California Coastal Commission Executive Director Peter Douglas says the city attorney is doing “technical hair splitting” while interpreting the law. He says there is no basis for a lawsuit.
By Jonathan Friedman / Assistant Editor
The City Council at its meeting Monday night unanimously voted to file a lawsuit against California Coastal Commission Executive Director Peter Douglas because of his support for an application for overnight camping and other parks enhancements by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy and its sister organization the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority.
Although the vote took place this week, City Attorney Christi Hogin filed the suit in Los Angeles Superior Court on Friday. She said on Tuesday she would have withdrawn the suit had the council not supported it Monday night. She declined to comment when asked why she filed the suit prior to the council meeting.
The council approved the suit during the closed session portion of its meeting and the decision was announced at the beginning of the public session. It was not revealed to the public during the meeting that the suit had already been filed. Douglas’ support for the conservancy’s application did not finalize the request for overnight camping in Malibu and other amenities, but it made the application eligible for review by the Coastal Commission voting body. Although the suit is technically against Douglas because he made the decision on the application, it will be treated as a suit against the state and be defended by the Attorney General’s Office.
Coastal head says no basis to suit
The conservancy’s application was made earlier this year in response to the city’s request to the Coastal Commission for a Local Coastal Program amendment to ban overnight camping on Malibu public land. The conservancy’s request was done through a rarely used procedure called an LCP Amendment Override. Hogin has said the conservancy’s request does not qualify for this procedure for various reasons. Douglas concluded otherwise.
Douglas said in an interview Tuesday morning the city’s suit has no basis. “I think it is squandering public resources and I wonder if they would spend this money if it were their own rather than the taxpayers,” Douglas said. “It is going to cost the taxpayers a considerable amount of money.”
Mayor Pro Tem Andy Stern said in an interview Tuesday morning that Douglas should not be surprised by the city’s decision.
“The Coastal Commission staff made a very unusual decision,” Stern said. “They knew this would trigger litigation. I don’t know what else could have possibly been done [by the city].”
Stern added that the suit is nothing personal against Douglas and he was sorry Douglas appeared to take it that way.
Conservancy attorney Laurie Collins said on Tuesday she was “saddened” by the city’s decision
“We’re very surprised that they would sue,” Collins said. “The taxpayers of the city of Malibu have already spent quite a bit of money on this [the battle on overnight camping]. There is no merit to this lawsuit at all. I don’t know how she [Hogin] thinks she is going to prevent the Coastal Commission from even getting to consider our plan. But that’s what she’s attempting to do.”
To qualify for the override procedure, the California Code of Regulations states the application must be for a public works project or energy facility that meets “public needs of an area greater than” the local jurisdiction, and the request must not have been anticipated by the applicant when the jurisdiction’s LCP was certified by the Coastal Commission.
Hogin said the conservancy’s proposal does not qualify for the procedure because it is not a specific public works project or energy facility, but rather a long-range public works plan. Also, she said, overnight camping was anticipated when the Malibu LCP was certified. Also, Hogin said the Coastal Commission should consider the city’s application first, since it was submitted prior to the conservancy’s request.
Douglas said on Tuesday Hogin was doing “technical hair splitting.” “That provision [exists] exactly for that situation,” Douglas said. “We expected there would be occasions when a local government would be hostile to a project having a broader public interest than what the neighbors or the parochial concerns would support.”
The Coastal Commission voting body is expected to consider the rival applications from the city and conservancy sometime early next year. Douglas is opposed to the city’s application. He is not able to vote on it, but his opinion is considered to be highly influential.
City Councilmember Sharon Barovsky said on Tuesday she “continues to hope” the city will get a fair hearing by the Coastal Commission voting body, despite the vocal opposition coming from Douglas. “There are a lot of times when the City Council gets a staff report with one recommendation, and we vote another way,” Barovsky said. “I want to believe that the commissioners will read our information and grant us a fair hearing.”
As part of the override procedure, the council had the option to support the conservancy’s application and include it in a revised version of the city’s LCP amendment request. During the public portion of Monday’s meeting, the council voted unanimously to reject this option.
A large crowd of people attended the council meeting and spoke in favor of the council’s decision to support the lawsuit and reject the conservancy’s plan.
Harmony abandoned
The city’s LCP amendment submittal late last year came not long after it appeared the city and the conservancy were united in a rare moment of harmony. The two entities had reached a tentative compromise in early 2007 that called for some overnight camping sites in conservancy-owned Malibu parks as well as in the city-owned Charmlee Wilderness Park, in addition to other features, including the creation of a Coastal Slop Trail connection of the east and west ends of Malibu.
The Planning Commission endorsed most of the features of the compromise in October, but the October 2007 fire occurred, fueling more opposition to the plan. The council heard the item in late November, but was unable to reach a decision. The item was continued to early December. Prior to the next meeting, the Corral fire in late November destroyed 53 homes. With residential opposition to the plan stronger than ever, the council in early December voted to reject nearly the whole plan, except for the trail feature.
But Collins from the conservancy said on Tuesday she doubted the city would support overnight camping in Malibu even if the fires had not occurred. “There is no doubt in my mind they oppose public access,” Collins said.
Douglas has a similar thought on what he believes the Malibu government and populace’s view is on public access. “The [city’s] arguments [against overnight camping] are specious and are there just as a cover for a blatant hostility to this kind of use in the city,” Douglas said.
Mayor Pro Tem Stern said it is unfair to classify Malibu as being opposed to public access. He said, “There is no city in the world with a population of 13,000 that welcomes as many visitors as the city of Malibu.”