Some Marin landowners wary of state plan to deal with rising sea
Mark Prado
Marin Independent Journal
06/27/2011
Sometime over the next century, huge shoreline swaths of Marin, including Hamilton Field, Highway 37 and the Tamalpais Valley could be under water if global warming causes the bay to rise by a meter, according to the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission.
Now the state agency is looking to amend its bay plan to ensure development and growth along those shoreline areas are not gobbled up by the sea.
But some landowners are wary of the plan, saying it could restrict future plans to build on their property.
"We are concerned about what will happen to new development," said Fred Grange, a San Rafael resident who owns about 100 acres with two partners near Home Depot in East San Rafael.
He worries new rules might stop him from building.
"If they take our 100 acres are they going to give us 100 acres on Mount Tam where the water can't reach?" he asked.
Presently the agency regulates buildings on land 100 feet from the shoreline. A proposed amendment would not give it additional jurisdiction, said Will Travis, executive director of the bay commission.
"It was never our intention to expand our jurisdiction," Travis said. "But we do want to create a strategy of protecting what we have now, and we should address that."
Proposed changes would give planners ways to handle the rise of the sea by a meter over 100 years. Among the language being considered: "The commission in collaboration with (others) should
formulate a regional sea level rise adaptation strategy for protecting critical developed shoreline areas and natural ecosystems, enhancing the resilience of bay and shoreline systems."
The bay commission staff hopes to have a report ready for approval by October.
But the amendment process has been mired in politics for a year over objections from some in the business community who say hand-wringing over future sea-level rise takes the focus away from the here and now.
Some are circulating an email announcement noting formation of a group of labor, business and property owners called the Protect Our Bayside Communities Coalition. It urges people concerned about the "over reaching effort by BCDC to further curtail development opportunities" to turn out for an agency meeting in Petaluma on Thursday.
"They're saying we need to focus on creating jobs — that we need to be focusing on the present," Travis said. "We're saying that ignoring the problem of sea level rise in the face of unemployment is not a prudent approach. We shouldn't be building something just to build something. We should be building it in the right places."
The real controversy will likely ensue when land trustees get a sense of just how expensive it is to raise a sea wall, the most likely form of short-term protection from rising sea levels. Adding miles of sea walls would cost millions of dollars.
