Opinion: Developing raw land would harm North Shore
By Ann Nichols
East West Partners, you remember them, the Colorado developers that bought Truckee when no one was looking? Think Ritz Carlton, Old Greenwood and the Grey’s Crossing bankruptcies filed in 2010.
Just when you thought it was safe, now in partnership with Sierra Pacific Industries who owns the land, they are back currently calling themselves Crew. An application has been filed with Placer County to begin the process to build clustered development (whatever that means) on top of the ridge on 112 acres inside the Lake Tahoe Basin. It’s called the Martis Valley West project. You know Highway 267 at the top of Brockway Summit? Take a left on Mt. Watson Road (aka Fiberboard Freeway), go in about a mile and you are there. The development will spill over the ridge into Martis Valley with a total of 760 units and 6.6 acres of commercial.
Currently the acreage is zoned forest, but East West wants to change that zoning to allow residential development. They aren’t saying how many units will be inside the basin. We’ve heard 200. How much land will be covered, how many trees will be cut down, how much commercial will be located there or how tall the buildings will be? East West says they will give us the details at a later date, but they want the zoning changed now. Wrong. Tahoe deserves a standalone detailed application first.
This expansion of the urban boundary at Tahoe could be allowed thanks to TRPA’s Regional Plan update. Remember TRPA’s no growth guarantees? The justification is a conservation easement on 6,000 acres outside the Lake Tahoe Basin on the east side of Highway 267. I guess if you save land in New York City you get to build at Tahoe. Talk about a dangerous precedent?
In 2011, East West Partners announced a partnership with KSL Capital Partners, the owners of Squaw Valley and Alpine Meadows. We can certainly look forward to more bad ideas in the future unless we stop this now. We only have until April 28 to comment on the Notice of Preparation for the environmental report. There will be other opportunities to comment and save an important North Shore recreation area between Kings Beach and Tahoe City. Save Mt. Watson Road. Let’s get on it.
Check it out the project online.
Here is evidence of my previous statements.
Ann Nichols is president of the North Tahoe Preservation Alliance, a 44-year resident and California-Nevada Realtor.
Ann Nichols, The TRPA should change their name to the TRDA, Tahoe Regional Development Agency, since they’ve done a 180 degree turn on there original intent to protect the lake. Nowadays they rarely turn down a project that lands on their desk, no matter how pristine an area or how close to the lake.
Developers with enough money, an army of lawyers, consultants, some political pull from favors owed and a cursory enviromental study and they’re off to the races.
My advice, for what it’s worth, get as many groups and indivduals who are united in opposition to be very vocal and persistent and of course “Lawyer Up”.
Keep us posted here on LTN concerning this situation.
United we stand, divided we fall. OLS
Here are some details:
The following actions by Placer County would be required to implement the proposed project for the entire project site (both East and West Parcels):
Certify the Martis Valley West Parcel Specific Plan project EIR/EIS.
Amend the Martis Valley Community Plan (MVCP) land use plan. Under the MVCP, the West Parcel is designated Forest (except for the portion in the Basin) and zoned Timber Production (TPZ) and the East Parcel is designated Forest, Low-Density Residential and General Commercial and zoned TPZ, Single-Family Residential and General Commercial. The project proposes to designate the entire East Parcel as Forest, with a conservation easement. In addition, the West Parcel would be designated as the Martis Valley West Parcel Specific Plan to include Residential, Commercial and Forest uses.
Amend the North Tahoe Area General Plan.
Rezone the East Parcel TPZ and the West Parcel to Martis Valley West Parcel Specific Plan.
Adopt the Martis Valley West Parcel Specific Plan.
Approve a Development Agreement.
Approve the Area Plan. The Area Plan, specific to this project, would redesignate the approximate 112 in-Basin acres of the West Parcel currently located within three different Plan Areas – 013 Watson Creek (Conservation), 015 North Star (Recreation) and 019 Martis Peak (Conservation) to Resort Recreation as defined in the TRPA Code of Ordinances. Although the entire 112 acres would be designated Resort Recreation, 85.3 acres would be developable and the remaining acreage would be left for open space and recreation. The Watson Creek (013), North Star (015) and Martis Peak (019) Plan Area Statements would be superseded by the Area Plan as to the 112 acres but remain in full force and effect as to the remainder of the land within their respective boundaries. Approve an immediate withdrawal from TPZ on the West Parcel.
The following actions by TRPA would be required to implement the proposed project for the 112.8 acres of the West Parcel within the Tahoe Basin:
Certify the Martis Valley West Parcel Specific Plan project EIR/EIS.
Approve an amendment to Map 1 of the Regional Plan to delineate the 112.8 in-Basin acres of the West Parcel.
Approve an amendment to the Basin boundary as currently delineated on TRPA’s Regional Maps.
Approve an Amendment to the definition Resort Recreation in the Regional Plan and Code of Ordinances to allow for a third Resort Recreation District in the Basin.
Approve the Area Plan.
Future project implementation would include:
Large Lot Tentative map
Improvement Plans
Small Lot Tentative Maps
The EIR/EIS may be used by other federal, state, and local agencies in the decision-making process for additional permits and approvals that might be required for the proposed project. These could include, but are not limited to:
Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board (RWQCB) NPDES permit, approval of the Storm Water Pollution Prevention Plan (SWPPP), and Section 401 Water Quality Certification,
State Water Resources Control Board filing of Notice of Intent to obtain a General Construction Activity Storm Water Permit before project construction,
California Board of Forestry (through CAL FIRE) approval of the Immediate Withdrawal from the Timberland Production Zone (TPZ),
Section 404 permit,
Northstar Community Services District, annexation of the project site into the NCSD service area,
California Department of Fish and Wildlife Streambed Alteration Agreement, and
California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) encroachment permit.
This is one of the most blatant examples of how far TRPA has turned into the TRDA (good one, OLS). Absolutely nothing can justify such a development other than corporate greed working in cahoots with the agencies. There’s NO possible environmental reason – only major harm and a very dangerous precedent. The New TRPA can’t claim this is ‘infill’ or ‘redevelopment.’ Can’t say it’s a Sustainable Communities approach. All the media lines they have used to justify big developments elsewhere simply can not be twisted in any way to say this is “good” for Tahoe.
Yes, communities need to band together and fight what these agencies are trying to do to this beautiful lake and to the communities we live in. Thanks to the RPU, it’s much more difficult and costly for the public to sue, but looks like Ann and others are organized enough that if they get the support they need, they could meet the complex requirements needed to have that option.
But for now, people need to speak up and start gathering voices against this stuff. Leaving it to a few volunteers, as good as they are, isn’t good enough, nor is it fair to them. They need the community to help back their efforts. Speak up and support them!
Cautious and Skeptical, Thanks for all the information on what Placer county has required in regards to this development. I’ve read thru it a few times and will save it.
Although the list is long, alot of this stuff is easily accomplished with the right, (or should I say wrong?) people working on it and of course all the other factors. Knowing someone on an agency who’s sympathetic to the developer and or investors, large “donations” made to certain people of influence and of course lots and lots of money spread about for those who give the go ahead and then look the other way and wash their hands of the whole mess when the truth comes out.
I’m hoping this works out for the best for our across the lake neighbors and you don’t get steamrolled. OLS
p.s. J&;B, Just read your comment, and I’ll say this, alot of it comes down to semantics. “Call it “sustainable,” they fall for that every time!”, or “It will be a green community” or “It’s good for the area and will create jobs”. OLS says, it’s all alot of B.S!!!
TRPA figured out that the only way for the agency to grow, and keep the salaries running and their charter valid is to follow the money, to go where the really high fees are available…..big development projects.
Remember a few years back the “triple bottom line” concept where the economy was, for the first time, ever considered by TRPA?
They justify it all by also get a few million spent on hastily classified cleanup/green/sustainable/good for the lake projects that have to be done as a condition of the permits. The concept of cumulative impacts seems to have been swept under the rug.
TRPA has either been infiltrated by developers, or simply sold out to them, taking a variety of currencies (including money) that would boggle our minds if we could only know.
I would say they have become just as corrupt as both houses of congress.
One way or another all this big development will contribute to degredaation of the mountain environment. Air quality, water quality, there is not any mitigation that can justify this.
The developers seem to always believe (and convince investors) that more and more people will get wealthy enough to buy units in these developments to use for second homes, retirement or to live in and telecommute to bank jobs in the big cities.
William McDonough, the “Mastermind of Sustainable Development” would call this “not knowing any better” –
Observer’s comment “Remember a few years back the “triple bottom line” concept where the economy was, for the first time, ever considered by TRPA ?” was the ‘developer’s’ opening.
Too many folks became enamored with the idea that the TRPA was (perhaps) coming ’round’, as they really have no experience (as that ‘first time’ finally came round) in economic development (how could they (?), after being ‘regulatory’ for so long), so the ‘sophisticates’ stepped up-to-the-plate. . .
Mostly of the ‘old school’, that think ‘green’ costs too much (meaning they don’t even try to know how to do it), when the opposite is true, while the “same ‘ol” is now more in control. . . not “knowing any better”. . .
It’s good to read all the detail here, but the devil is lost in the details.
A large chunk of this proposed development is NOT in the basin, and therefore, the TRPA has NO say. It is outside the Town of Truckee, and therefore they have NO say. They are prostitutes for new housing development, so I’m not even certain their approval is worth anything.
You cannot change the world by saying NO to everything. The market will dictate the future of this development, and my crystal ball tells me there is NO market for it.
This proposal is the kind of thing the Sierra Club sued to stop. Too bad more people didn’t support the lawsuit.