Coastal Commission double checks its decision

As plans to restore full tidal flooding to the Bolsa Chica wetlands

move forward, the California Coastal Commission will meet to verify that

plans it approved match reports drawn up by staff.

The Coastal Commission will meet at 8 a.m. Monday at the Westin Hotel

at Los Angeles International Airport.

Some of the items in the Bolsa Chica restoration plans that the

commission will focus on include excavation and new plantings, the ocean

entrance itself, habitat areas affected by construction of the inlet and

the reduction from six to four lanes of the Pacific Coast Highway bridge

that will cross over the inlet, said Coastal Commissioner and Huntington

Beach City Councilwoman Shirley Dettloff, who will attend the meeting.

“We’re determining that the actions the commission took are the

correct ones in the reports,” Dettloff said. “This is a routine

procedure.”

Commissioners present at the November meeting will be the only ones

allowed to vote at Monday’s hearing, Dettloff said.

The Coastal Commission approved the $100-million proposal to dig a

channel across Huntington State Beach to allow tidal flushing of 1,200

acres of wetlands at Bolsa Chica at its Nov. 13 meeting.

The plan was made possible when California Department of

Transportation officials announced that they were scrapping plans to turn

a four lane section of Pacific Coast Highway into a six lane bridge over

the tidal inlet a week prior to the Coastal Commission’s approval of the

inlet. Caltrans officials agreed to scale the bridge down to four lanes

after learning the commission intended to fight the expansion.

Construction of the inlet is expected to begin in 2003 and will take

about three years.

Bolsa Chica is home to a number of endangered species and rare plants.

It has been cut off from nearby salt water that once flowed through it

for 100 years.