Pacific City appeal possible

Jenny Marder

A developer is waiting in the wings for a decision on the proposed

Pacific City project, yet is ready to swoop in and fight it.

Officials from the Robert Mayer Corp., which owns the Hyatt

Regency Huntington Beach Resort & Spa and the Hilton Waterfront Beach

Resort that sit next to where Pacific City is slated to be built,

have said that if the Planning Commission approves the project at its

April 27 meeting, they will appeal it to the City Council.

The project lacks the necessary on-site parking, and fails to

adequately address traffic impacts, said Steve Bone, president of the

Robert Mayer Corp.

Projects never fail when they have too much parking, they fail

when they don’t have enough,” Bone said.

Bone also said that the project’s environmental report, which the

Planning Commission unanimously approved on March 23, fails to

consider the potential for bacterial contamination on the beach. All

storm flows should be redirected to the sanitation district before

flowing into the ocean, Bone said.

“The beach is the soul and the lifeblood of Huntington Beach,”

Bone said.

Storm water runoff from the Pacific City project would be filtered

through a storm water treatment system on site. From there it would

flow into storm drains and then into the ocean. It would not be

treated for bacteria.

“Our water quality system is good enough or better than what’s on

the Hyatt or Hilton property right now,” said Michael Gagnet, vice

president of developer Makar Properties. “We are doing what we feel

are the best practices available today. I think we can develop a

water quality plan will be successful.”

Gagnet said he’s “a little confused” by the appeal.

“[Bone] is a neighbor and hopefully his concerns are truly based

on the environmental impacts of this project,” Gagnet said. “But I

think that the questions that were raised by him have already been

answered everybody has a right for his voice to be heard and the

Robert Mayer Corp. is exercising that right.”

Any appeal will have to wait, however, because the Planning

Commission delayed voting for the project Tuesday night to give an

activist group two more weeks to choose an independent consultant to

oversee the clean up of the property, which was formerly a Chevron

Corp. oil field.

The Chevron Corp. is responsible for thorough testing and cleanup

of the land, which is being overseen by the Huntington Beach Fire

Department. The resident’s group, the Pacific City Action Coalition,

wants a third opinion.

Plans for Pacific City, which would stretch along the coast and be

bordered by Atlanta Avenue, Huntington and First streets, call for

516 homes, a luxury hotel, shops, restaurants and offices.

The coalition was founded to keep a close watch on the project’s

effect on the health of surrounding residents. Its members fear that

contaminated soil, if not properly cleaned, could pose a health

hazard to children playing in neighboring yards and others who

breathe airborne dust particles.

John Sisker, founder of the group, also fears that hazardous

chemicals in the soil were the cause of a rare form of cancer that

robbed the lives of four children who lived in surrounding homes and

died within a two-year period.

Fire Chief Duane Olson gave the group until April 9 to choose from

a list of five consultants, but Sisker said the coalition was too

rushed and needed more time to research the firms.

The Planning Commission agreed on Tuesday to grant the group an

additional 13 days to choose a firm.

A handful of residents holding yellow signs that said “Don’t

sacrifice children’s lives for the sake of development” backed the

resident’s request for more time.

John Ott, whose daughter Nikki died in 2001 of a rare cancer

called brain stem glioma, was one of those residents.

“If I were to stand here and tell you how [the disease] takes the

life of a child away, you would cringe.... I believe the cause is in

the contaminated soil and air in Huntington Beach.

Makar Properties is “in agreement that the site should be fully

remediated,” Gagnet said.

“I lost my father to cancer,” Gagnet said. “I know what it’s like

to lose someone and we’ll do whatever we have to insure this site is

clean.”

The Pacific City project will return to the Planning Commission

April 27.