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Greenbelt Alliance In the News

June 21, 2002

Pushing the limits

Contra Costa residents say growth out of control

Streets are choked with traffic. The Gordillos' 4-year-old son, Joey, may have to attend a school outside the neighborhood this fall because the local one is full. Even the grocery store is congested.

"The Safeway store is packed. It serves about 20 developments," said Joe Gordillo, a certified public accountant who works in Dublin. "It's at capacity, that's the big gripe."

The Gordillos say enough is enough. They are among the residents, environmentalists and elected officials who oppose plans for 1,400 more homes and 4,000 more residents moving into one of the Bay Area's fastest growing suburbs.

Contra Costa supervisors will hold a final public hearing and possible vote Tuesday on the plan, which has become the focus of the latest skirmish in a battle over growth east of Danville and San Ramon that began more than a decade ago.

County officials approved a huge housing development in nearby Dougherty Valley in 1992 that is expected to become a mini-city of 30,000 people in the next decade. But four years ago, facing strong anti-growth sentiment, developers withdrew plans to build 5,330 homes in the Tassajara Valley.

This time, opponents are fighting just as hard. They claim the development would destroy scenic ridgelines and cause traffic congestion and water shortages.

"This decision will show the residents of Contra Costa County whether the Board of Supervisors represents their interests or those of powerful developers," said Evelyn Stivers of Greenbelt Alliance, an environmental group.

The 767-acre project site is made up of rolling hills dotted with trees, land now used mostly for grazing.

The separate but related proposals -- known as Alamo Creek and the Intervening Properties -- are in unincorporated southern Contra Costa east of Danville, and would be developed by Braddock & Logan, Ponderosa Homes and Shapell Industries of Northern California.

Shapell is building the nearby Dougherty Valley project, which is expected to be home to 30,000 people by 2015.

The Tassajara sites surround the Wendt Ranch Property, which was approved for a 323-unit subdivision in 1996 but has not yet been built. Proponents say the homes, more than 20 percent of which would be affordable to low- and moderate-income families, are badly needed.

The project comes after a booming decade in Contra Costa, which led the Bay Area in population growth, and recent attempts to slow development.

"(Back then) the Nasdaq was at 5,000. The question was how high is high?" Tom Koch, vice president of Shapell Industries, told Contra Costa supervisors at a recent meeting.

Then came the backlash. In 1999, residents of San Ramon, Livermore and Pleasanton formed the Citizens Alliance for Public Planning and sponsored ballot measures requiring voter approval of even modest-size developments.

The measures failed, but Pleasanton voters adopted a two-year moratorium on general plan amendments. And in 2000, Alameda County voters passed a Sierra Club-sponsored measure setting growth boundaries in the county's east end that blocked development of 12,500 dwellings planned north of Livermore.

Developers saw their influence over local politicians wane further when Contra Costa supervisors voted unanimously to tighten the county's urban-limit line. The current development would run to the boundary line.

San Ramon's planning commission voted against the current development proposal, saying it would overload area traffic. County Supervisor Donna Gerber, a slow-growth advocate, said the plan would severely cut into hillsides.

"You're just guaranteeing that 20 years from now, you're going to have landslides," said Gerber, who wants the project to be drastically reduced. "It's poorly designed, and we can do much better."

The Greenbelt Alliance, which advocates modest growth clustered near transit hubs, contends that water needed to supply the new homes could restrict supplies to the 1.3 million current customers of the East Bay Municipal Utility District. The problem would be greater during consecutive drought years, Stivers said.

Officials at Shapell, Ponderosa, and Braddock & Logan declined to comment on the criticisms or details of the project. Plans submitted to the county call for utility and transportation upgrades and show open space, an elementary school, parks and playfields built along with homes.

But Mark Goldberg, executive director of the Blackhawk Homeowners Association, is not convinced.
"Traffic congestion is already a problem on Camino Tassajara," said Goldberg. "It's very busy mornings and afternoons, especially when kids are being picked up and dropped off in the mornings."

But not everyone thinks more development is a bad idea. Don Wood, 67, a hay bailer whose family sold its 1,158-acre Danville ranch to housing developers, said the days of family farms are gone and the only hope of preserving the region's natural beauty is by embracing thoughtful development plans.

"My heart is agriculture; I don't want to see any more of it destroyed than is necessary," said Wood.

"(But) they've ruined it for farming, so why not build what people need."

But Joe and Wendy Gordillo, who paid $390,000 for their home, say prices for the new homes will be outside the range of working and middle-class residents.

"We understand the desire to buy a new home," said Joe Gordillo, 41. "(But) show me a policeman or teacher or firefighter who makes $70,000 a year - - that's what it'll take to buy one of those houses."

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Contra Costa supervisors will hold their final public hearing on the Alamo Creek and Intervening Properties project on Tuesday at 4 p.m. at the county administration building board chambers, 651 Pine St., Martinez.

E-mail Jason B. Johnson at jbjohnson@sfchronicle.com.

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