Share
A letter from the Halls
A letter from the Halls
Bill Hocker | Mar 15, 2016 on: Walt Ranch
The Napa County planning department public presentation of the Walt Ranch Final EIR is scheduled to happen on April 4th 2016.
This week in the mail I received a promotional packet for the project from the developers with a prepaid mail-in survey card. It is an impressive public relations effort. The owners, Kathryn and Craig Hall, probably have a large circle of friends, so no doubt a lot of postcards will be sent in with the "I support the Walt Ranch vineyard proposal" box checked. One wonders how many of the "I oppose the Walt Ranch vineyard proposal" boxes will be checked. I give them credit for asking both questions.
The flier, as one might expect, is rosy about the issues of "water conservation", "erosion control" and "tree preservation" not dwelling on the 69 million gallons of water that must be pumped out of the aquifer each year, the amount of earth moving needed for 500 acres of clearing and grading including 21 miles of roads or the removal of 28,600 trees over 5" dia. to make way for the vines. As usual in every EIR, all environmental impacts have been mitigated by the developer's numbercrunchers to "less-than-significant levels". Unfortunately, residents must also spend enormous amounts of money to have their own equally qualified numbercrunchers come to different conclusions.
The one issue that is most important to me (and it seems to be only my interest) is almost unmentioned in the flier: "For most of the year, vehicles entering or leaving Walt Ranch will be almost unnoticeable, as there will not be a winery on-site or the ability for tourists or the public to access the site." They overlook the 4 years of construction activity, of course. Also they imply that this is one site with the potential for "a" winery. Walt Ranch is in fact 35 already subdivided sites with the potential for 35 wineries plus 105 dwelling units under current county zoning. Are the Halls willing to prohibit further development with binding non-development conservation easements on the properties to insure that future development "would not result in cumulative impacts to transportation and circulation in the area"? As I have tried to make the case here, to treat this project as just a vineyard conversion without considering "growth inducing impacts" that development of the site will have is a travesty of appropriate governmental oversight. This project is simply the infrastructure development for a 35 parcel housing subdivision, no different from other properties developed by that Halls and the county should be treating it as such.
This week in the mail I received a promotional packet for the project from the developers with a prepaid mail-in survey card. It is an impressive public relations effort. The owners, Kathryn and Craig Hall, probably have a large circle of friends, so no doubt a lot of postcards will be sent in with the "I support the Walt Ranch vineyard proposal" box checked. One wonders how many of the "I oppose the Walt Ranch vineyard proposal" boxes will be checked. I give them credit for asking both questions.
The flier, as one might expect, is rosy about the issues of "water conservation", "erosion control" and "tree preservation" not dwelling on the 69 million gallons of water that must be pumped out of the aquifer each year, the amount of earth moving needed for 500 acres of clearing and grading including 21 miles of roads or the removal of 28,600 trees over 5" dia. to make way for the vines. As usual in every EIR, all environmental impacts have been mitigated by the developer's numbercrunchers to "less-than-significant levels". Unfortunately, residents must also spend enormous amounts of money to have their own equally qualified numbercrunchers come to different conclusions.
The one issue that is most important to me (and it seems to be only my interest) is almost unmentioned in the flier: "For most of the year, vehicles entering or leaving Walt Ranch will be almost unnoticeable, as there will not be a winery on-site or the ability for tourists or the public to access the site." They overlook the 4 years of construction activity, of course. Also they imply that this is one site with the potential for "a" winery. Walt Ranch is in fact 35 already subdivided sites with the potential for 35 wineries plus 105 dwelling units under current county zoning. Are the Halls willing to prohibit further development with binding non-development conservation easements on the properties to insure that future development "would not result in cumulative impacts to transportation and circulation in the area"? As I have tried to make the case here, to treat this project as just a vineyard conversion without considering "growth inducing impacts" that development of the site will have is a travesty of appropriate governmental oversight. This project is simply the infrastructure development for a 35 parcel housing subdivision, no different from other properties developed by that Halls and the county should be treating it as such.