There’s so much activity, information, activism, angst, legislation, confusion, obfuscation and outright consternation concerning the Los Cerritos Wetlands generally and, most recently, Sub-area 23 of those Wetlands specifically, that it’s tough for a layperson like me to keep track of it all.
The Los Cerritos Wetlands, existing as they do in a Coastal Zone, are protected up the wazoo (That’s a technical term formerly known to only a very select few laypersons like me. Having now seen that term employed in its proper context, you are hereby granted full authority to freely employ it in this context yourself).
These wazoo-istic protections come in the form of various federal, State and local laws that govern not only what can be done within their confines but precisely how things must be done if, indeed, someone gets to do them.
Some parts of these Wetlands are publicly owned and some are privately owned but they’re all, as mentioned, protected up the wazoo. Given both the prevalence and the predominance of these many protections, one can easily see how recent heavy equipment activity on privately-owned Sub-area 23 was met first with considerable confusion, then annoyance and anger and, ultimately, outright outrage and public protest.
Here’s the Cliff-notes version of what we know happened and when: Sometime in February 2009, former Sub-area 23 owner Tom Dean sold that parcel to Sean Hitchcock. When this occurred, Hitchcock claims, Mr. Dean told him that the Fire Department had recently issued an order to have the property cleared of weeds and debris. On March 20th, Mr. Hitchcock proceeded to do just that, hiring several pieces of heavy equipment to clear the entire site of vegetation and other debris and hauled in several large dump-truck loads of waste asphalt with the intent of leveling some parts of the property and making it easier for the heavy equipment to get in and out. The waste asphalt (the result of scraping the top layer off of various City streets) came from a City Public Service Yard on DeForest Avenue, where such materials are commonly stored for re-use of this type.
Several very eco-aware residents saw this activity in progress and rightly felt certain that no Permits could possibly have been issued for that sort of work on this sort of land and started calling various Council members who, in turn, called City Manager West who, in turn, responded directly to the site, assessed that the work was not properly Permitted, and ordered the work to be immediately stopped. Mr. West and other City officials left the site but some of the work still continued, despite his verbal order, and officials had to return and again order the work stopped and all heavy equipment removed from the site. Once this was accomplished the work did, indeed, stop.
But not, as we quickly learned, before several acres of wazoo-istically protected Wetlands were, in essence, completely destroyed.
“Destroyed” is, of course, a relative term. The land is still there, certainly, but the characteristics that qualified Sub-area 23 as part of these Wetlands in this Coastal Zone were, indeed, destroyed, and perhaps irrevocably. Much native flora was removed or plowed over and much native fauna displaced or killed outright in their various nests and burrows.
Let me be clear: I’m not an environmental activist. I use public transportation quite a bit. I pick up trash in my neighborhood when I walk my dog and I make sure any graffiti that is scrawled in the area is quickly removed or painted over. My family helps Justin and C.A.T. clean up our beach whenever we can and we only water our lawn twice a week, rather than the three times per week that is currently allowed.
But I prefer to leave the bigger-picture environmentalism to fine organizations like, in this case, the Los Cerritos Wetlands Land Trust, which organized a protest near the corner of Loynes and Studebaker last Friday.
I have to say, however, that this incident annoys me considerably. As a self-governed people in a free society we have seen fit to enact legislation to protect and preserve these Coastal Zones and Wetland Areas and to prevent precisely the sort of damage that was done on Sub-area 23 on March 20th. And yet the damage occurred anyway.
Normally I loathe over-regulating how private citizens dispose of their private property. It drives me crazy, for example, when some jurisdictions presume to dictate to home owners what colors they may use to paint their homes. But Mr. Hitchcock wasn’t painting his home; he was digging up, leveling and dumping asphalt upon acres full of wazoo-istically protected Wetlands. Mr. Hitchcock should have known better. Some believe he did know better, because he has made statements that tend to indicate that he did, but he proceeded anyway.
Some are outraged that the City didn’t somehow prevent this environmental destruction. Short of posting guards or placing 24-hour surveillance cameras on the site, I don’t really see how the City could have prevented this. Nor do we normally employ such measures where private property is concerned. Someone noticed and someone called and the City, through its elected and appointed officials, stopped the activity as soon as it was practical to do so. Given the cards it was dealt in this situation, and with the notable exception of a thus far un-named Public Works employee giving away our waste paving material without the proper authority to do so, the City functioned as it was supposed to.
Unfortunately, its functions proved far too late to stop the destruction that occurred.
Either way it’s crystal clear, to me and to many others that a lot of things were done that should not have been and a lot of things were not done that should have been. The comedy [sic] of failures surrounding this incident seem countless and, in most cases, inexcusable.
It appears that when Mr. Dean sold Sub-area 23, he may not have fully explained to Mr. Hitchcock the various restrictions upon and protections of the parcel. Or, if Dean did, that Hitchcock ignored them. According to City Planning Officer Derek Burnham, Mr. Hitchcock had, sometime before March 20, asked the City some general questions about development of the property and was advised that development could, indeed, occur but that various applications, approvals and Permits would be pre-requisite.
If Mr. Hitchcock understood this admonition, he appears to have forgotten or ignored it.
Mr. Hitchcock claims Mr. Dean told him that the Fire Department had ordered that weeds and debris be removed from the property. Mr. Dean has not, as yet, confirmed this, no written order to this effect can be located and, in fact, according to the City Development Services Department “initial review indicates no such action was given”.
There’s a lot of confusion about how this parcel is actually zoned. Some say “Commercial”; some say “Open Space”; some say “Brackish Pond and Wetlands Overlook” and still others say “Wetlands.” I recently asked this specific question, and others, of Councilman DeLong (in whose District I reside) and he assisted me in receiving a definitive answer from City Development Services: “Currently zoned as wetlands. Any other development would require change to the zoning”.
So here we are. The Los Cerritos Wetlands generally and Sub-area 23 specifically, are protected up the wazoo. No development can occur without applications to and Permits issued by any number of government agencies. And yet the unique Wetland characteristics of Sub-area 23 have been, perhaps, irreparably destroyed. The person responsible for the damage claims ignorance of existing law; compliance with a “weed and clear” order that, as far as we can tell, doesn’t exist and efforts to build some soccer fields for the community in a place that is not currently zoned for such use.
This whole story sounds more like something one might hear about very late at night on a radio show hosted by Art Bell or George Noory. You know, the show on which they routinely discuss alien abductions, crop circles and various government conspiracies.
I can hear it now: “In the next hour we visit Long Beach, California and the strange goings on in the Los Cerritos Wetlands…“Sub-area 23 or Area 51 – You Decide.”
I very much welcome your questions and your comments.