Unwarranted Traffic Signal

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The Beachwood Development / AB 1991 was sent back to the "rules Committee" of the California State Senate for amendments to meet the requests of all agencies involved.

It would appear that the rules committee will attempt to enhance the "value" of the Beachwood property (number of houses allowed to be built??) to increase its value.

The present developer may choose the 18 million dollar payout by the city of Half Moon BAy (down from the 41 million dollar awarded the developer in Federal Court).

Note: Beachwood development would provide a traffic signal at Bay View and Highway 1 for possible access to Pacific Ridge/Ailanto Property.

For the City of Half Moon Bay to recover some of the 18 million dollar payout -
is there a developer/property manager that has the skill and ability to work with the various agencies/organizations to Do It!?

Mr Keenan has suggested "only someone who has had a "lobotomy" would be interested...but I think there does exist a firm that is doing development on the coast with proven capability of "conflict resolution" between the various group "visions" for land development.

The question is, Do they have the "appetite" to do it?

Jerry Steinberg
July 3, 2008

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Or, to paraphrase the title of this entry: "Whose Quality of Life is to be sacrificed...and WHY?"

1. The City of Half Moon Bay is being sued by the Beachwood developer for $30,000,000. (That's right 30 MIllion dollars...which would bankrupt the city if the developer won a jury trial scheduled to start mid April 2007) Note the City has budgeted an additional 1.2 million dollars for this litigation...and may spend more.

Apparently the lawsuit is not about building lots of houses. But because the developer apparently alleges the City, by unauthorized excavation of soil from his property, tried to build a drainage route for the adjacent (Alianto property) the city "took his property". (Closest synonym I can think of is "they bought it") by creating wetlands on the property and making it worthless for development.

It would appear that all the definitions of wetlands (Seasonal/Unseasonal/nocturnal), buffer zones (100/50/0 Feet) and who created the definitions will be discussed to the jurys satisfaction. Oh!... also its been rumored that the Beachwood developer wants to charge Ailanto properties many millions (15 ?) of dollars for the right to cross his property from Highway 1 (the most logical entry to the Ailanto property and favored by competent traffic engineers)

2. The goats are gone and rumors are circulating about development of the goat farm property(wouldn't a gas station to replace the one to be lost in the widening of Hwy 92 be just theright location at the corner of the stoplighted Foothill Blvd and Hwy 92?)

3. Rumors have been circulating that the Podesta property (corner of North Main and Hwy 1) may be developed?

SO WHAT HAS ALL THIS GOT TO DO WITH: Under Difficult Conditions Can The Right Decisions Be Made? ...read Lucy Lopez letter below to the HMB City Council and put yourself in the position of a City Council member and what would you do (on April 3rd) to do some "community building" ...remembering what your mom taught you that "Two Wrongs Don't make a Right" ...or (please forgive the sexist remark )...what your Dad may have told you...somebody is going to get "sold down the river...again".

Jerry Steinberg
Half Moon Bay

Lucy Lopez has written the email "pasted in below" to the HMB City Council requesting clarification of remarks by City Attorney Adam Lindgren at the last City Council meeting.

March 25, 2007

Dear Mayor Patridge, Vice Mayor McClung, Council Member Fraser, Council Member Grady and Council Member Muller,

At the March 20, 2007 Council Meeting, Adam Lundgren stated that the Ailanto lawsuits were a discussion item during that evenings closed session and that he would have a report on this issue for the April 3, 2007 Council Meeting.

Did Adam mean that there would be a report on the Highway1/Terrace Signalization Project? If so, will this item be on the meetings agenda? If this item is on the agenda, will the outcome of the project be decided at this meeting?

On December 15, 2006, there were many comments submitted to the City regarding the results of the Draft Environmental Impact Report, which also included a 9-page document signed by many of the Neighborhood residents. At the time when I submitted the Neighborhood comments to the City, I also dropped off a copy for each one of you. For your convenience, I have attached a copy to this e-mail. Please take the time to review all the comments submitted by the residents of the Community and include them in the decision making process. These comments were made in response to the DEIR but they express legitimate concerns that should be considered regardless of the status of the DEIR. I understand that you have consultants to advise you, but they don’t know our Community, you do.

I look forward to hearing from you. Please let me know if I can assist you in any way. I can be reached by e-mail at lucyhmb@aol.com.

Sincerely yours,
Lucy Lopez

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This topic flashed into my mind when I overheard some folks discussing the Terrace/Highway 1 signal light.
The reason it should be accepted by the community was so the owner of a landlocked piece of property could see the fruitiion of his plan to substantially profit by developing 63 homes of 5000 sq ft on a !00x100 sq ft lots before he dies.

Oh my gosh! . . . That's the kind of thing you think about at my age!

Aren't we all going to die?

I was brought back to reality, realizing that I was not in a position to engage a former San Mateo County Supervisor or to engage an attorney previously doing work for the Coastal Commission to help me achieve my dream.

What do you want to do before you die?

Jerry Steinberg
Half Moon Bay

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HMB City Operational Issues

On August 3,2006 the HMB Plannung Dept issued this amendment to the "Affected Agencies Via Certified Mail"
...this is more than a YEAR after the agencies were asked for comments on the "Unamended" EIR and the consulting firm has been working on gathering data for the "Unamended" EIR!

This amendment states "The project would also include... amendments to the City's Local Coastal Program Land Use Plan and General Plan Circulation Element would reflect the City's long-range policies and objectives with respect to the roadways in the project vicinity, and ensure that the project approval is consistent with the Land Use Plan and Circulation Element.

Questions:

1. Since the City's Circulation Element is a document in which the "CITY" is studied in "total", must a separate EIR studying the total city (or better ALL of the coastside) be done before the proposed stoplight at Terrace and Highway 1 even be considered?
2. Who pays the $500,000+ for the study?
3. 2000+ citizens have publically indicated by signing a petition that they do not want a stop light at Terrace and Highway 1. The present City Council has stressed the desire for the involvement of the public on issues of "Quality of Life" on the coastside.
4. After reading/participating in months of discussions on the Coastsider.com it would appear unclear as to how the "Circulation Element" "reflect(s) the City's long-range policies and objectives with respect to the roadways in the project vicinity (includes Hwys 1 and 92?) and ensure that the project approval is consistent with the Land Use Plan and Circulation Element.
Wow...it sure doesn't seem that there is any agreement yet on long range planning.

Jerry Steinberg

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Encroachment Permit From CalTrans for Proposed Traffic Signal at Terrace Avenue and Highway 1

Letter submitted to CalTrans - 6/25/06

Mr. Bijan Sartipi

District Director

State of California

Department of Transportation

111 Grand Avenue

PO Box 23660

Oakland, CA 94623-0660

June 25, 2006

Dear Mr. Sartipi,

Thank you for your letter dated June 20, 2006 acknowledging receipt of our recent correspondence.

In your letter you indicate, “We continue to await the city of Half Moon Bay ’s submittal of appropriate technical analysis and documents before any decision can be made on the proposed encroachment permit.” This would be for the proposed signal light at Terrace Avenue and Highway 1.

This letter is to alert you to a conflict in your accepting any data or documents from the City of Half Moon Bay on this encroachment permit.

The City professional staff is bound by an “out of court settlement agreement” that includes a “gag” order which does NOT allow them to disagree with the proposed signal light.

This agreement was concocted by a sub-committee of a previous city council that found it expedient to agree with this condition in order to obtain their goals.

In an exchange of comments with the senior signer of this agreement it was painfully clear that there was a complete lack of familiarity/understanding of the code of professional conduct required of a licensed professional engineer.

i.e. Rule 475 Code of Professional Conduct – Professional Engineering

(Department of Consumer Affairs – State of California.

I have asked Mr. Adam Lindgren, contracted City Attorney to look into the precedents for this “gag” order and am awaiting his promised response in the next few days.

While in college I participated in a work/study program sponsored by the California Division of Highways. I worked on inspection of roadways in the San Fernando valley area in southern California and on Highway 40 (now Hwy 80) bridges in the Cisco Grove area.

From “shaking rocks” for size grading, to “sticking grade”, to pushing a “profile graph wheel, to inspecting concrete “slump” with a “Kelly Ball”, to verifying the number of rotations of concrete supply trucks, I was trained in Professional Conduct by example.

My supervisor would “back me up” if I found things “out of spec” in those days with the “yellow book”.

In my first professional job with American Bridge/US Steel I found the earlier ethics training invaluable while the only field/safety engineer on a 1200 foot bridge 600 feet above the Rio Grande river outside of Taos, New Mexico.

During the past few months I have attended presentations by CalTrans engineers Mr. Keyhan Moghbel and Mr. Moe Amini on local coastside issues and congratulate CalTrans and its representatives on maintaining the highest ethical engineering standards.

Jerry Steinberg, CE

jerry@jerrysteinberg.com

591 Terrace Avenue

Half Moon Bay, California

94019

cc: Jackie Spier – Senator

Gene Mullin – Assemblymember

Richard S. Gordon – Board of Supervisors

Peter Douglas – Executive Director, Coastal Commission

Dain Anderson – Project Manager, MHA Environmental Consulting

Half Moon Bay City Council Members
Planning Commission HMB

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