Executives with a Concord-based developer contend the city of Martinez is stonewalling them in their efforts to settle a disagreement over requested additional drainage work at a new housing development — an impasse they say is halting further work.
This dispute involves part of a 26.9-acre parcel of land, the onetime Pine Meadow Golf Course south of state Highway 4. It’s the latest chapter for a parcel that has been in the news over the past six years for several reasons, most of them related to its prospective development.
Two DeNova officials, CEO Dave Sanson and Dana Tsubota, DeNova’s executive vice president and general counsel, took the unusual step of speaking to the City Council during the open public comment period at the
start of the meeting.
Tsubota said her company has been unable to land a spot on the council’s public agenda to address a disagreement over some drainage work the city is asking DeNova to do as part of building the “Traditions at the
Meadow” housing tract.
Added Sanson, “This is the only way we can communicate with the council at this juncture. You can’t resolve things if you don’t talk about it.”
At issue now, DeNova officials said, is a request by the city for further drainage work on the east side of the former golf course land, along Vine Hill Way. Tsubota told the council a previous plan had already been
approved, and that the new work was not among the conditions of approval.
“We are not willing to redesign,” Tsubota said. “That puts us at a standstill.”
Added Ryan Hansen, a technical engineer working for DeNova on the Martinez development, “Simply put, there’s nothing else we can do, from a technical standpoint, to respond to a condition that does not apply.”
With Mayor Rob Schroder absent from the Jan. 15 meeting, it was Vice Mayor Mark Ross who responded publicly to the DeNova comments.
“We hear you,” Ross said. “We want to get to a resolution on this, too. We want to see it come to a fruitful conclusion for all parties involved.”
Martinez City Manager Eric Figueroa said this week he couldn’t comment on the DeNova complaints or about the Traditions at the Meadow housing tract.
Tsubota this week did not answer follow-up questions.
The standoff centers on the onetime Pine Meadow Golf Course. But even before the last rounds were played there in April 2015, DeNova, the city and the land’s former owners had discussed a housing project for that site.
The City Council voted in January 2015 to rezone the golf course land from open space/recreation uses to residential use, to make way for a 99-home project there. The course closed four months later.
A citizen group, the Friends of Pine Meadow, preferred the golf course remain undeveloped as “open space,” and collected petition signatures to force a public vote on the former golf course’s fate. Voters approved one of two competing land-use measures driven by the Pine Meadow battles in June 2018.
In April 2016, DeNova sued the Friends group, asserting the group was spreading lies about the housing project. The suit also called for the group to quit calling themselves the “Friends of Pine Meadow,” as members of
that group fought plans supported by the longtime owners of Pine Meadow. The suit was dismissed the following September.
The Friends group sued the city in April 2017, challenging the Martinez council’s 4-1 vote the previous January to rezone the golf course land for residential use to accommodate a DeNova housing project. DeNova was listed on that lawsuit as a “real party in interest” standing to be affected by the lawsuit’s outcome.
Finally, in July 2019, the City of Martinez, Friends of Pine Meadow and DeNova Homes struck a settlement agreement for DeNova to build 65 houses (down from 98) on 12 of the 26.9 acres and set aside 9 acres for a public park. DeNova also agreed to ante up $1.5 million for improvements to Martinez’s parks system. The agreement also called for the Friends of Pine Meadow group to drop its lawsuit against the City of Martinez.
On Jan. 15, Sanson, Tsubota and Hansen told the City Council they need to meet with city officials to work out the drainage situation before any more work can happen.
“We’ve done everything we can to comply with the settlement agreement,” Sanson told the council. “We’ve all had to sacrifice.”
There’s another similar size development underway a bit to the west of the golf course location. It’s on Muir Station Road on a 6 acre lot that’s behind Nob Hill Foods. Around 80 three-story townhouses are being built. There’s an adjacent 7 acre lot to the south but I don’t know if that’s part of this development.
While some neighbors have protested at times there has not been much news coverage. The development is called Laurel Knoll or Laurel Knolls (they have used both names).
For many years this lot was used for boat and RV storage.
And then people wonder why housing is so expensive?! Delays, lawsuits, last-minute request for redesign, etc…add up.
The fact is that there is absolutely no will in the Bay Area to substantially increase the housing stock or provide an adequate supply of affordable housing. And if a politician tells you otherwise, you can bet they are lying.
Let’s go back to the fundamental question – why wasn’t the necessary drainage improvement(s) identified during the review process?
Also, the environmental analysis under CEQA for the development project should have analyzed downstream requirements. Weren’t plans routed to County Flood Control? Hard to believe the project qualified for a CEQA exemption!!
… just asking.
The original owners of the Pine Meadow Gold Course had to close the course after years of losing money and they just couldn’t do it anymore. The family owned most of the land out and kept a small piece to have a golf course for the community to use. When the owners knew they couldn’t do it anymore they went on a mission to find a responsible and community oriented developer. They did not want a Seeno or Lennar type developer. They actually could of gotten more for the land but also live within a block of the future development so they wanted to see and have part in a nice development. Enter Tim Platt and Mark Thomson of the “Friends of Pine Meadow” which they are no friends of Pine Meadow. They claim to be into Open Space but they are just a group of people that go around stirring up problems. They have made this transaction a nightmare for the land owner, the developer and the city. This is why it’s a problem to get homes in the Bay Area. The only thing they got is less homes in the development which there wasn’t that many before and they will be more expensive. Now they city’s made errors and it’s a mess.