We object to your attack on the involvement of Environmental Health Coalition and the residents of Chula Vista in development planning on the mid-bayfront.

For 23 years, EHC has worked with low-income communities and communities of color impacted by unjust land-use decisions throughout the San Diego/Tijuana region. EHC worked with thousands of South Bay residents to establish the South Bay National Wildlife Refuge. We supported land use changes on the Chula Vista Bayfront to stave off expanded industrial development there, and in fact, have worked with two prior developers to try to bring an equitable, sustainable project to the mid-bayfront.

Although developer Pacifica Cos. asked us to stop talking to the Chula Vista community about this issue, we refused. We know from experience that talking to residents and holding our elected officials accountable is the only way that meaningful change happens in and for communities.

Western Chula Vista is urbanized with a significant lack of parks and open space. Residents there also suffer from the ill effects of the South Bay power plant and childhood asthma hospitalization rates far exceeding the rest of San Diego County.

Pacifica's proposal for an upscale housing development where lower income people will never be able to live and that generates thousands of additional car trips a day will not bring justice to children in the South Bay.

Due to EHC's efforts, more than 400 Chula Vista residents attended two public meetings and clearly expressed their thoughts on this project. Chula Vista residents working with EHC surveyed 300 of their neighbors about the development proposal. The majority of residents have expressed their preference for open space and limited development on the site. That the Union-Tribune finds this public input offensive speaks volumes about your position.

Contrary to your assertion, EHC does not oppose all development at the mid-bayfront site. We have offered four conceptual community-based development plans that are reasonable, responsible and appropriate.

Maybe our activities against the corporate self-interests of Pacifica is "meddling" to you, but to EHC it is fighting for justice.

DIANE TAKVORIAN
Director,
Environmental Health Coalition

It is unfortunate that with all the problems in south San Diego County, the San Diego Union-Tribune chose to criticize the Environmental Health Coalition for working to protect the endangered wildlife and ecosystems of San Diego Bay.

South San Diego Bay contains the last natural wetland habitats in the entire bay. That is precisely the reason why it is protected as a national wildlife refuge by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

As the southern portion of San Diego Bay is the only natural feeding refuge for endangered Eastern Pacific green sea turtles in California, I welcome the efforts by the residents of Chula Vista and organizations such as the Environmental Health Coalition to protect our little corner of wildlife paradise.

SERGE DEDINA
Director, WILDCOAST
Imperial Beach

We have lived in Chula Vista for a combined 87 years and do not consider it "meddling" to care about the development of our bayfront. In fact, we have both been involved one way or another since the very first bayfront plan in 1970, one of us as a City Council member and mayor. Some of the plans offered since then have been outstanding, others not so good – but the current Pacifica plan is by far the worst.

When Pacifica made its first appearance before the City Council and presented its plan, only about three or four citizens, including ourselves, were there to speak against it. But it was conceptually approved by the council. We thought that was that and began getting ready for the next stage of the battle before the Coastal Commission.

To our surprise, Laura Hunter and the Environmental Health Coalition showed up and began making big waves, so much so that the planning process was put on hold and two community forums were held – with several hundred Chula Vista residents in attendance. Without Hunter and EHC, there would have been no real opposition.

The EHC's community survey may not have been scientific, which the organization never claimed it was, but it sure beats any other sounding of the community. Do you think our council would dare do a scientific survey itself? Not likely, because they know the results would be the same.

We ourselves, in fact, also do not agree with Hunter's emphasis on using much of the developable 100 acres as more undeveloped open space. You correctly point out that the 1980s' agreement preserved 300 acres as permanent open space but left 100 acres that could be developed. Flora and fauna are important, but so, too, are people. But the fact is that if it were not for Hunter and the EHC, that 100 acres would have been just another 3,400 housing units in a city that is already building 2,000 to 3,000 new housing units every year.

Our dream for Chula Vista is that this 100-acre plot be used for a destination hotel and its attendant amenities such as recreational opportunities and a small-scale version of Seaport Village, with lots of parkland for visitors and residents alike, not unlike Mission Bay.

WILL HYDE
PETER WATRY
Chula Vista

The Chula Vista bayfront area contains a major portion of the remaining natural shoreline of all of San Diego Bay. It has huge value for wildlife and for the people of the region. It could be an eternal benefit for the image of Chula Vista or another thoughtless cookie-cutter development. This property is way too important for the latter.

The agreement that the editorial refers to involved more than just the mid-bayfront and the wildlife refuge. It included the final stage of transforming the Sweetwater River and its rich delta into a sterile flood control ditch, considerable loss of wetlands, some questionable mitigation projects and the preservation of some very productive remaining wetlands and shoreline habitat. It is important to find a way that the mid-bayfront development will not degrade the habitat that survived that previous environmental travesty.

As the article mentioned, the problems might not have occurred if there had been real public discussion and agreement on how this and nearby public property should be developed. Community and environmental groups have simply been trying to facilitate the sort of public process that should have occurred well before the Exclusive Negotiating Agreement that was hastily issued to Pacifica by the City of Chula Vista. To its credit, Pacifica responded to public concerns and agreed to stop.

The Environmental Health Coalition and many other organizations have helped local citizens to initiate that discussion with the "Don't Pave Paradise" campaign.

JIM PEUGH
San Diego Audubon Society

I am addressing your editorial's complaint that the "worse thing EHC did" was conduct a "very unscientific survey." I am the "activist" who gave the closing arguments at the public hearing on Jan. 11 to the City Council and to a room filled with scores of Chula Vistans.

The survey results presented by my colleagues were extrapolated from a sampling conducted by a group of concerned citizens of over 300 Chula Vista residents. I said that the survey was not meant to be an objective survey, but instead, a grass-roots effort.

The process was clean. The collection method of the survey was compiled by a cross-pollination of people spanning age, ethnicity, ideals and all cross-sections of Chula Vista. These concerned citizens are of the opinion that Chula Vista continues to be choked by development. As a result, our community is fast becoming a metropolis with inadequate community services, parks, family recreation, conference centers and places to enjoy a sunny weekend without having to travel outside our own city limits.

MARISSA GAUCIN
Rancho del Rey

The mid-bayfront project proposed by Pacifica Cos. has very little to do with moderately priced or affordable housing.

The original Pacifica mid-bayfront project proposed approximately 3,400 dwelling units in 20-story high-rise towers. Many of the units were to be priced above $500,000. If, as the editorial stated, the median household income in Chula Vista is $35,000, then that would be inadequate to purchase a home costing more than $150,000 (virtually non-existent in San Diego County) using common mortgage financing. The cost of oceanfront or bayfront land anywhere in California makes unsubsidized moderately priced or affordable housing in such locations economically infeasible.

JOHN CHAVEZ
Chula Vista

Your editorial in effect tells the city of Chula Vista to stop listening to citizens who come together at public meetings to talk about the proposed mid-bayfront development plan.

I think your editorial comments should be considered the ultimate "meddling", and I also think the Chula Vista City Council should be prepared to hear a lot more from its interested citizens.

SUSAN FULLER
President, Friends of San Diego Wildlife Refuges
Imperial Beach

Copyright 2003 Union-Tribune Publishing Company. Used by Permission