Digging at Crystal Cove Preceded Legal OK

CRYSTAL COVE —  State parks officials allowed a private developer to carve 10-foot-deep trenches inside a National Register historic district on parkland without obtaining final environmental clearance.

In what officials call a communications snafu, the developer of a proposed luxury resort conducted soil testing at Crystal Cove State Park in late January--including borings and the digging of five to 10 backhoe trenches--even though the testing had not received final approval under state environmental laws.

Three known prehistoric archeological sites lie within the 12-acre district, state records show. It is unclear if any digging occurred near those sites.

Work halted with the discovery that the state had not completed an environmental review, officials said Friday.

“What happened: You had a bureaucracy that overlooked something,” said Roy Roberson, a partner with developer Crystal Cove Preservation Partners. “I don’t think there’s any harm done.”

“It was a communications problem,” said Ken Colombini, spokesman for the state Department of Parks and Recreation, which operates the park between Newport Beach and Laguna Beach.

The proposed resort has emerged as one of Orange County’s hottest environmental controversies, with critics saying that a private resort has no place inside a state park--especially one with some of the region’s most spectacular coastal scenery.

The proposed $23-million resort project, hailed by the state as a pioneering public-private partnership, would include tourist units renting for $100 to $400 a night; a restaurant; three swimming pools; a fitness center; and a dive shop. Its developers include the owners of Post Ranch Inn, a Big Sur resort.

News of the backhoe work has raised the ire of some project critics who point out the resort still faces several stages of public review, including a Coastal Commission vote slated for 1999. Most were unaware the testing had taken place.

“I’m concerned about anything that advances the project, that denies us a right to comment about what’s going on,” said Murray Rosenthal, chairman of the state parks committee for the state Sierra Club, which opposes the project.

And two environmental attorneys contacted last week questioned whether the state had correctly applied the law when it approved future soil testing, including seven 24-inch-wide borings to depths of 30 to 80 feet. Parks officials have granted the upcoming testing a so-called categorical exemption, in essence freeing it from state environmental laws.

“The problem with the exemption is that it’s circumventing public review,” said Tara Mueller, an attorney with the Environmental Law Foundation, a public-interest law firm based in Oakland.

But Roberson, one of the project partners, said earlier that the state has not bent the law.

“The state did go to a lot of effort to make sure this met all the rules,” Roberson said.

“We were doing our damnedest to make sure there were no secrets,” he said, noting that testing notices were given to cottage residents. “I’m very concerned about trying to do everything by the rules on this project.”

*

The proposed resort would be centered in the Crystal Cove Historic District, a community of weather-beaten cottages clustered on the beach and adjoining bluffs. The colony is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the region’s “last intact example of vernacular beach architecture.”

The state and Crystal Cove Preservation Partners in September signed a 60-year contract, the longest of its kind, giving the partnership permission to develop and operate on 28 acres of state parkland, including the historic district. But the proposal still needs to undergo environmental review and votes by two key state panels.

Most of the 46 cottages are to be refurbished, with seven torn down and 14 new structures built. The developer began geotechnical testing in late January to learn more about issues like soil stability that will help govern project design, Roberson said.

“It’s a very common step in any development project,” he said. He noted that a small landslide recently occurred near one cottage.

The earth work began Jan. 26, and Roberson said he moved ahead after meeting with Jack Roggenbuck, the district parks superintendent, and conferring with Sacramento parks officials.

*

Roggenbuck told The Times on Tuesday that the soil work was done “with the knowledge of the park and the terms and the conditions of the contract” between the parks system and the developer.

And Roberson said, “I got a clear authorization to proceed from the people at state parks” in Sacramento. State officials told him they would file an exemption for the project, he said.

But the exemption had not been processed, due to a communications problem involving parks officials in Sacramento, Orange County and San Diego, said parks spokesman Colombini.

When the oversight was discovered, the developer and the state together decided to halt the project, he said. “We stopped it because we didn’t have the paperwork.”

But that was after the digging of five to 10 trenches and some borings, Roberson said--work that Colombini concedes was done without written review or approval under state environmental law.

State records released Friday show that parks officials have granted the remaining borings an exemption, saying that tests will be done away from historic features, known archeological sites and native vegetation. All excavations are to be backfilled the same day, the exemption says, adding that no impact on natural or cultural resources is expected.

But the state’s own evaluation of the remaining work suggests officials believe it could have an impact. Records dated Wednesday state that the future testing has “the potential to unearth cultural material which are presently unknown.” An archeologist should monitor six of the tests, the evaluation says.

In fact, the project manager states in the records: “I understand this project as proposed or modified may affect historical or archeological resources” and promises to ensure that protective measures are taken.

Under state law, an exemption such as that granted at Crystal Cove is not supposed to be used when there is a possibility that the work “will have a significant effect on the environment due to unusual circumstances.”

Thomas Adams, a Bay Area attorney specializing in environmental law, said Saturday that the term “unusual circumstances” could apply to land within a state park, within important coastal habitat, near historic or archeological features, or even subject to weather conditions like El Nino.

Adams said that although he is unfamiliar with the Crystal Cove project, courts have restricted the use of exemptions because there are no public hearings on such actions.

But Colombini said Saturday he has been told the exemption is correct.

“Especially once we make sure all the specialists are on site. That will mean it won’t have a significant effect on the resources,” Colombini said, noting that an archeologist will be present during the upcoming work.