Desert Rose Recap

Talk about town is that the Desert Rose vote was not understood by residents and observers. It is spoken about as a watershed moment in the public's expectations of the council. This email was forwarded to the LB. We don't know squat about Desert Rose or if it was actually a big deal. (Edited for brevity)

Dear Neighbors and Friends,

As promised, here is SDR’s recap and perspective of the City Council meeting on March 13th, D-Day.

It is with a heavy heart that we must report to you that it really was D-Day in Encinitas.  In fact, there were several D’s involved, the first being disappointing, followed by despicable and disheartening.  After hours of watching the City staff dance around questions posed by the Council and deride the work of the many experts that the community had presented, the Council turned a deaf ear to the all of the evidence provided in support of the Planning Commission’s decision.  When it came down to the time when the Council members had the opportunity to do right by the community and to stand by some of their campaign promises, they were intimidated by the threat of litigation.  Despite the work of at least eight Ph.D.’s who offered proof that the proposed development is inherently unsafe and will have significant impact on the environment, the Council ignored that body of work and succumbed to the fear of having to go to court.  Dr. Fred Frumin had it right in his opening argument that all of our experts could not have been universally wrong and theirs right.  If you listen to their comments, it appears evident that they had already made up their minds and they placated the public by allowing us to speak. 

The Mayor said that they had four options to consider and after stating only the first one (approval of the appeal), Tony Kranz interrupted that explanation and made a motion to overturn the Planning Commission’s ruling.  The other three options were not even brought up or considered.  They paid lip service to environmental protection and a mandated 50’ wetland buffer zone but even that was dropped from the conversation and omitted from their resolution because Kristen Gaspar repeatedly drove home the point that they might have to defend it in court.  Her other major concern was that a glass fire wall would require frequent cleaning for a type “A” person like herself.  It was apparent to everyone in the room that Gaspar, Kranz and Mayor Barth were going to vote against the community.  The only part [Shaffer] got right was when she commented that the City Staff had not done a very good job in their preparation of objective materials that would enable her to make “effective, informed, thoughtful” choices.  This concern about the low quality of the information that Staff supplied to the Council should have been stated and discussed at the beginning of the deliberation session.  Awareness of issues with the staff provided information potentially could have changed the focus of the discussions and changed the outcome.

Kranz lamented that he felt the “sword of Damocles” over his head.  What he and the others overlooked was the “grenade” that we had made available to them, in the form of compelling evidence and facts that should have at least caused them to require a full Environmental Impact Report.  They just lacked the courage to use it.  Instead, they gave in to the bluster of Marco Gonzalez and ultimately made a decision that will FOREVER change Olivenhain.  His position has always been that the Planning Commission and the City Council has no legal option but to approve the project and at least the Planning Commission had the courage to challenge that.  Despite Gonzalez’ assertion that “The presence of public controversy does not qualify as substantial evidence of potentially significant impacts.”, we offered substantial evidence, backed by thoughtful and scientific evidence that was completely discounted by the City staff.  That statement was not only arrogant and condescending, it suggested that only he is in possession of “facts”.

After a face-saving presentation by the City Staff, the applicant’s attorney was afforded 10 minutes to present their case.  Afterward,  the floor was opened to the public, at which time, much of our evidence and response to the staff’s most recent report was presented.  After the public testimony, the Mayor stated that the public portion was closed and only questions from them, to the staff, would be permitted.  They proceeded to ask questions of the Staff that seemed crafted to support the approval of the project.  The staff and fire marshal were very careful to make certain that their answers were beneficial to the developer.  Despite Mayor [Barth] insisting that the questions would only be of staff, at one point and without being asked to by the Council, their engineer for the project took the podium and gave testimony.  The Council continued to ask questions of this person.  This was clearly out of order and would not have been tolerated by any member of our group.  I commented to the Council that in the January meeting, despite one of our experts being in the room, not one clarifying question was asked of him, only the developer’s advocates were queried.

At the close of the public testimony period, the developer’s attorney was given the last word.  He used this opportunity to dismiss the data and facts that had been presented in opposition.  He chastised us for attempting to mislead the Council by presenting pictures that showed the condition of the wetland.  The fact is that they were his pictures, taken from one of his prior presentations that showed how bad the conditions are in the wetland and why it was so important to him to clean it up.  If they were not relevant to the wetland issues on this property, why were they used in support of their case?  He just berated Dr. Katzneslon’s traffic study, stating that he could not use data from Mexico as the basis for his study (he had not done so).  The reality is that this probably made little difference because it was obvious to most in the room that Council had made their decision long before that.

It is disappointing that the City Council lacked the courage and conviction to stand up for the community. 

Save Desert Rose Steering Committee


Is there a written explanation for the Council's decision somewhere? It would be good to link to that.