This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Health & Fitness

Westchester Dems to Study Ballona Do-Nothing Resolution

(Strange as it feels to write about oneself in the third person, here goes…-DK) 

At its September 25 meeting, the Democratic Club of Westchester-Playa del Rey again tabled action on a member resolution to Do Nothing for the Ballona Wetlands. Proposed by Club Member Marcia Hanscom of the Ballona Institute, the resolution called for withholding federal funds for any mechanized excavation and grading needed for the Ballona Wetlands Restoration Project. Hanscom spoke to her resolution at the meeting. The Club voted to have a committee study the matter further and return a recommendation to the membership.  

The state will propose a variety of Ballona Wetlands Restoration alternative plans in the project Environmental Impact Report (EIR), due out next spring, according to Dr. Shelley Luce, Executive Director of the Santa Monica Bay Restoration Commission, managers of the restoration project.  At the meeting Dr. Luce explained that most project alternatives require large-scale excavation and grading, since wetlands formerly occupying the entire north half of the present day Ballona Ecological Reserve have been buried under soil since the 1950s dumped from Marina del Rey construction, and must be excavated for any ocean tides to reach the area.  Up to 3 million cubic yards of fill dirt would need to be relocated, depending on the alternative plan chosen. 

Find out what's happening in Marina Del Reywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Friends of Ballona Wetlands President Dr. David Kay also addressed Club members.  Dr. Kay managed the now complete 440-acre San Dieguito Wetlands Restoration near Del Mar.  Kay shared photographs and data documenting San Dieguito’s rapid and successful transformation from an old airfield and agricultural lands to thriving tidal wetlands in just a few years, following excavation and grading of 2.25 million cubic yards of fill.  San Dieguito met 10 of 15 performance goals in its first year of independent Coastal Commission monitoring.

Dr. Kay also explained the practical and legal obstacles to the "community restoration" concept oft-proposed by Hanscom, Ballona Institute and others.  He calculated that even a well-organized, trained and and reliable volunteer workforce would take 140 years to execute a full tidal restoration of Ballona if denied conventional mechanized construction methods.  Despite a twice monthly, 25-year volunteer weeding effort, Friends of Ballona Wetlands managed to restore only 2 acres of endangered species dune habitat on the western edge of the ecological reserve.  The Ballona reserve encompasses 600 acres. 

Find out what's happening in Marina Del Reywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Kay then addressed Hanscom's resolution proposal to re-start the public review process and oppose the Annenberg Foundation's interpretive center proposal for the Ballona reserve.  Annenberg has drawn steady criticism for its incorporation of animal rescue and adoption facilities at its proposed 46,000 square foot center, to be co-located with the Culver-Marina Little League fields on the reserve parcel bounded by the Marina Freeway, Lincoln Boulevard and Ballona Creek. Wallace Annenberg’s personal interest in animal welfare is well known.  Kay cautioned Club members to not act hastily, let the EIR inform their decisions and weigh the potential regional educational benefits of the proposed center as well as its drawbacks. 

Friends of Ballona Wetlands, which claims about 1000 members, has deferred taking a position on the interpretive center proposal until after the project EIR is published.  However, Kay pointed out the non-profit could accommodate ten times as many students in their donor-funded education programs with a campus-sized facility that befits a region of 2 million students. "Annenberg is offering this facility, but not without strings attached”, Kay said.  “At the end of the day, our decision really comes down to whether or not we want to make a deal with the rich lady."

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?