3/3/16
The Humboldt County Planning Commission is set to review at its meeting tonight whether the Humboldt Bay harbor district’s King Salmon property conforms with the county’s land use guidelines — a topic that in the past has led to commissioner-voiced concerns about public entities acquiring private lands.
While he had voiced these same concerns last year, Planning Commissioner Lee Ulansey said that is not the subject at hand tonight, though he still has questions.
“I don’t think the planning commission’s role is to decide whether or not the harbor commission should or should not purchase the land, but only if they’re going through the appropriate methodology to accomplish that,” Ulansey said Wednesday.
Planning Commissioner Alan Bongio said in a phone interview Wednesday that he plans to pull the item for discussion, but said he preferred to discuss the details at the meeting.
“There are questions about it, certainly,” he said. “Until I get those answered I don’t really have an opinion. I need some clarification before I can make a decision.”
The meeting will focus on about 31 acres of the King Salmon fisherman’s channel located on the southern end of King Salmon that the Humboldt Bay Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District acquired from Pacific Gas and Electric Co. in 2014.
PG& E once used the channel to house a cooling water intake valve for the nearby Humboldt Bay Power Plant. However, the company stopped dredging the area after the power plan shut down in 1976, and the channel filled with sediment in subsequent years.
The harbor district took ownership of the land in 2014, with PG& E paying $2 million as part of the agreement. The district used about $1 million to buy a dredge that same year. The harbor district has since been working to begin dredging the entrance to the King Salmon fisherman’s channel in order to open up the channel for use by boaters and fishing vessels. The nearly 5,000 square feet of dredged soils is proposed to be used to restore wetlands at the nearby White Slough to the south.
Harbor district Deputy Director Adam Wagschal said that once the permits for the project are in order, he expects the dredging to begin around August.
“This will be our first time using the harbor district dredge,” Wagschal said.
While the harbor district currently owns the fisherman channel property, the county planning commission still needs to determine whether the change of ownership complies with the county’s Humboldt Bay Area Plan and the county’s General Plan, which includes the county’s guidelines on different land uses. Humboldt County Planning and Building Department staff are recommending that the planning commission find the land transfer to be in conformance with the General Plan and lists no major issues.
Harbor District planner George Williamson said he would not understand why any commissioners would pull the proposal for further discussion as the project does not intend to stray from any of the uses the land is zoned for.
“The only matter that’s before the planning commission tomorrow night is if the existing land use designation in the Humboldt Bay Area Plan still appropriate,” he said on Wednesday. “The answer is obviously yes.” Back in August 2015, the planning commission pulled a similar item for discussion regarding the harbor district taking ownership of 17 acres of the former Samoa pulp mill site.
During the meeting, several commissioners — including Bongio, Ulansey and Ben Sheperd — expressed some concern about have coastal industrial land being transferred to a public agency rather than be available to private industries.
Ulansey said he also took issue with the fact that county planning staff stated that such public agency land acquisitions are exempt from adhering to California Subdivision Map Act and Americans With Disabilities Act requirements if the land is still being used to further the purpose and function of that agency.
Ulansey said private industries would not be given the same leniency, though he said the same could be said of the reverse scenario in other cases.
“I like to look really closely and make sure we’re treating people the same,” Ulansey said. “I hadn’t seen any other example in the past where those kinds of requirements and reviews were waived on any development.”
The harbor district held a meeting Wednesday night to discuss the proposed dredging project with King Salmon residents. Wagschal said a major topic of the meeting would be the harbor district’s decision not to dredge the residential canals that have been filling with sediment and eelgrass.
While he said the concerns of the King Salmon fishing fleet and residents are valid, Wagschal said there are different challenges presented by that project as the residential canals are privately owned.
“It needs to be done,” he said.
Humboldt Baykeeper Director Jennifer Kalt said she also has concerns about the residential canals being dredged due to the presence of contaminants in the soils, which Wagschal said is mainly petroleum from the boats.
“They are working on the idea to restore wetlands,” she said. “Of course you can’t do that if they’re contaminated.”
State tests on the sediment and water in the fisherman’s channel showed low levels of contaminants and was not an issue for Kalt.
