spaces and a third field would be kept in place.
By Ken Gale/Special to The Malibu Times
High hopes prevail for replacing the ball fields in the doomed Malibu Bluffs Park. Work began earlier this month on an environmental impact report, or EIR, for a development agreement that would allow a housing subdivision in the bluffs adjacent to the park in exchange for a place to relocate the playing fields.
The development proposal was brought to the city earlier this year by the Roy Crummer Trust, which owns approximately 24 acres next to the park on the bluffs bordering Pacific Coast Highway and overlooking Malibu Road and the ocean below.
If the proposal passes scrutiny of an EIR, the deal would soften the blow of losing the well-maintained ball fields that were built at Bluffs Park in 1989 by Los Angeles County at a cost of $2.5 million on land leased from California State Parks. In addition to baseball and soccer fields, the land also holds the Michael Landon Recreation Center, a telescope platform for watching migrating dolphins and whales, picnic tables and a 93-space parking area-all on about 6 acres of land.
State Parks informed the city last year it would not renew the Bluffs Park lease when it expires in May next year. The land is to be turned into a nature reserve for “passive recreation,” complete with a visitor center.
The Crummer proposal reserves 6.18 acres that abut the northeast corner of Bluffs Park for relocating two playing fields and the parking area. A third playing field, on parkland adjoining the Crummer parcel, would be kept in place.
In return, the Crummer trust would be given the right to subdivide the remaining acreage into eight residential lots of 2 acres each.
City Parks Commissioner Doug O’Brien, a vocal critic of the state’s action, has endorsed the deal. State Parks superintendent for Malibu, Hayden Sohm, said at an EIR scoping meeting that “at this level it seems fine. I agree it makes sense, subject to the EIR.”
However, at a City Council meeting in May, when the plan was introduced, a concern was raised about the amount of grading that will be necessary to prepare the land for development.
“In all fairness, I’m not going to support 72,000 cubic yards to fill up a canyon … ,” said Councilmember Sharon Barovsky.
The council, nonetheless, voted to proceed with the EIR.
The environmental impact report can make or break the deal. The city has chosen Envicom Corp. of Agoura Hills to prepare the EIR, which will be paid for by the Crummer Trust.
“This will be a focused EIR as opposed to a full-blown EIR,” said Envicom representative Scott Weinstock. A full-blown EIR, he explained, looks at 16 different environmental issues. But the Crummer EIR, he said, will look at only nine issues pertinent to the bluffside property.
These include soil erosion and loss of topsoil from grading, water quality and runoff endangered plant and animal species, traffic, noise, wastewater treatment and wildfire hazards.