Tuesday, Oct, 2007 • Board finally approves Dyer Mountain Resort EIR, map, developer agreement

Publisher’s note: This story originally appeared in the Tuesday, Oct. 7, 2007 edition of the Lassen County Times.

If lawsuits don’t stop it, the Dyer Mountain Four Season Resort can finally move forward.

The Lassen County Board of Supervisors approved the Dyer Mountain Associates environmental impact report, development agreement and tentative parcel map last week.

Sierra Watch, Mountain Meadows Conservancy, the Honey Lake Maidu and, most recently, the Chico-based Yahi Group of the Sierra Club, have objected to the project and the first three groups have promised to sue.

The Sierra Club also challenged the EIR, citing the EIR’s failure to adequately mitigate biological, cultural, traffic and air quality impacts of the resort, among others. In a letter dated Sept. 6, Grace Marvin, chair of the Yahi Group, wrote the EIR fails to propose mitigation measures and alternatives that would reduce the project’s significant environmental impacts.

“Regarding the adequacy of the EIR, the Sierra Club agrees with previous comments submitted on behalf of Mountain Meadows Conservancy and Sierra Watch that document  that the EIR fails to fully analyze the impacts of the project,” Marvin wrote.

Developer DMA has begun talks with the groups that have threatened to sue.

“In the recent past we have met with the three groups (Sierra Watch, Mountain, Meadows Conservancy and the Honey Lake Maidu) to discuss issues and to establish a dialog,” Nick Ceaglio, of Dyer Mountain Associates, wrote in an e-mail to the newspaper on Wednesday, Sept. 26.

The board unanimously passed the EIR and tentative parcel map. Though he said the EIR was “as good as it gets,” District 2 Supervisor Jim Chapman voted against the development agreement, saying he wasn’t sure it fully protected the public interest.

District 1 Supervisor Bob Pyle said no contract is bullet proof; “If so we wouldn’t need lawyers,” Pyle said, adding the contract is fluid and can be amended.

Chapman asked where the agreement lists the recreation center for local youth promised in the initiative rezoning the land from timber production to mountain resort voters approved in 2000.

“I really strongly feel that the project that was promised and the project that was delivered aren’t necessarily the same,” Chapman said.

At the Sept. 25 meeting, the board amended the agreement from a 20-year to a 30-year term, since full build out is estimated at 25-30 years. DMA attorney Bill Abbott agreed to the change.

“Taxes have been paid and we now have excess funds on hand,” said Assistant Community Development Director Joe Bertotti, telling the board it was appropriate to move forward.

Board approval paves the way for the developer to finalize actual subdivision maps for the 7,000-acre resort adjacent to Westwood’s Walker Lake, also known as Mountain Meadows Reservoir. DMA plans to build, or agree to have other developers build, three golf courses, ski runs, more than 4,000 houses and condos and commercial and retail projects.

The tentative parcel map for the Dyer Mountain Resort divides 7,000 acres into 13 parcels ranging in size from 40 to 1,118 acres. It does not refer to specific projects.

Developers of the individual parcels will have to do EIRs and hold public hearings on each proposal to build the resort’s golf courses, ski runs, houses and condos and commercial and retail projects.

The planning commission will review development plans, tentative subdivision maps and improvement plans over the 25- to 30-year build-out envisioned in the development concept plan.

The development agreement, a contract between the county and DMA, ensures the developer will meet county building standards and take the steps necessary to mitigate environmental impacts.

Keefer says Dyer resorts is about as fire safe as can be
The Dyer Mountain Four Season Resort is “about as fire safe as it can be,” according to District 3 Lassen County Supervisor Lloyd Keefer.

Keefer, who retired in 1998 with 31 years of experience in emergency management and fire protection with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, said the fire danger is a concern for everyone.

The recent local Moonlight Fire and the Angora Fire at Lake Tahoe caused even more concern, Keefer said.

The 3,100-acre Angora Fire started June 24 and wiped out 254 homes and 75 other structures in a high-density residential subdivision west of South Lake Tahoe.

It was “surrounded by National Forest lands where very little management has been done,” Keefer told the board at its Sept. 25 meeting.

“They have accomplished some fuel reduction projects in the past few years,” he said, “but nothing to the scale that would be required to reduce the potential threat to those structures.”

The Tahoe Regional Planning Agency also imposed onerous restrictions on fuel reduction to accomplish the state required 100 feet of defensible space around structures, Keefer said.

The 65,000-acre Moonlight Fire burned for the most part on the Plumas National Forest, which Keefer also characterized as “heavily overgrown.”

Dyer Mountain Associates, in contrast, put a lot of thought into fire protection for the four-season resort near Westwood, Keefer said.

The technical appendices in the Dyer Mountain draft environmental impact report spell out a vegetation management and fire protection plan. Fire protection measures include a 250-foot-wide fuel break along the entire western edge of the project.

The fuel break will tie into another existing fuel break around the Lake Almanor basin, Keefer said, and protect against the prevailing fire pattern in Lassen County. With the prevailing southwest wind, fire generally burns from southwest to northeast, he said.

The Dyer fuel break will be thinned to 35 percent crown closure, referring to the space between the tops of the trees, or their crowns.

“What that means is that the trees are going to be spaced far enough apart that when a crown fire hits that fuel break, it’s going to basically drop to the ground,” Keefer said, “because there’s enough space between crowns that it’s not going to carry from crown to crown.”

DMA also proposed a 300-foot feathered area along the edge of the fuel break with space between the crowns of trees increasing closer to the resort.

Keefer also said all the ski runs are fuel breaks.

“Those are areas that are going to be cleared and planted with grass or low-lying brush,” he said. “The forest in between those fuel breaks is going to be thinned to shaded fuel break standards.”

The golf courses also serve as green belts. Since the ski runs and golf courses surround most of the residential and commercial areas, they offer increased fire protection. District 1 Supervisor Bob Pyle also said the snow-making water system can be turned on a fire.

In addition, grazing on meadows around the resort will reduce fuels that feed fires.

Fire hydrants spacing, the sprinkler system in all buildings and class A roof material will also reduce the fire danger.

Keefer said DMA will also comply with the state 100-foot clearance requirement around structures.

“I think you really can’t compare this project to what happened at the Angora Fire or the Moonlight Fire,” he said. “We’re talking about an active fuel reduction program built into the project, and I just don’t see that kind of potential.”

District 2 Supervisor Jim Chapman said he appreciated Keefer’s analysis and the significant points he raised.

However, Chapman said nothing can totally preclude the potential for fire and he questioned how to get people out of harm’s way.

When the roads are maxed out with traffic and firefighters are trying to get into the area, Chapman said the second access the road required will save lives.