Politics
City to search for Ranch funds
Newport forms committee, takes step toward buying land. Residents insist area will be valuable as a recreational resource.
Newport Beach residents urged the City Council Tuesday night to find a way to
protect Banning Ranch from development.
The area, which includes coastal
bluffs and wetlands, is the last large piece of undeveloped privately held
coastal land in Orange County, environmentalists claim.
"Newport Beach is the perfect vehicle to organize the many parties that will
have to come together to buy the land," said Terry Welsh, chairman of the Sierra
Club-sponsored Banning Ranch Park and Preserve Task Force. "It's going to cost a
lot of work and take a ton of money."
Newport Beach City Council voted
Tuesday to form a committee to oversee the appraisal process for Banning
Ranch.
Mayor Ed Selich, Councilman Steve Rosansky and Councilwoman Nancy
Gardner will make up the three-member committee, which will search for funding
to buy the land.
Appraising the more than 400-acre piece of land would be
a step toward buying it from the gas and oil company Aera Energy.
The
city hopes to secure funding from sources including private donations and bonds
to buy the land.
Residents at the council meeting Tuesday said they hoped
Newport Beach would exhaust its options to purchase the land before allowing it
to be developed for housing, shopping and hotels.
The city must
eventually determine whether to buy the land and preserve it, or allow parts of
it to be developed.
"(If the area were preserved) within any urban area
in the state, we would have something that would be so unique 20 years hence - a
stretch of land for people to just be," said resident Kevin Nelson. "That land
will be very valuable just as a recreational resource."
About 53 acres of
Banning Ranch lies within the city limits. Although the rest of the land is in
the county's jurisdiction, Newport Beach maintains a sphere of influence over
the area, which stretches along the Santa Ana River and West Coast
Highway.
Newport Banning Ranch LLC, the private management team that
oversees the land, hopes to unveil plans for more than 1,300 housing units, an
upscale 75-room hotel and 75,000 square feet of retail space as early as late
spring. Tentative plans would still preserve about 50% of the area's open space,
Newport Banning Ranch representatives said.
BRIANNA BAILEY may be reached at (714) 966-4625 or at brianna.bailey@latimes.com.