landwatch logo   Home Issues & Actions About

Archive Page
This page is available as an archive to previous versions of LandWatch websites.

LandWatch Opposes Use of Prime Farmland For Offices and Factories

 

November 28, 2003

Fernando Armenta, Chair [Sent By Email and FAX: 831-755-5888]
Monterey County Board of Supervisors
240 Church Street
Salinas, CA 93901

RE: Consent Agenda Item #20 – Meeting of December 2, 2003

Dear Chairperson Armenta and Board Members:

This letter is to request that the Board of Supervisors remove Item #20 from the Consent Agenda of your December 2, 2003 meeting, and that you then take no action to find that the agricultural processing plant proposed by D’Arrigo Brothers of California is consistent with the County’s compatible uses within Farmland Security Zones.

You have been requested to find that building a major agricultural processing facility (essentially a factory) on twenty-seven acres of commercially productive farmland subject to a Farmland Security Zone contract would be “consistent” with the County’s list of compatible uses, specifying what sort of developments can be carried out on properties protected by such contracts.

LandWatch believes that developing a large scale agricultural factory (including a major office building) on prime farmland covered by a Farmland Security Zone contract is not consistent with the purposes of the Farmland Security Zone, nor is it consistent with the provisions of the contract. We also think it is clear that the County’s list of compatible uses does not allow the construction of the proposed large scale agricultural processing facility and office building on property subject to a Farmland Security Zone contract.

Even if it were possible to make a finding of “consistency,” which we believe it is not, the action proposed on your Consent Agenda is a discretionary decision that might have a significant impact on the environment. As such, this is a decision that cannot be undertaken without adequate review under the California Environmental Quality Act. No such adequate environmental review has occurred, and the Board has not been presented with any EIR, or other environmental document related to the proposed decision.

I have had an opportunity to review the memo of County Counsel, included in the Agenda Packet for your December 2, 2003 meeting. The Agenda Packet also includes a letter from Brian Finegan, attorney for the D’Arrigo Brothers (asking for a determination of consistency), and a letter from Dennis J. O’Bryant, Manager of the Williamson Act Program at the California Department of Conservation.

Please note that the County Counsel’s memo says, “The Department of Conservation concurs” with the County Counsel’s recommendation that development of the proposed agricultural processing plant is consistent with the County’s approved compatible uses within Farmland Security Zones. In fact, this is not an accurate representation of what the Department of Conservation has said in its letter.

The Department of Conservation letter says that the County has asked for an “official determination.” It then immediately indicates that it is providing “the following comments.” In other words, the Department of Conservation letter is a comment letter, and is not an “official determination’ Further, and contrary to what the County Counsel says, the Department of Conservation does not agree with County Counsel’s recommendation. Their letter states, “the expanded cooler facility could be considered a compatible use… (emphasis added).” The discussion leading up to this comment by the Department of Conservation (again, this is not either an “official determination” or a “recommendation”) assumes that the “expanded cooler” will “be used to process agricultural products grown on land owned by D’Arrigo Brothers in Monterey County (first paragraph of Department of Conservation Letter; emphasis added). As the application filed by D’Arrigo Brothers makes plain, the proposed processing facility (which is not an “expanded” cooler, but a brand new facility) will be used for processing products grown throughout the Salinas Valley—not just products grown on the property itself, and not products grown only on property owned by D’Arrigo Brothers.

In other words, far from being a facility that is intended to process crops from the property on which it is located, this proposed facility would essentially be a new business, intended to process agricultural products grown throughout Monterey County. As such, this proposed facility cannot be constructed on land encumbered with a Farmland Security Zone contract. Further, the proposed project is not only for processing facilities. It also includes a 24,000 square foot office building, and parking to support such office uses.

Please review closely the language of the County’s list of compatible uses. The list specifies uses that are “compatible” with the Farmland Security Zone contract. Unless a use is specifically included on this list, the use is not compatible. Here is the language relied upon by D’Arrigo Brothers:

“1. The drying, packing or other processing of an agricultural commodity usually performed on the premises where it is produced but not including slaughter houses, fertilizer yards, bone yards or plants for the reduction of animal or vegetable matter (emphasis added).”

It is obvious that the processing proposed is not “usually performed on the premises.” In fact, as the application materials submitted to the County show, processing of commodities produced on the premises is now (usually) performed in Castroville, an urban and industrial area—and just the kind of area in which agricultural processing facilities are appropriate, and permitted. Not only are the products grown on the premises not now processed on site, but the proposal is to process commodities grown throughout Monterey County, and specifically from properties not owned by D’Arrigo Brothers.

If the County contract were construed to say what D’Arrigo wants it to say, then this would mean that all agricultural lands located in Monterey County on which a Farmland Security Zone contract has been recorded would be deemed appropriate for large scale agricultural processing. The requested determination would also mean that farmland owners could build large office buildings on lands subject to a Farmland Security Zone contract. Such an interpretation would fundamentally change the nature of land uses throughout the County. The possible impacts of this change (one not legally supportable under the current contract) would be extremely significant, and must be analyzed in a full Environmental Impact Report, prior to any decision that could have this result.

Should the Board of Supervisors actually want to turn all of its Farmland Security Zone properties into sites that could be used for the processing of commodities grown off site (which is what the decision asked for would accomplish), we believe that the Board would need to amend its list of compatible uses, and the State Department of Conservation would need to approve this new use in such zones.

As the Board must be aware, D’Arrigo Brothers has received significant property tax benefits by promising to abide by the provisions of state law relating to a restriction of possible uses in Farmland Security Zones. The letter from the Department of Conservation properly cites what the state and the county are supposed to receive in return for the tax benefits provided. As state law has been cited by the Department of Conservation, ”compatibility” exists only when “(a) the use will not significantly compromise long term productive agricultural capability of the subject contracted parcels or other contracted land in preserves; 2) obstruct or displace potential agricultural operations, or 3) induce non-agricultural development of prime farmland.” These principles are to achieve the original purpose of Williamson Act contracts to “preserve the maximum amount of the limited supply of agricultural land [Government Code Section 51220(a)].”

Allowing the placement of the proposed processing facility and office building on the D’Arrigo lands, which are encumbered by a Farmland Security Zone contract, would violate each one of the above principles. Approval would immediately displace existing agricultural production on the contracted parcels. It would displace future agricultural use of this prime land. And the interpretation recommended by County Counsel would “induce nonagricultural development of prime farmland.”

The comments of the Department of Conservation are clearly not a statement determining that what is proposed is acceptable, or consistent with either state law or the existing contracts. Furthermore, it is clear that the Department’s comment letter was based on an erroneous or partial understanding of what is being proposed.

LandWatch urges the Board to make no finding that the proposed use is “compatible” with the Farmland Security Zone contract. Simply stated, it isn’t.

Very truly yours,

Gary A. Patton, Executive Director
LandWatch Monterey County

cc: Monterey County Counsel
California State Department of Conservation
Monterey County Planning Department
Brian Finegan
Other Interested Persons


LandWatch Memo

To: Board of Supervisors
From: Gary A. Patton

RE: Decision on D’Arrigo Farmland Security Zone Contract
Date: November 28, 2003

The attached Notice of Intent to Adopt a Mitigated Negative Declaration substantiates the facts cited in our letter: (1) The proposed project would eliminate agricultural production on 27 acres of farmland; (2) The agricultural commodities proposed for processing would come not only from the subject property, but also from lands owned by other persons, and from throughout the Salinas Valley; (3) The proposal is not only for agricultural processing facilities, but also includes a large structure proposed for general office uses.

Neither state law nor the County’s list of “compatible uses” contemplates the construction of such facilities on property encumbered with a Farmland Security Zone contract.

[Return to Spreckels Issues and Actions]

11.30.03


LandWatch's mission is to protect Monterey County's future by addressing climate change, community health, and social inequities in housing and infrastructure. By encouraging greater public participation in planning, we connect people to government, address human needs and inspire conservation of natural resources.

 

CONTACT

306 Capitol Street #101
Salinas, CA 93901


PO Box 1876
Salinas, CA 93902-1876


Phone (831) 759-2824


Fax (831) 759-2825

 

NAVIGATION

Home

Issues & Actions

About

Donate