Thanks primarily to Proposition 12, the parks and wildlife bond act passed by California voters in March 2000, the Coastal Conservancy was able to make significant progress between October 2000 and January 2001 in improving public access and protecting natural resources along the coast and around San Francisco Bay. With the state’s economy strong and healthy, the Conservancy’s ability to undertake creative projects with its partners was also expanded by legislative appropriations, the Governor’s Challenge Grant Program, and a healthy infusion of contributions to local land trusts and other Conservancy partners. Recent projects include:

Los Angeles River Projects

In December the Conservancy authorized the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers Watershed Council to award over $600,000 of Conservancy funds for resource enhancement and public access projects along the Los Angeles River and its tributaries. The Conservancy had authorized this funding to the Council last June, subject to approval of specific projects. The Council reviewed 13 proposals and recommended that six be funded. It selected three backup projects to be funded only if one or more of the others proved unworkable.

Six grantees and projects were authorized for funding by the Council and the Conservancy. One has since been withdrawn. Those remaining are:

• City of South Gate: $100,000 to prepare a riparian habitat restoration plan for an 8.5-acre parcel along the Los Angeles River
• North East Trees: $63,005 to prepare a bikeway and greenway plan for the stretch of the Los Angeles River from Cypress Park (Los Angeles) to Maywood
• National Audubon Society: $116,110 to prepare a habitat restoration plan for Ernest E. Debs Regional Park on Arroyo Seco
• Friends of the River: $86,562 to prepare a hydrodynamic study of Tujunga Wash
• Friends of the River: $88,297 for surface and subsurface water sampling in the River next to Taylor Yard.

The sixth will be one of these:

• Friends of the River: $92,758 for wetland and riparian mapping of the Los Angeles River Watershed
• Arroyo Seco Foundation: $179,286 to prepare a stream restoration plan for part of Arroyo Seco
• Friends of the River: $29,243 to prepare a design study for expanding the Los Angeles River Greenway in the San Fernando Valley.

Part of the current authorization will be used by the Watershed Council for administration. The Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers Watershed Council is a consortium of government agencies, community and environmental groups, businesses, and academic institutions seeking to prevent or resolve problems in the watershed in a cooperative, collaborative manner.

Historic Ranch on Gaviota
Coast to Be Preserved

People have been holding meetings, leading tours, and giving presentations on the importance of preserving the Gaviota Coast for several years now. State legislators have budgeted millions of dollars for this purpose for two years in a row. The first major conservation purchase is finally under way. In October, the Coastal Conservancy allocated up to $4 million to enable the Land Trust of Santa Barbara to proceed with the purchase of the 800-acre Arroyo Hondo (J.J. Hollister) Ranch as a natural and historic preserve for the public to visit, study, and enjoy.

The ranch extends from the ridgeline of the Santa Ynez Mountains to the ocean, on both sides of a year-round creek. It has changed little in the past 150 years. Arroyo Hondo Creek, which starts in Los Padres National Forest, is habitat for steelhead trout, red-legged frogs, and other species. Peregrine falcons, sharp-shinned hawks, four species of owls, mountain lions, and black bears have been seen in the canyons. Steep canyon walls with dramatic sandstone formations, fern grottos, granite ravines, and sweeping views of the ocean leave visitors in awe. Hiking opportunities are spectacular. Ranch structures include an 1840s adobe residence, a barn, corrals, a group campground, a bridge, several acres of fruit trees, and three wells.

The Santa Barbara Land Trust obtained an option to buy the ranch after almost a year of negotiations with 17 partial owners. The funds from the Coastal Conservancy represent about two-thirds of the purchase price. The land trust intends to raise the rest from public and private sources.

Monterey’s Window-on-the-Bay
Opens Wider

The Conservancy chipped in another $1 million in Proposition 12 funds last December to enable the City of Monterey to buy 4.5 acres on the bay side of Del Monte Avenue, east of the municipal wharf, for its Window-on-the-Bay project. The purchase will enable the City to move the Coastal Recreational Trail away from Del Monte Avenue, separating bicyclists and pedestrians from vehicular traffic.

The City has an option to purchase the property for just under $4 million from Catellus Development Corporation. In addition to the newly approved funds from the Conservancy, it will use its own funds and $600,000 remaining from a $2 million Conservancy grant approved in December 1999 for Window-on-the-Bay. Since 1981, nine of 16 properties the City wants to include in this project have been acquired, and seven of these have already been converted to parkland.

The Conservancy approved $3 million to the American Land Conservancy last December, enabling this land trust to buy conservation and trail easements appraised at $4.2 million on a coastal farm just south of Half Moon Bay in San Mateo County.

The 534-acre property, Purisima Farms, lies on both sides of Highway 1 and has about a mile of ocean frontage, with over 4,000 feet of sandy beach. It is bordered on the north and south by the Cowell Ranch, on which the Coastal Conservancy acquired easements in 1988 in a joint effort with the Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST). POST has owned Purisima Farms since 1996 and will continue to lease the property’s 250 acres of agricultural land to its current tenants, who grow artichokes and brussels sprouts.

The trail easements will allow a three-mile extension of the Coastal Trail to be built across the Cowell and Purisima properties that will eventually link with upland trails leading to the ridge and over to San Francisco Bay. The conservation easements will permanently protect farmland and prevent subdivision or significant development on 300 acres of coastal lands that, according to the Department of Fish and Game, support as many as 120 different wildlife species. The endangered San Francisco garter snake and threatened California red-legged frog inhabit two ponds and two miles of riparian corridor along Purisima Creek, along the northern border of Purisima Farms.

Eventually, the Land Conservancy expects to transfer the easements to a local public agency such as the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District. POST will apply the funds it receives for sale of the easements to its ongoing conservation work. Of the Conservancy’s contribution, $2 million will come from federal transportation grant funds, and $1 million from Proposition 12.

Mori Point Headland Protected

In September the Trust for Public Land (TPL) seized a fleeting opportunity to acquire Mori Point, a headland that protrudes several hundred feet into the ocean just south of the main beach in Pacifica. Conservation organizations have sought to protect Mori Point since at least the 1970s. In December the Conservancy granted $1 million to TPL to reimburse it for part of the acquisition cost.

The nonprofit land trust bought the property at auction for $3.3 million, using its own capital and borrowed funds. Since 1984 owners had proposed two major developments, one for a hotel/conference center and 60 homes, another for a casino.

This 105-acre headland property, north of Rockaway Beach, offers spectacular views of San Pedro Point to the south and, on clear days, Fort Funston, the Marin headlands, and Point Reyes to the north. At lower elevations, freshwater wetlands provide habitat for the endangered San Francisco garter snake and the threatened California red-legged frog. A popular levee-top trail leads to the point from Sharp Park Beach and Pacifica Pier. A trail link could be established between Mori Point and Rockaway Beach to complete the Coastal Trail stretch between Pacifica Pier and San Pedro Point.

TPL plans to transfer Mori Point to the National Park Service for inclusion in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, but the Park Service does not expect to have funds to buy the property from TPL before 2002. The Pacifica Land Trust has initiated a local fundraising campaign that so far has brought in $85,000 in donations from over 200 individuals to reimburse TPL.

Preserve in Alameda
County to Grow

The East Bay Regional Park District will add 320 acres to the Brushy Peak Regional Preserve with the help of the Conservancy, which last December approved $300,000 in Proposition 12 funds toward the $1 million purchase. The park district will contribute the bulk of the acquisition cost.

The property, now owned by the Weaver Family Trust, is in an unincorporated area of Alameda County just north of the city of Livermore. It is part of a 20,000-acre wildlife corridor that extends north to Mount Diablo and on to Black Diamond Mines Regional Park in eastern Contra Costa County. It provides habitat for a variety of species, offers spectacular ridgetop views, and is part of the designated regional trail route between Del Valle State Recreation Area in eastern Alameda County and the Delta Shoreline in eastern Contra Costa County. A road that leads from I-580 in Livermore to the Weaver property will give the public a new access route to the Brushy Peak Preserve. The park district earlier bought 800 acres with the help of $300,000 from the Conservancy, adding to 669 acres purchased in 1994 by the Livermore Area Recreation and Parks District.

Richmond’s Ferry
Point Pier to Be Restored

The East Bay Regional Park District will restore about 250 feet of Ferry Point Pier, at Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline in Richmond, with the help of $492,500 in Proposition 12 funds approved by the Conservancy in October. The pier, built mostly of wood in 1899, was the western terminus of the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad. Ferry Point was the first western U.S. port to allow direct transfer of railroad cars to barges, and its construction marked the beginning of industrial development in Richmond. Commercial use of the pier ended in 1975, and in 1984 a fire damaged it severely.

The park district intends to restore and open this part of the pier for fishing and other public recreational use while also preserving it as a historic landmark. It will contribute $479,500 to the project; an additional $376,000 will come from a federal transportation grant.

Deer Island Preserve
to Double in Size

With the help of $340,000 of Proposition 12 funds approved by the Conservancy in October, the Marin Audubon Society has bought 84 acres with seasonal freshwater wetlands that provide foraging and resting areas for shorebirds and waterfowl, as well as a refuge from storms and rough water for diving birds wintering on San Francisco Bay. This acreage will be added to the 126-acre Deer Island Preserve in Novato, along with 60 acres being donated to the Society by an adjacent private owner, expanding the reserve to more than twice its current size. The Society will convey both properties to the Marin County Open Space District, which owns and manages the preserve. The Open Space District has provided $42,000 for the purchase.

New Entrance Road
to Hood Mountain

In December the Conservancy approved $217,000 to help the Sonoma County Regional Parks Department to repair the entrance road into 1,450-acre Hood Mountain Regional Park, east of Santa Rosa in the Mayacamas Ridge, and allow the reopening of its main parking and picnic areas.

Built in 1972, the mile-long entrance road was repeatedly damaged by landslides and erosion, and has been closed to vehicles since 1988. Visitors must park in a makeshift area and hike down the steep road to the picnic areas and trailhead. Once the road is repaired, the public will be able to reach 15 miles of multipurpose trails in Hood Mountain Regional Park and trails in the adjacent state-owned McCormick Sanctuary and Sugarloaf Ridge State Park.

New Trail in Sebastopol

In January the Coastal Conservancy approved $258,000 from Proposition 12 funds to enable the City of Sebastopol to build a three-quarter-mile trail circling a 60-acre site, and restore oak woodlands at the Laguna de Santa Rosa, the Russian River’s largest tributary.

The Laguna feeds one of the largest freshwater wetlands in northern California, but over the last 170 years it has been cleared, filled, channeled, drained, and developed into a patchwork of agricultural, residential, and commercial uses.

The new four-foot-wide trail will connect to the Joe Rodota Regional Trail, which runs from Santa Rosa to Sebastopol and on to the Russian River. Native oak woodlands and savannas will be restored and alien vegetation removed along the trail corridor. Much of this work will be done by volunteers who, under the city’s Laguna Keepers program, have already planted hundreds of native trees and shrubs in the area over the last two years.

The City currently leases the 60 acres to the Barlow Company, which uses it as a disposal site for apple processing waste. The company has agreed to take part in the restoration. The Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation, Circuit Rider Productions, and Questa Engineering will also help with the project. The loop trail complements a comprehensive restoration and public access planning effort undertaken by the Sonoma Land Trust with $80,000 from the Conservancy, approved last October.

$11.4 Million for Coastal
and San Francisco Bay Trails

The Coastal Conservancy approved a total of $11.4 million of Proposition 12 money last December for three major trail projects along the coast and around San Francisco Bay.

Almost $7.4 million goes to the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) to provide funding for the San Francisco Bay Trail Project, which is building a 400-mile trail around the entire Bay shoreline, linking parks and open spaces. So far, about half of this trail network has been completed, with the help of more than $7 million from the Conservancy. The funds most recently approved will go toward new and ongoing projects. Several trail gaps will require costly property acquisitions, and some trail sections must be realigned to accommodate wetland restoration projects that were not anticipated in the original Bay Trail Plan.

The Bay Area Ridge Trail Council will receive over $3.4 million from the Conservancy toward the completion of the San Francisco Bay Area Ridge Trail, which also will eventually be 400 miles long, running along or near ridgelines and also linking parks and open spaces. So far, 220 miles are in place.

To advance work on the California Coastal Trail, which is to run the entire length of the California coast, the Conservancy approved $600,000 to Coastwalk, a nonprofit organization, to enable it to develop detailed plans and maps of the Oregon-to-Mexico trail.

To protect one of the most magnificent stretches of the Big Sur coastline from being subdivided into luxury estates, the Coastal Conservancy approved $5 million to the Trust for Public Land (TPL) in February so that the land trust can acquire Bixby-Ocean Ranch for public use and resource protection.

The 1,226-acre property lies on both sides of the highway, extending for about two miles south of the Bixby Bridge and reaching from the ocean into the foothills of the Santa Lucia Mountains. The views it offers are world-famous. It has two accessible sandy beaches, two creek valleys, redwood groves, broad coastal terraces, and includes Hurricane Point, Sierra Hill, and other landmarks. Coastal and mountain trails already exist on the property and more can be built. There are areas suitable for campgrounds and day uses. TPL expects to acquire the ranch by the end of August and to convey it by March 2002 to the U.S. Forest Service for management.

The estimated purchase cost will be $26.25 million. The landowner, Woodside Development of Las Vegas, bought the ranch about a year ago for about $10 million from the heirs of Allen Funt, creator of Candid Camera shows, who had owned it since 1977. The developer had discovered what the Funts apparently did not know: that 19th century deeds divided the property into nine parcels. After confirming the legality of these parcels with the Monterey County planning department, Woodside Development bought the ranch, intending to sell it as nine individual home sites.