"New Farm" would plough through Urban Limit Line

The proposed New Farm development would not merely place 193 houses on 770 acres of the greenbelt east of San Ramon and Danville, but threatens to undermine Contra Costa County's entire Urban Limit Line.

The ULL, approved by voters in 2006, puts the Tassajara Valley off-limits to development. Just the agreement of the county Supervisors (only Supervisor Susan Bonilla voted no) to consider the New Farm proposal outside the ULL sets a bad precedent. If the proposal is accepted, it could open the floodgates for similar development proposals throughout Contra Costa, putting thousands of acres of land at risk. Voters agreed on the ULL with the understanding that no urban or suburban development would be allowed beyond the line until at least 2026, when the whole General Plan will be reevaluated.

Developer FT Land LLC of Hillsborough, represented by Tom Koch, one the county's most influential political consultants, is attempting to skirt the law by labeling the proposed development as "rural". But New Farm is not rural, and it's no farm. The proposal would blatantly break the ULL by extending growth-inducing urban services - water and sewage lines - across the line. The New Farm 193-unit proposal would bring massive development to prime agricultural land where currently only one housing unit is allowed per 80 acres, to support true farms, but New Farm would subdivide the land into five-acre parcels. The developer is even requesting "density bonuses" allowing extra units in return for consolidating development on 40 acres.

The proposal is sprawl development, pure and simple.

Bringing in San Ramon

In case the county doesn't approve the project, the developer is pursuing a second insidious strategy. It has asked the city of San Ramon to extend its sphere of influence to the entire Tassajara Valley, including, of course, the New Farm parcels. This SOI amendment would serve both to pressure the Supervisors, and as an alternative procedure for allowing New Farm even without the county's concurrence.

The SOI amendment implies an impending annexation into a city. If the land is annexed, the city can extend its urban growth boundary (UGB) and approve development proposals throughout the valley. While the county ULL will remain in place until 2026, San Ramon's UGB will be re-evaluated in 2010, and the developers will most likely attempt to expand it through an election. If they are successful, the county's ULL will not apply to protect this land, and Tassajara will be lost to development. If the developers are successful in San Ramon, they will use this same strategy in other pro-development cities to open up a lot of land outside the county's ULL.

WhatYouCanDo

To receive e-mail updates about the campaign to protect the Tassajara Valley, contact Christina Wong of the Greenbelt Alliance at cwong -at- greenbelt.org or call (925) 932-7776.

Attend the Board of Supervisors and San Ramon City Council meetings about the New Farm development and annexing the Tassajara Valley; these are not yet scheduled.

Contact your Contra Costa supervisor at:

District I (El Cerrito, Richmond, San Pablo)
John Gioia
11780 San Pablo Ave., # D
El Cerrito, CA 94530
(510)374-3231
dist1 -at- bos.co.contra-costa.ca.us

District II (Hercules, Lafayette, Moraga, Martinez, Orinda, Pinole, Walnut Creek)
Gayle B. Uilkema
651 Pine St., #108A
Martinez, CA 94553
(925)335-1046
gayle -at- bos.cccounty.us

District III (Alamo, Brentwood, Walnut Creek, Danville, San Ramon, Byron, Discovery Bay, Blackhawk, Knightson)
Mary N. Piepho
309 Diablo Road
Danville, CA 94526
(925)820-8683
dist3 -at- bos.cccounty.us

District IV (Clayton, Clyde, Concord, Pacheco, Pleasant Hill, Walnut Creek)
Susan Bonilla
2151 Salvio St., #R
Concord, CA 94521
(925)521-7100
dist4 -at- bos.cccounty.us

District V (Pittsburg, Antioch, Oakley, Bay Point, Bethel Island)
Federal D. Glover
315 E. Leland Road
Pittsburg, CA 94565
(925)634-5915
dist5 -at- bos.cccounty.us

Tell them not to expand San Ramon's sphere of influence to include New Farm and the Tassajara Valley.

Greenbelt Alliance