Butte Creek Canyon residents get their ag designation back

Opponents of a change that could allow increased residential development in Butte Creek Canyon broke into applause Tuesday afternoon when the Board of Supervisors voted to quash that change.

The vote returned the draft General Plan 2030 land use designation for land along Centerville Road to an "agriculture" designation.

The vote came after 31Ú2 hours of sometimes emotional testimony.

In January, during a two-day workshop on proposed land use designations, Jim Mann with Rural Consulting Inc. came before the supervisors representing the Dan Allen family of Poway, to request a 205-acre parcel adjacent to Centerville Road, about a mile and a half east of Honey Run Road, be changed from "agriculture" to "foothill-residential."

The agriculture designation would require a minimum 20-acre parcel for a residence. Foothill-residential could allow for residential parcels as small as one acre.

On a 3-2 vote, with Supervisors Bill Connelly, Kim Yamaguchi and Steve Lambert in favor and Jane Dolan and Maureen Kirk opposed, the land use designation was shifted.

At the time, Dolan predicted canyon residents might have something to say about that vote.

Almost immediately, a coalition of canyon residents asked the board to revisit the issue so they could have their say. Tuesday, the residents packed the supervisors chambers well beyond the official 190 capacity to make themselves heard.

Mann and Allen were the only people to speak in favor of keeping the foothill designation.

Allen told the board that while he is a "big-box developer" from the San Diego area, he has had family in Butte County since the 1880s and he grew up in Los Molinos.

He said the ag designation would allow him to build, but he would have to build "mini-ranches" that would cause "sprawl." Under the foothill-residential zone, he could cluster the residences on about 45 acres at one end of his 205-acre parcel. He claimed the result would be more open space overall.

Mann said the land is not suitable for grazing — which is what would be the primary use under the ag rules — but is suitable for some "high-quality" foothill-residential homes.

Allen also said if the board reversed itself and returned to the ag designation, "I could live with that."

For the next 21Ú2 hours, nobody had a good thing to say about the idea of foothill-residential uses.

Nancy McCune, a canyon resident, narrated a computer slide show presentation for the board, spotlighting the wildlife that lives in the canyon and the natural beauty of the area.

She urged the supervisors to "support the rural character of Butte Creek Canyon."

Allen Harthorn, volunteer executive director of the Friends of Butte Creek, pointed to the critical nature of the creek to the survival of spring run salmon. He said "high-density" development has no place in the canyon.

Canyon resident Sam Yanez urged the board to go further than to just reverse its previous decision and consider some sort of a conservation designation that would ban such development in the future.

After hours of testimony, it only took minutes for the panel to make a decision.

Paradise Supervisor Yamaguchi moved that the agriculture land use designation be reinstated for Allen's property and eight other parcels that had been swept into the designation change in January.

Dolan seconded the motion, and it was passed with a unanimous voice vote.

Reprinted from the April 14. 2010 Enterprise-Record.