New Take, But Same CV Results

New policy to protect farmland pleases some, but others say it
won’t change the development
San Jose – Environmentalists have high hopes that this city’s new policy to protect farmland may alter Coyote Valley development, but the advocates, and greenbelt property owners, think it will fail.

“We’re back to square one,” said Richard DeSmet, who represents a large group of landowners in the greenbelt separating south San Jose from Morgan Hill. “The point we’re trying to make is, the whole plan is flexible right now, the plan is changing all the time, yet they don’t want to address the greenbelt issue, which is a really big problem.”

The greenbelt accounts for about half of the 7,000 acres in San Jose’s specific plan for a new town of 25,000 homes, 50,000 jobs and 80,000 residents in Coyote Valley. 

The plan has become more fluid in the last year. Changes will be made to the northern, or commercial and industrial section of Coyote Valley because Gavilan College will build a new campus there. And rather than wait for thousands of new jobs to come to the area, as long planned, San Jose will consider filling the area with new housing developments in the next few years.

What hasn’t changed is the city’s intention to leave the greenbelt undeveloped as a counter to the environmental degradation and loss of farmland to Coyote Valley development.

And critics of San Jose’s first official efforts to preserve farmland in the area say the plan, like others before it, forces down the area’s property values and doesn’t protect the area’s most sensitive environmental corridors.

“Without [an acre for an acre] agricultural mitigation, there will be no greenbelt,” said Juliana Chow, of the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society. “Maybe they need to think about places other than the greenbelt. They have this idea of preserving it, but there’s already a lot of development there.”

In the past, San Jose policy has been to recognize the loss of farmland when it produces an environmental impact report, but conclude that nothing can be done about it, according to planner Laurel Prevetti. Recent court decisions under the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, persuaded the city to adopt a more open approach and consider a policy akin to Gilroy, which requires the preservation of one acre of prime farmland for every acre lost to development. Morgan Hill does not have an agricultural mitigation policy.

San Jose has not yet finalized a policy and Prevetti said the new approach may mean few changes to the Coyote Valley specific plan or the greenbelt.

“We will address site specifics in our EIR; however, we will still have an impact that will be significant. As far as changing the plan it won’t. This may create an implementation mechanism for achieving our greenbelt strategy.”

Chow and other environmental advocates, and greenbelt owners, are pressuring San Jose to abandon its commitment to a north-mid-south plan for Coyote Valley that leaves the southern greenbelt area as the only available land for true environmental mitigation.

Environmentalists want the city to protect the most ecologically important land, including areas north of the greenbelt that provide critical habitat and migration corridors to such species as the bay checkerspot butterfly and California tiger salamander. Landowners in south Coyote Valley say more flexibility in the development will allow them to share in the expected property value windfall. As it stands, the city may attempt to preserve the greenbelt at prices as low as $10,000 an acre. Too low, property owners say, pointing to the $327,000 an acre Gavilan paid for its campus site.

“If you want to fund the greenbelt, you need to come up with new and creative ways to do it,” DeSmet said. “What they’re trying to do is a taking. They want to regulate the property values and drive the price down and then buy it. They need to get flexible and figure out a way to really fund it, or forget it.” 

Greenbelt property owners were encouraged for a time last year by a proposal from Mayor Ron Gonzales that would have allowed land owners outside the development area to negotiate sales or conservation easements with homebuilders who must provide open space to replace the land they develop. 

But that proposal has not moved forward. In the coming months, the Coyote Valley Specific Plan Task Force will consider financial scenarios to preserve the greenbelt. One idea has been to subsidize boutique farming; there is no sign that the city will allow any further development in the area, even though much of the land doesn’t meet the strictest definition of open space. The greenbelt is peppered with disused farms, greenhouses and estate homes.

“When all you have is country estate homes, there’s no way to encourage agriculture,” Chow said. “They need to rethink their ideas.”