Imminent Land Sale, New Hotel Contested
By Joe Nelson, San Bernardino County Sun, Calif.
Apr. 29–BIG BEAR LAKE — The Big Bear checkerbloom and slender-petaled mustard share two things in common: They are both indigenous plants that grow in the meadows of this mountain resort area and they are both on the endangered species list.
Human encroachment has destroyed much of these plants’ natural habitat, experts say.
“They are like canaries in a coal mine. They represent the systematic loss of an entire ecosystem, including habitat for many other rare plants and wildlife species,” said Tim Krantz, a professor of environmental science at the University of Redlands and a member of the San Bernardino Valley Audubon Society.
He has studied the area’s ecosystems for 30 years.
The plants are the focal point of a battle launched by a bevy of local environmental groups against the city of Big Bear Lake and the director of a nature preserve at Baldwin Lake.
A hotel planned for development across from the Big Bear Lake Civic Center threatens checkerbloom habitat, and the selling off of a 20-acre parcel of the Baldwin Lake Preserve, environmentalists allege, threatens the habitats of both the checkerbloom and slender-petaled mustard.
The Big Bear Lake City Council on July 5 approved the development of a three-story, 91-room Hilton Garden Inn on four acres across from the Civic Center on Big Bear Boulevard.
About 1 1/2 acres of the project site are home to the checkerbloom, which depends on the hydrology provided by the neighboring Metcalf Creek for sustenance. Development of the hotel could severely impact the natural hydrology the plant depends on, Krantz said.
City spokeswoman Cheri Haggerty declined to comment on the matter, citing pending litigation.
According to a court brief filed earlier this month by the attorney representing the environmental groups, the city believes the project site is not a wetlands area because city officials were notified by officials at Fish and Game and the Army Corps of Engineers that it wasn’t. The city has also argued the site lacks hydric soils and indicators of wetland hydrology.
But the lawsuit’s petitioners allege the City Council failed to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act and the city’s own development code by approving the project on the merits it did, and that the environmental impact report was flawed. They’re asking that the City Council vacate its previous decision and are asking for a thorough environmental assessment.
“Everyone and their uncle is very concerned. The planning is not good on this project, and it will jeopardize one of the most endangered plant species in the area,” said Adam Keats, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity in San Francisco who is representing the environmental groups named in the suit — the Center for Biological Diversity, the San Bernardino Valley Audubon Society, the Sierra Club, Friends of Big Bear Valley and Christians for the Earth.
Another rare pebble-plains plant exclusive to the San Bernardino Mountains, the Kennedy Buckewheat, has already been destroyed by the building of a log cabin on the mouth of the bay, Krantz said.
“It was one big pebble-plain knoll, and they just destroyed it,” Krantz said.
He said both plants are restricted to mountain meadow habitats, and less than 10 percent of the checkerbloom habitat remains. The building of the Big Bear Lake dam, airport, Moonridge Golf Course and residential development have destroyed the bulk of the habitat.
Keats said a final court date is scheduled for May 16.
“We expect they will have a ruling from the judge on that date,” Keats said.
A 20-acre parcel of a nature preserve — one of the only areas in the San Bernardino Mountains where the checkerbloom and the slender-petaled mustard plants are known to grow together — is in the process of being sold to a private party, raising objections from environmental groups.
The 153-acre Baldwin Lake Preserve fell into disarray under the control of its former director, Robert Lindblad, who in 2003 was sentenced to three years in prison for attempted murder and false imprisonment in a highly publicized 2002 shooting at his home on the preserve.
Last summer, the state Attorney General’s Office recommended that Roger Williams, the administrator of Wildhaven Ranch, a wildlife sanctuary in Cedar Glen, be appointed as the sole director of the Natural Heritage Foundation, the nonprofit that Lindblad formerly headed that provided the funding mechanism for the preserve.
Lindblad’s son, Christian, was convicted of shooting his girlfriend and holding her captive in their home for six days to elude capture. He and his parents treated the woman’s several gunshot wounds before she was finally taken to a hospital and treated. She survived. Christian Lindblad was subsequently sentenced to 20 years in prison.
A $150,000 lien was placed on the property when the Lindblads went to prison. Williams and the San Bernardino Land Trust, another nonprofit that acquires private property in the mountains with the intent of turning it over to the U.S. Forest Service, subsequently vied for control of the preserve in court.
The court sided with Williams after learning the land trust had not filed tax returns for three years. The land trust had also indicated to the court that one of its intents was possibly to transfer the property to the Forest Service, said state Deputy Attorney General Tania Ibanez.
Williams is now in the process of selling a 20-acre parcel of the preserve. Ron and Jana Taylor, who own and run the sprawling Shay Meadow Ranch on the edge of the preserve, said they are in escrow on the parcel and plan to use it for horse grazing.
While the environmental groups argue that the planned use of the land could jeopardize the natural habitat of the two plants, the Taylors don’t believe the habitat is threatened.
“Cattle have been grazing this mountain for more than 100 years, and there’s still checkerblooms. What do you think that says?” Jana Taylor said.
But environmentalists argue the court’s decision to appoint Williams as sole director was flawed because he didn’t have the financial resources or land management experience to care for the land. In a nine-page summary, they argued that Wildhaven showed only $7,000 in liquid funds.
The land trust claimed that it, however, had about $100,000 in liquid funds and the land-management experience to resume control of the preserve.
Ibanez said they missed the full financial picture of Wildhaven.
“They looked at one line on the tax returns, which was Wildhaven’s lowest balance in one year, but they ignored the line that says what the highest balance was a year, and what the average income was a year (more than $100,000),” Ibanez said. “You also have look at how much money they’re bringing in every year.”
In 2004, Ibanez said, Wildhaven brought in $28,934, and the cash reserves were $2,964. In 2005, they showed $113,516 in revenue, but their cash reserves ranged from a low of $2,969 to a high of $85,883.
“When we looked Wildhaven and their tax returns, they were bringing in more money every year,” Ibanez said.
Williams said the only reason to sell the 20 acres is a May 1, 2008, deadline to pay off the $150,000 lien on the property.
“It’s not a 30-year loan,” he said.
As far as his experience in land management, he said through Wildhaven he has conducted erosion control and planted thousands of trees in his time working in the San Bernardino Mountains, and that he is no novice to land management.
Ibanez said Williams is allowed, by law, to sell off portions of the preserve if he wants to, and that it was expected the debt could be paid off.
“I have no idea why (San Bernardino Mountains Land Trust is) so upset,” Ibanez said. “We have not changed our opinion that Wildhaven was the right charity.”
Sierra Club member Ed Wallace said he and his colleagues feel they have been misled.
“The idea was to move the horses off the property and try to return the land to its original state. And Mr. Williams (said) he had no intention of selling off the land,” said Wallace, of Big Bear Lake. “I don’t trust these people any farther than I can throw them. They haven’t shown any honesty to me.”
He’s hoping the entire 150-plus acres will remain intact. If not, he’s uncertain what will happen.
“It’s a difficult thing. We have attorneys looking at it,” said Wallace. “At this point in time, I just don’t know what our next step is.”
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