Repairing Coastal Commission, Changing Sac'to Senate Committee From Part of the Problem to Part of the Solution</small>

LBReport.com

News / Perspective

Repairing Coastal Commission, Changing Sac'to Senate Committee From Part of the Problem to Part of the Solution

LBREPORT.com is reader and advertiser supported. Support independent news in LB similar to the way people support NPR and PBS stations. We're not non-profit so it's not tax deductible but $49.95 (less than an annual dollar a week) helps keep us online.

(Feb. 15, 2016, 11:15 a.m.) -- As carried live on LBREPORT.com for nearly eleven hours on Feb. 10, coastal protection advocates, environmental groups and individual taxpayers traveled from across the state (including several from Long Beach, a round trip of several hundred miles to and from Morro Bay) to voice dismay and alarm over a Feb. 10 agenda item indicating that some publicly unidentified Commissioners sought for publicly unidentified reasons to dismiss the Coastal Commission's coastal protective Executive Director.

Following the public's impassioned testimony unanimously in support of the Executive Director and against his dismissal, with several public speakers calling for openness in deliberations, the Commission defeated a motion to deliberate in public, then retreated into closed session and voted by the slimmest 7-5 margin to dismiss the agency's Executive Director, an action unprecedented in the 40+ year history of the Coastal Commission.

Long Beach Councilman Roberto Uranga joined in voting to defeat a motion to deliberate in public (which would have shown whether vaguely stated internal issues were pretextual camouflage for other issues), then cast what amounted to the deciding vote behind closed doors (tally released after vote) to fire the Coastal Commission's Executive Director.

[Scroll down for further.]

The process by which Long Beach Councilman Uranga arrived on the CA Coastal Commission, and his Commission predecessor now-Mayor Robert Garcia arrived and exited the Commission, are a big part of this story. Uranga and Garcia were both chosen by the state Senate Rules Committee, one of three sources for appointing Coastal Commissioners and the only one that acts in a collective action. The other Coastal Commission appointers are individuals: the Governor (whose appointees serve at his pleasure) and the Assembly Speaker (whose appointees serve for fixed terms.

For years, the state Senate Rules Committee (current membership: Senators DeLeon, Mitchell, Leyva [Dems] + Runner, Cannella [Repubs]) has prevented public and the press access to its proceedings that appoint Coastal Commissioners. The Committee doesn't publicly agendize Coastal Commission appointment proceedings. It orders the public and the press to leave the Committee meeting room during Coastal Commission appointment proceedings. It doesn't allow testimony pro and con on prospective Coastal Commission appointees. It doesn't release materials submitted by prospective Coastal Commission appointees. It doesn't release minutes or audio/video recordings of what it does in choosing appointees to the Coastal Commission, one of the state's most powerful decisionmaking bodies.

The Committee applied that non-transparent process (under different membership) in early 2013 when it chose Long Beach Councilmember/Vice Mayor Robert Garcia to fill the remaining months of an exited Commissioner, then gave him a full four year term in mid-2013. Garcia's appointment raised eyebrows locally:

In December 2011, Garcia was one of only three Councilmembers (of eight voting) to approve a proposed development at 2nd/PCH [Seaport Marina hotel site] that the Coastal Commission's LB office staff advised city staff not to advance on grounds it raised procedurally issues under the Coastal Act. The development was also opposed on its merits by the Los Cerritos Wetlands Land Trust (represented by LB attorney/former Coastal Commissioner Mel Nutter) and by multiple environmental advocates.
During a Nov. 2010 quasi-judicial City Council hearing on a resident's appeal under the CA Environmental Quality Act, Garcia was captured on video typing or texting on his computer during sworn hearing testimony. Garcia then went on to second a motion to overrule the resident's appeal (which raised issues over handling of toxics in sludge unearthed in cleaning up Colorado Lagoon.) [Garcia's emailed response to LBREPORT.com at the time: "I may have sent a couple texts for probably no longer than 1 or two minutes total. It is common for me to send messages to my staff, or respond to them during a council meeting. They provide us with information and vice versa."]

In 2013, LBREPORT.com made a request under the CA Legislative Open Records Act to view materials that Garcia had submitted to the Committee in pursuing his Coastal Commission appointment; Committee staff refused to release any materials.

After gaining a four year fixed Commission term, Garcia's campaign for Mayor of Long Beach held an October 2013 event at the San Fernando Valley home of CA Coastal Commission member Wendy Mitchell (first appointed by Governor Schwarzenegger, continues to serve at Governor Brown's pleasure, was among those who voted to fire the Exec. Director.) The Garcia campaign invitation told recipients that Garcia was "the pro-business candidate, and wants Long Beach to strengthen it's [sic] name, 'The International City,' by making it an economically booming, world-class city that businesses want to be a part of." [The fundraiser was privately organized and to our knowledge didn't use any state or public resources.]

After spending record sums in the Mayor's race and receiving roughly 52% of the vote, Garcia was informed by the state Attorney General's office that within 90 days of becoming Mayor he'd have to exit the Coastal Commission by operation of law; as LB's non-voting Mayor, he no longer had his Coastal Commission eligibility as a voting Councilmember.

That set off a mad dash by some in Sacramento to change the state law. On August 28, 2014, CapitolWeekly.net reported that Garcia's "allies in the state legislature were pushing what it called the "hastily amended bill" and said critics note that Garcia "has received campaign donations from lobbyists, land-use experts, developers and others. CapitolWeekly.com said state Senator Ricardo Lara (D., Long Beach/Huntington Park) is reportedly the "driver behind the bill." Amid media attention, Dem leadership declined to advance the bill; it failed passage and Garcia had to exit the Coastal Commission.

That's what brought Long Beach Councilman Uranga to the Coastal Commission; the state Senate Rules Committee chose him in early 2015 to fill the Garcia opening. A few months later, while a new bill advanced (SB 798) with verbiage that would let Mayors without voting power (like Garcia) serve on the Coastal Commission, Commissioner Uranga candidly told the July 8, 2015 Coastal Commission meeting that he tried to appoint Long Beach Mayor Garcia as his voting Coastal Commission alternate. "As a consequence of my being here [resulting from Mayor Garcia having to step down], I did nominate the Mayor to be my alternate, and there is a holding pattern on that until we see what results from [SB 798]," Commissioner Uranga stated. The bill became law but Uranga hasn't named anyone as his Commission voting alternate...yet.

[Feb. 17 update: Coastal Comm'r Uranga Recommended Mayor Garcia As His Coastal Comm'n Voting Alternate Last Year, Matter Is Now Pending In State Senate Rules Committee]

On Feb. 1, 2016, 35 former Coastal Commissioners and their alternates released a letter supporting Executive Director Lester. Long Beach Mayor Garcia (as well as Vice Mayor Suja Lowenthal, a former alternate) weren't among those signing that supportive letter.

As a coastal city, Long Beach has much at stake with a large coastal zone that some have long sought to develop further. In 1977, the City enacted low profile planned zoning in southeast Long Beach (SEADIP) while accepting density and higher rise development downtown. LB City Hall is currently updating/revising SEADIP with a hired consulting firm that has already invited discussion of higher rise, more intense development...but a Council majority couldn't approve those changes on its own; it would need Coastal Commission approval.

So...what do you think would happen to SE LB if the Coastal Commission with Commissioner Uranga (or as Uranga has previously suggested voting alternate Garcia) were asked by voted action of the LB City Council to approve higher heights and greater density in the SEADIP area?

In the wake of the Coastal Commission's Feb. 10 vote, state Senate Rules Committee chair Sen. Kevin de León (D, Los Angeles) issued a Feb. 11 statement reciting that "The Coastal Commission's recent internal disputes culminated in an ugly turn of events yesterday that should have been avoided. The Commission and its staff have to work out their issues and regain focus on the very important mission of preserving our coast for future generations."

But Sen. de León and his Committee appointed Councilman Uranga to the Coastal Commission, and as Mr. Uranga himself candidly stated, he's on the Commission now because former Councilman, now Mayor, Garcia no longer is. The common factor: both men were appointed in state Senate Rules Committee proceedings not public agendized, from which the public and press were banned, witnesses pro and con weren't heard, and decisions were done in the dark. The Coastal Act empowers the state Senate Rules Committee to appoint a number of Coastal Commissioners...but the Committee doesn't have to do so in secret.

Committee chair Sen. De León should announce reformed practices forthwith for his Committee's future Coastal Commission appointments that include some basics: publicly agendized Coastal Commission appointment proceedings; public and press presence welcomed, not banned; public testimony, pro and con, on Coastal Commission appointees; public access to documents submitted by prospective Coastal Commission appointees; Committee questioning of prospective appointees in public; and a publicly recorded vote on the Committee's Coastal Commission appointees.

These aren't radical steps. They're basically what the public expects in appointments to lesser positions. They the minimum that California taxpayers should expect before giving individuals the power to protect or permanently damage California's coast.

Opinions expressed by LBREPORT.com, our contributors and/or our readers are not necessary those of our advertisers. We welcome our readers' comments/opinions 24/7 via Disqus, Facebook and moderate length letters and longer-form op-ed pieces submitted to us at mail@LBReport.com.