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Greenbelt Alliance In the News

November 9, 2005

East Contra Costa voters splitting on growth

With all precincts tallied, Antioch's Measure K had a 59 to 41 percent victory. Pittsburg's Measure P appeared secure with a 51.2 to 48.4 percent margin. However, in Brentwood, Measure L was losing 50.7 to 49.3 percent, trailing by 119 votes out of 8,549 counted.

It was unclear early Wednesday morning how many provisional and other ballots had not been counted and whether they could swing the outcome in either Pittsburg or Brentwood.

Antioch's Measure K would expand the line south of the city to include about 1,000 acres and 1,100 houses, most of them expensive, "executive-style" homes.

With its passage, the developer will spend $2 million on improvements to the Highway 4 bypass, and on arts, music and sports programs for the Antioch school district.

Pittsburg voters were favoring Albert Seeno III's proposal to expand the growth boundary around their city by about 1,400 acres, 551 of which could hold up to 1,400 new houses.

As part of a last-minute deal with state Sen. Tom Torlakson, Seeno agreed to a greenbelt along the Concord-Pittsburg border and to a doubling of the open space fee within the San Marco Hills project to $2,000 per house, among other things.

If Brentwood's voters accept roughly 2,100 acres into their city, the newly included land could hold up to 2,800 homes. Eight hundred acres would remain open space.

Brentwood's measure had fallen behind after leading in early tallies Tuesday evening. "I would sure think we're in good shape," Bob Nunn, whose family, longtime farmers and developers, sponsored Brentwood's initiative, said before the count turned. "A lot of things can change. You never know."

During the campaign, the Nunns benefited from a deal with the environmental group Save Mt. Diablo, the East Bay Regional Parks District and the Brentwood City Council.

The environmentalists agreed not to sue or fight the initiative at the ballot box, and the city agreed not to try to grow beyond the urban limit line.

Critics said that by adding new land to cities that still have plenty of "in-fill" land to build upon, voters are allowing more sprawl development in an area that is already suffering the effects of suburbanization.

But David Reid of the environmental group Greenbelt Alliance wasn't ready to concede victory to the developers late Tuesday.

"People want growth control and they want traffic relief and these measures promise it. I don't think they're going to deliver it," Reid said.

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