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By: Jessyka Heredia
Watch the full video here: https://www.youtube.com/live/EfC-xnCUzmo?feature=share
July 25, 2023 (El Cajon)—
Hundreds of residents showed up Tuesday evening to a public meeting held at Hillsdale Middle School, convened by The County of San Diego Planning Commission regarding a revised Environmental Impact Report (EIR) on the controversial Cottonwood sand mine proposal. Those present in the packed room showed solidarity in opposition to the sand mine project currently under consideration by the County of San Diego on a 214 acre section of Cottonwood golf course in El Cajon.
Background
Back in March of last year, ECM reported on residents and local organizations such as Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation, the Sierra Club, the Valle de Oro Community Planning Group and Stop Cottonwood Sand Mine, writing letters to the county to express their concerns about the original EIR submitted to the county. These groups cited inadequacies in the EIR for the 12-year or more proposed project.
The applicant originally started submitting permit applications in 2018 and has seen opposition from residents and community organizations ever since. The Stop Cottonwood Sand Mine Committee submitted over 2,100 petition signatures to the County of San Diego from area residents after the application for a Major Use Permit (MUP), filed by the developer with the County on November 19, 2018.The draft EIR for the Cottonwood Sand Mining Project was previously circulated for public review from December 16, 2021 to February 28, 2022. According to the county website, “As a result of the public comments received from the circulation of the Draft EIR, changes were made to the project description and analysis of biological resource impacts. Specifically, new information regarding the need for additional soil import to achieve final reclamation elevations and the number of truck haul trips generated by the project to accommodate this import was added to the project description. New information regarding the potential for significant impacts to biological resources, the findings of additional biological surveys, and additional mitigation measures were added to the biological resources analysis.”
The County further states, “Together, the Draft EIR and Recirculated Draft EIR identify significant environmental impacts to the following environmental factors: Aesthetics; Biological Resources; Cultural Resources; Noise, Paleontological Resources, and Tribal Cultural Resources. Impacts to Aesthetics, even with mitigation measures, would remain significant and unavoidable. All other potential significant impacts would be reduced to less than significant with implementation of mitigation measures.”
Changes to the original EIR
Chris Jacobs the project manager at the county for the Cottonwood Sand Mine project said the changes that were made from the original EIR included biological resources analysis specifically relating to new information regarding the need for additional soil needed for the reclamation phase, stormwater quality management plan as well as updated numbers on the amount of haul trips would be required during the 2 year reclamation portion of the project as the haul trips for reclamation were not included in the original EIR. The recirculated EIR added that “58 haul trips per day would be required to import suitable backfill material to achieve the projects proposed post reclamation elevation.”
Residents’ Concerns
Many of the residents in the community got up to speak and share their concerns with environmental impacts, decreasing property values, traffic concerns, exposure to harmful air quality and health risks for them and their families.
Cindi Denny is a local area resident since 1994 and says she has boarded her horse in Lakeside for 30 years. “Lakeside is nothing but a washboard of mines and not one mine operation has completed a reclamation after they got done with their operation,” Denny said. “Make no mistake; it’s about money and the one thing that preserves our aquifer, that filters our water, is the thing they want to mine, which is the sand. So what are they gonna put in? Are they gonna put in something that is equal to the sand that filters our water? No, they are gonna bring in total garbage and contaminate everything.”
Elizabeth Urquhart, Chair of STOP Cottonwood Sand Mine, an organization of concerned community members who oppose the sand mine project at Cottonwood. Urquhart was given an opportunity to give a presentation to the audience to explain their concerns to the public. Urquhart only addressed the changes in the recirculated EIR.
Urquhart said,” the revised project description raises more questions. It was only after the circulation of the draft EIR, that it was discovered that the proposed project would be required to import backflow material, adding an additional 58 truck trips per day as well as the second conveyor.”
“in addition the storm water management plan initially proposed was insufficient, addressing only the frontage improvements along Willow Glen Drive. We recommend opposing the entire sand mining operation,” said Urquhart .
Urqurhart said that the biological resources section needed to be completely redone since the draft EIR missed several special status plant and animal species.
Traffic concerns were heavy on the minds of many residents and were also a big concern to the STOP Cottonwood Sand Mine organization. Urquhart said, “Traffic remains a significant impact that cannot be mitigated. In fact, the new information makes the traffic impacts worse” due to the added 58 truck trips daily as opposed to the draft EIR that only accounted for 88. Urquhart said, “This totals 147 round trip truck trips daily or 294 either coming or leaving the standby location.”
Urquhart went on to explain that “the recirculated documents state that it was determined that the additional truck trips will not change the already determined less than significant impact.” The crowd reacted in anger. Burkhart claimed that this statement was erroneous and made no sense.
Urquhart added, “The documents dismiss the fact that the Cottonwood Sand Mine heavy truck hauling will affect the community streets, air quality, greenhouse gas emissions, health risks and noise in the area.
In closing Urquhart said that “the cumulative traffic impacts have not been adequately analyzed and that therefore an updated traffic analysis is needed to address the impact of the project but the cumulative of both truck and vehicle impacts as well.” The crowd cheered in support. Urquhart explained that the traffic reports were done from 2020- 2022 and that due to unforeseen consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, those studies are not accurate because many people were no longer on the roads.
Josan Feathers, a civil engineer, gave a public comment and asked, “How can we trust the accuracy and credibility of the recirculation of the EIR when the applicant and his consultant fail to recognize a need for an additional 3.75 million tons of backfill?”
Feathers said, “They propose to excavate 79 acres west of Steele Canyon Road Bridge and approximately 100 acres upstream of the bridge, up to 40 feet below the ground surface. Feathers said, they want to backfill that area with excavated material they can’t sell.”
Response from County Supervisor Joel Anderson
At times the crowd cheered for their neighbors but at one point someone yelledf, “where is our Supervisor, Joel Anderson?” and the crowd got angry. ECM reached out to Supervisor Anderson to get his comment on the record as to whether he believes this will pass despite the overwhelming opposition of residents and organizations, what his feelings are on the environmental impact and safety of residents as well as a chance to tell his constituents why he was not in attendance.
Michael Botello the Director of communications responded, “To preserve his right to vote if the item is appealed to the Board, the Supervisor is precluded from providing any opinion on any project that may be heard before the Board pursuant to State law. Currently the project is under the purview of the Planning Commission, not the Board of Supervisors. Because the Supervisor knows this is an important issue to the community and is likely to eventually come before him for a vote, he and his staff are closely monitoring the process and all the feedback from constituents.”
Botello also said that Supervisor Joel Anderson is “providing constituents with the following information regarding the project and process moving forward so that they can stay involved:”
He provided this statement from Anderson: “As the project goes through the County process, we encourage you to reach out to Planning & Development Services (PDS), who is responsible for reviewing the project. They’re available to help answer any questions you may have regarding the project or process moving forward. You can contact Ashley Smith at Ashley.Smith2@sdcounty.ca.gov or Mark Slovick at Mark.Slovick@sdcounty.ca.gov. PDS also has a website for the Cottonwood Sand Mine project, where you can find information regarding the project, the current EIR recirculation, and how to submit comments: https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/pds/ceqa/MUP-18-023.html. PDS can also help you understand the next steps and overall timeline of the project moving forward. If you’d like more information about the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) or next steps in the permit process, staff prepared a video overview for members of the public to help explain the process and how members of the public can provide input. The video is available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4uSx-ekf5g. I will absolutely keep everyone’s opinions in mind should this come before me for a vote.”
Candidates for County Supervisor weigh in
Also in attendance were three of the four County Supervisor candidates: Amy Reichert, Janessa Goldbeck and Monica Montgomery- Steppes. Earlier this month, ECM interviewed these three candidates to discuss their bid for the District 4 seat that was left vacant by the resignation of Nathan Fletcher. All three candidates said they were against this particular project in our candidate forum but Amy Reichert said, “I have not been endorsed by developers, I’m not beholden…but that builders are saying they have to bring in sand from out of state. “That hurts the environment, too,” she said of mining elsewhere and transporting sand long distance. “I am against this particular project:” she said of Cottonwood, but left the door open to another local site. “We can all come together and find a much better place in the county.” Reichert did not speak at last night’s public meeting.
Janessa Goldbeck did get up to speak tto the audience and expressed her concerns. Goldbeck very firmly stated that she is “running to be your next supervisor and I’m here to tell you that I am in firm opposition of Cottonwood’s sand mine, and I will vote against it if it gets that far. I spent my career fighting for preservation of public land. We had to fight the presidential administration against mining the Grand Canyon if you can believe that. It is imperative to our communities, to our kids, that we have clean air to breathe and clean water to drink. I fought this at the federal level, the state level and I will fight for it as your next board of supervisors."
Later Monica Montgomery-Steppes got up and addressed the concerned crowd and said, “I just wanted to stop by and make sure you all know that I oppose the Cottonwood sand mine. I have opposed it since I first heard of it”. Montgomery-Steppes spoke about her reputation at the San Diego City Council as being the “people’s council member” and said, “What that means is I put the people first and what they believe and when I look out at you all and see this effort that you have had to organize, unfortunately you have had to organize it, but you have the strength to organize it and come together. I am very encouraged by the outcome of this. I just want you to know Im with you, and I look forward to more conversations but I have opposed it from the very beginning and that will not change.”
ECM reached out to Paul McQuigg by email for his position on the Cottonwood Sand Mine Project but he has not yet responded.
Applicants Response
The applicants, New West Investment and investor Michael Schlesinger, who purchased Cottonwood Golf Course in 2015, four years after the golf course filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, see the project in a different light. Kenneth Moore, spokesperson for the Cottonwood Proposal, said, “The Cottonwood Proposal would transform a defunct golf course property into permanent, preserved open space through a community-minded and phased approach. In the short term, the physical aspects of the golf course would be decommissioned, sand supplies would be gathered temporarily, and environmental restoration efforts would be implemented quickly. When completed, this proposal would create two hundred of acres of carefully restored open space, reimagine a water-wasting and obsolete golf course, and help address the San Diego Region’s skyrocketing housing and infrastructure construction costs by providing local sand supplies.”
The residents in the community were concerned with environmental impacts, decreasing property values, traffic concerns and exposure to harmful air quality.
Perhaps one of the most important public comments was by Tania Jackson, a local resident and educator who said, “I took a crap ton of notes to write the letter that is going to count more than your voice right now. Write a letter. I don’t have time to write a letter but I am going to write a letter because it matters.”
How to make your voice heard
The public has until August 21 at 4 p.m. to submit comments on the revised EIR. The county extended the original date out an extra week.
Comments can be sent via email to Christopher.Jacobs@sdcounty.ca.gov
Comments on the Recirculated Draft EIR should reference the project numbers and name:
COTTONWOOD SAND MINING PROJECT (PDS2018-MUP-18-023), (PDS2018-RP-18-001); LOG NO. PDS2018-ER-18-19-007; SCH# 2019100513
You can view the county’s documents online at https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/pds/ceqa/MUP-18-023.html.
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