Home > Resource Center > In the News Home > Greenbelt Alliance in the News

Greenbelt Alliance In the News

September 29, 2005

Environmentalists slam ballot measures on urban limits

2 sides disagree on number of new homes that could be built if initiative is approved

Measure P in Pittsburg and Measure K in Antioch, which will be on the Nov. 8 special election ballot, are touted by supporters as "growth-control" measures, but representatives of the Sierra Club, Save Mount Diablo, the Greenbelt Alliance and the Mount Diablo Audubon Society say they will increase sprawl and lead to homes built across the Kirker Hills separating Concord and Pittsburg.

"They're deceptive bait-and-switch initiatives,'' said David Reid of the Greenbelt Alliance, as opponents began their campaign against the measures with a press conference overlooking the rolling hills east of Concord. "They promise growth control, but what they deliver is nothing more than thousands of homes.''

Seth Adams of the conservation group Save Mount Diablo said developers would grade ridgelines and fill in canyons in the Kirker Hills above the Concord Naval Weapons Station to build thousands of new houses visible not only from Concord but also Walnut Creek.

Supporters accused the environmentalists of mischaracterizing the measures and exaggerating the numbers of houses that could be built.

"They are 100 percent wrong,'' said Sam Singer, a spokesman for the Yes on Measure P campaign and for developer Albert Seeno III, who is pushing for the urban limit to be moved so he can build more houses. "That's simply not true and disingenuous on the part of the environmental groups.''

Reid estimated that Seeno would be able to build up to 4,000 new houses, but Singer said the Pittsburg general plan would allow a maximum of 1,700 homes. He also said that Seeno had sent a letter to Pittsburg city officials agreeing not to build any homes visible to the Concord Naval Weapons station area or central Concord.

The back-and-forth allegations are sure to grow during the next six weeks as the election draws near. Development battles are nothing new in Contra Costa County, especially in the fast-growing eastern area plagued by traffic congestion not only on backed-up Highway 4 but on two-lane country roads now used to avoid the highway.

Brentwood also has an urban limit line expansion on the ballot, Measure L, but some environmental groups agreed with the Nunn family developers not to oppose it after a compromise that would allow 2,800 new homes and preserve 800 acres of open space.

County supervisors tried to persuade the cities to go along with a countywide urban limit, which was first approved by Contra Costa voters in 1990, but the east county cities want to grow more than the county would allow. An urban limit line is required under Measure J, a half-cent transportation sales tax approved by county voters last year.

Environmental groups complained that Measure K in Antioch would allow construction of the long-stalled Roddy Ranch development outside current city limits. The measure would allow 700 mostly estate houses, down from the original proposal of 1,700, once Highway 4 is widened from Railroad Avenue in Pittsburg to L St. in Antioch.

Antioch voters fed up with rapid growth that pushed its population above 100,000 rejected a 240-unit apartment complex last year, leading the City Council to drop controversial plans for a 4,000-home development.

Tom McNell, who opposed the apartment project but supports Measure K, says the Roddy Ranch development is different because of the Highway 4 requirements, because the area is in the Brentwood school district instead of the overcrowded Antioch district and because the developer would donate $1 million to Antioch schools.

"This is the type of development that I've wanted to see in Antioch for years as a slow-growth advocate,'' McNell said "Antioch needs a high-end development. Growth if it's done right is not necessarily a bad thing.''

E-mail Erin Hallissy at ehallissy@sfchronicle.com .

###