Marin County, the Trust for Public Land and the San Geronimo Advocates agreed this week to drop the pursuit of an appeal and subsequent cross-appeal of a Marin Superior Court decision on the future of the San Geronimo Golf Course. The groups are instead settling the matter out of court, and the county is paying the advocates for their attorney fees.
The nonprofit trust purchased the course in 2017 with a plan to sell it to Marin after the county found enough grant funding to convert the course into open space. A lawsuit filed by the San Geronimo Advocates, a group seeking to preserve the course for golf, stymied that plan when Judge Paul Haakenson handed down a temporary injunction that prevented the county from obtaining funding.
In November, Judge Haakenson ruled that the county would need to perform a California Environmental Quality Act analysis before completing its purchase of the property. This effectively put an end to the county’s interest in the course: Max Korten, director of Marin County Parks, said performing such an analysis would be prohibitively expensive and time-consuming.
The county no longer has any control over the property and is not engaging in further conversations about it. Although it was paying for maintenance during litigation, golf operations ceased in December.
The trust, which had never intended to hold the property in the long term, filed a motion to appeal Judge Haakenson’s ruling in December. The nonprofit group says it decided to do so in part to contest what it called a dangerous precedent.
“The California Environmental Quality Act is an important environmental review law, but when it is used to prevent acquisitions of land for conservation purposes, the effects can be contrary to the clear intent of the Act,” the group said in a statement.
In response to the appeal, the advocates filed a cross-appeal, in which they raised a complaint with the county’s general plan.
Ultimately, the nonprofit said it decided litigation was not “the appropriate way to resolve this statewide public policy concern” and stated that it would work toward a solution with the broader California conservation community.
“We filed a notice of appeal, the advocates filed a cross-appeal, and then the three parties worked out a settlement agreement where appeals are going to be dismissed and the advocates will get its attorney’s fees paid by the county,” explained Winter King, an attorney for the Trust for Public Land.
Riley Hurd, an attorney for the San Geronimo Advocates, pushed back on the idea that Judge Haakenson’s ruling set a precedent around CEQA. “You cannot cite—in briefings or in court—superior court decisions. You can only cite appellate and higher. That’s the danger that T.P.L. faced: going up on appeal and losing and really having a precedent problem,” he said.
Per the terms of the settlement, the county will pay the advocates $308,391—though Mr. Hurd said the legal fees were nearly double that figure. County counsel Brian Washington said the amount is typical of such litigation and that it is normal for winners of CEQA litigation to recover attorney fees.
Under the settlement agreement, the trust is required to commit to a dialogue with the advocates about the future of the property. “Now is the time people need to roll up their sleeves to get in a room and figure this out,” Mr. Hurd said. “There’s a future for this site that includes golf, restoration and public access. It’s all there, and the conversation should have been had at the beginning.”
The future of the property is still in the air. The trust does not ordinarily own and operate parks, acting instead as a fundraiser for their creation. In a statement, it said it “looks forward to continuing to engage with the community about exciting opportunities for the San Geronimo Valley through a separate process.”
Meanwhile, a voter initiative seeking to restrict the use of the property to golf will appear on the March 2020 ballot. All registered Marin voters will be able to vote on the issue.