BIA|Bay Area has successfully thwarted a sustained 18-month push from anti-housing forces to mandate unreasonable open space and farmland mitigation ratios as part of the Contra Costa County Local Agency Formation Commission’s new countywide agricultural and open space policy. Instead, applicants seeking annexations or other boundary changes will have the flexibility to propose their own mitigations when agricultural and open space lands are converted to other uses. Environmental organizations sought to override local jurisdictions’ land-use authority and set mandatory minimum 3-to-1 preservation ratios for prime agricultural land, require 300-foot buffer zones and cede open space protection levels to state and federal regulators. Adopted on Nov. 9, 2016, the final policy language is pending the inclusion of clarifying language that BIA|Bay Area requested and minor corrections. Please email BIA East Bay Executive Director for Governmental Affairs Lisa Vorderbrueggen at
lvorderbrueggen@biabayarea.org if you wish to be be notified when the final policy document is publicly available.
Click here to access the Nov. 9, 2016, agenda, staff report and meeting audio.
