Marin County voters will decide whether to restrict the use of the San Geronimo Valley Golf Course, following a decision on Tuesday by the Board of Supervisors to place the initiative on the March 2020 ballot. Yet the initiative itself is insufficiently clear in its demands, county officials say, and could lead to further tangles.
Brought forward by San Geronimo Valley real estate agent Niz Brown and her son Matthew J. Brown, the initiative would prevent the supervisors, the county and the golf course’s owners from making any change in the primary use of the property without the approval of a majority of Marin voters. It would also amend the language of the San Geronimo Valley Community Plan to mandate the retention of golf as the land’s primary use. Although the owners would not be forced to operate the property as a golf course, they would need to jump through a set of procedural hoops to change its primary use from golf. Before any change in use could be submitted to voters, county officials would have to prepare for the Board of Supervisors an economic study on the historic use of the course, a fiscal impact analysis and a report on environmental impacts. The Registrar of Voters has estimated that the cost of placing such an initiative on the ballot will range from $14,000 to $22,000.
In January, after the initiative was verified, supervisors were tasked with deciding whether to implement the petition’s request, approve the initiative for the ballot, or first commission a report examining the proposal. They opted for the report, asking staff to pay special attention to how the initiative would require the property to be operated and maintained as a golf course. They also asked for clarity on the initiative’s possible impacts on the property’s water rights and property value.
The resulting report, prepared by the staff of the Community Development Agency, concluded that the language of the initiative was unclear regarding what specific modifications would be restricted, and what would mandate a property owner to mount a campaign.
“There are a number of areas where it’s going to lead to future challenges for the C.D.A. and the county to interpret to what extent a proposed change would trigger a need to send this to the voters,” said Tom Lai, assistant director of the development agency. “One of the three most blatant areas where it’s confusing has to do with proposed language in zoning code, [which] basically says any change could trigger this vote.”
As an example, Mr. Lai went on, “the initiative uses the language ‘including but not limited to modifications in landscaping.’ Well, what does that mean? Letting grass grow back and not mowing? Would that be considered modification to landscape? It sets in motion this procedural process for the owner to get approval from the county, and for the county to send it to people for a vote before we could give approval for the owner not to maintain the course.”
The initiative also “creates a conflict, because we typically don’t require land use approval for someone to not maintain their garden—it creates a conflict with usual land use regulations,” he said.
The golf course property holds an appropriative right from the State Water Resources Control Board to divert 20 acre-feet per year of water from Larsen Creek. The staff report notes that appropriative rights are based on continuous use; if the initiative slows down or blocks the approval of a new use, it could potentially result in losing the riparian rights due to nonuse.
Lastly, the report concluded that the initiative would have a minimal effect on county revenue.
The fight over the future of the 157-acre property began in November 2017, when the county began an effort to convert the course into parkland. A group called the San Geronimo Advocates, who wanted to preserve the course for golf, sued Marin County and, a year later, a judge ruled that the county had to perform a California Environmental Quality Act analysis before it could complete a purchase of the property. The decision effectively ended the county’s involvement with the land.
The course is now owned by the Trust for Public Land, which initially purchased it under the assumption that the county would buy it from the nonprofit within two years. Though the county was paying for the course’s upkeep during the litigation, golf operations ceased in December.
During the public comment period on Tuesday, a handful of residents spoke out against the initiative. They acknowledged that the supervisors’ options were few—to adopt the initiative or send it to the ballot—and urged them to do the latter.
“We understand that your hands are tied at this point, that you have two options, and so we support placing it on the ballot in 2020,” said Barbara Bogard of the Sierra Club’s Marin chapter.
She also voiced a concern brought up by residents and the supervisors themselves, over whether the initiative would set a precedent for zoning through the ballot box. “We continue to be very concerned about the terrible precedent this initiative would have for land use planning in Marin County, as it eliminates local control,” Ms. Bogard said.
One resident asked for the petition to be adopted immediately, while another, Pat Ravasio, suggested the county bypass “this circus of a campaign” by convincing Ms. Brown to withdraw her petition. “She sees the writing on the wall, she sees how it’s going to go down and be awful,” Ms. Ravasio said, adding, “I think she thought they were trying to save something they loved.”
County counsel Brian Washington said the petitioners could withdraw the petition until 88 days before the election.
“I would love it if we could work it out such that we retain golf and we can satisfy the other people,” Ms. Brown said. “I would just as soon not have an election and all the acrimony associated with that.”