Wetlands

Paul Clinton UPPER NEWPORT BAY -- The Irvine Ranch Water District laid the groundwork for a large-scale cleanup project earlier this week, setting aside $1.36 million to study and plan a series of natural, wetland filters. The district's board unanimously agreed at its Monday meeting to hire Bon Terra, a Costa Mesa consulting firm, as part of the planning stages before the installation of wetlands along the San Diego Creek Watershed. Bon Terra will analyze the project's potential effect on the creek's watershed.

Paul Clinton The Irvine Ranch Water District has extended a deadline for public comments about the 8-inch thick tome that analyzes environmental effects of a sweeping, wetlands filtering project. In extending the deadline to May 30, the agency is bowing to water regulators who say they need more time. The Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board requested the extension, said Norris Brandt, the project's manager. "They are short on staff time," Brandt said about the reason for the extension.

June Casagrande Environmentalist Jan Vandersloot calls it mitigation, but Mayor Steve Bromberg calls it a quid pro quo at seniors' expense. A group of environmentalists led by Vandersloot have temporarily put the brakes on a senior affordable housing project at Lower Bayview Landing by asking the Coastal Commission to rule on whether portions of the site qualify as wetlands. In the meantime, Vandersloot and others have presented an environmental wish list for the adjacent Upper Bayview Landing park to city officials.

June Casagrande A senior affordable housing project could cost up to $1 million more in workers' wages if last-minute environmental studies push the matter past a deadline to get on a Coastal Commission agenda in June. City staff have been scrambling to move the project forward to beat the state's impending prevailing-wage laws that will spell about $1 million in added costs if work doesn't start by December. But to get all the necessary approvals, permits and funding to start work by December, staff members say the matter must make it onto the next Coastal Commission agenda.

In their first critique of the Banning Ranch development plans, California Coastal Commission staff members found that the proposed project would be unlikely to meet state standards. Banning Ranch would likely destroy sensitive habitat, develop on wetlands and otherwise trip up state law governing coastal development, according to a review of the draft environmental impact report (EIR) submitted to Newport Beach city planners. One of the last large undeveloped parcels in the region, Banning Ranch has been the subject of much debate.

Wednesday's Community Commentary by Stephanie Barger ("Wetlands not what is holding up senior housing") argues that "wetlands" on the Bayview Landing site are not the basis of the environmental attack on the city's senior housing project planned along with a park for that 11-acre site. She relates a story about the city Parks Commission, which I chair. The article suggests that we approved a plan for the park with all native plantings. We did not. We have not even held public hearings.

Deirdre Newman Water quality in Orange County could improve substantially if President Bush signs a bill passed by the House of Representatives Monday. The bill, written by Congressman Gary Miller, who represents seven cities in the county, would provide up to $20 million to the Orange County Water District's expansion of its natural wetlands treatment of the Santa Ana River. This treatment enhances water quality by purifying the water naturally.

Paul Clinton UPPER NEWPORT BAY -- The Irvine Ranch Water District's plan to install a filtering network of man-made wetlands in San Diego Creek has moved another step closer to reality. The district will wait to implement the program until a bill proposed by Assemblyman John Campbell (R-Irvine) becomes law. Campbell's Assembly Bill 810, which would give the district the power to acquire land along the watershed to install the wetlands, sailed through the Assembly and is waiting to be heard in a Senate committee.

Paul Clinton UPPER NEWPORT BAY -- A state agency is set to award a $330,000 grant to UC Irvine for the study of a new freshwater wetland that would add a mix of birds and other animals and act as a filter for urban runoff heading into the Back Bay. The California Coastal Conservancy on Thursday is expected to award the money to the university to assemble a report analyzing the conversion of dry land into the wetlands,...

NEWPORT BEACH — Candace Leuthold's students aren't just learning about the environment this year. They're also doing their part to save it. Every month, the Early College High School biology teacher leads her ninth-graders to a restoration site on the Back Bay, just blocks away from the campus. The classes spent the first few months of the year listening to lectures, but last week, they broke out their gloves and shovels and set to work preserving the wetlands. Leuthold's students planted more than 200 shrubs in the soil on a tiny stretch of land near Irvine Avenue and Santiago Drive.

In their first critique of the Banning Ranch development plans, California Coastal Commission staff members found that the proposed project would be unlikely to meet state standards. Banning Ranch would likely destroy sensitive habitat, develop on wetlands and otherwise trip up state law governing coastal development, according to a review of the draft environmental impact report (EIR) submitted to Newport Beach city planners. One of the last large undeveloped parcels in the region, Banning Ranch has been the subject of much debate.

Clarence Irwin Haydock, Ph.D., California ecologist, passed away peacefully the evening of July 30, 2011 in Fountain Valley, CA having been born April 15, 1938 in Bakersfield, CA.  As a boy, growing up in northern CA he sculled a duck boat on San Francisco Bay in the winter and was a gondolier and glass bottom boat guide in the Pacific Grove Marine Gardens for the summer.  He earned his Bachelors Degree in Biology from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, Masters...

Jan Vandersloot, a founding member of the Bolsa Chica Land Trust, will be honored posthumously for his dedication to preserving the Bolsa Chica Wetlands. The late Newport Beach resident on Sunday will be recognized as an outstanding wetlands community leader by the Environmental Law Institute in Washington, D.C. The award is part of the National Wetlands Awards Program that honors six individuals who have contributed to the preservation of the country’s wetlands through education, restoration or activism.

Conservationists, environmentalists and architects want to put surfers in line — literally. A glimpse of a perfect “A-frame” wave at Lower Trestles can send surfers power-walking to the beach, in some cases straight across sensitive wetlands. “They’re very singular-minded; they want shortest distance between two points,” said Steve Long, the former chief lifeguard at Trestles and father of famed big-wave surfer Greg Long said. A proposed path to Lower Trestles is designed to keep them off the sensitive habitat.

The L-shaped bundle was giving Kelly Beavers trouble as she maneuvered it carefully toward a plastic crate in the lab at the Wetlands & Wildlife Care Center in Huntington Beach. A pair of webbed feet began kicking under the white sheet that she cradled in her arms. A long beak, which Beavers gripped tightly with one hand, thrashed about as well. Looking around the crates, which had been manufactured for dogs but were housing pelicans Tuesday afternoon, she opted for one that was small enough to hold a single, hot-tempered bird.

Your article (“Dredging banking on stimulus funds,” Feb. 7) states that Newport Beach hopes to receive some federal funding for completing the Back Bay dredging project. This is important for many reasons, and this topic gets lots of attention from the City Council and the Daily Pilot. I am a resident of Newport Shores, which is bordered on the north by the Seminiuk Slough. Most local residents probably are not aware that this wildlife area is destined to become a meadow unless there isn’t some action to dredge it. In fact, at low tide, you cannot even get through in some areas with a kayak because of the sediment buildup.

This corrects an earlier version of the story. For longtime Costa Mesans it may be hard to believe that the lower portion of Fairview Park might soon be filled with ponds, streams, trees and shrubs, but the city plans to start making that vision a reality next month. The park, situated just below Estancia High School, has long been little more than a barren, arid dirt lot with seasonal grasses growing on the hillsides. But with the help of $1 million from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and $250,000 each from the city’s Park Development Funds and a grant from the Habitat Conservation Fund that will all change in October as the first phase of the Fairview Park Wetlands and Riparian Habitat Project begins.