When I was a kid, much of the South County was still being farmed. Nowadays, the area is one piece of urban sprawl. Like other areas of Southern California, it is difficult to discern where one town ends and another begins.

What is funny is the rhetoric coming from the South County about the need to preserve agriculture and open space. They are, of course, primarily talking about ag lands and open spaces elsewhere in the county, since they paved over the land they live on.

One of the places they seek to save is the coastline between the Gaviota tunnel and Goleta. Dubbed the Gaviota Coast, there is no small amount of rhetoric and propaganda being spewed forth to mobilize people to save this stretch of our coast. Save the coast from what? Development, of course.

This coastline is presented as the last bit of undeveloped coastline in all of Southern California. The truth is the area was developed a long time ago. Development of all kinds is scattered throughout this stretch of land.

Dozens of homes are concentrated in two gated communities, and one fairly large rural residential neighborhood. One of the poshest hotels in all of Southern California shares a strip of coastline alongside a golf course and an oil production facility.

At least four additional facilities developed for oil-related industrial uses dot the area. Then there are three state beaches, a couple of rest stops, and a fire station.

Did I mention the privately owned campgrounds, and the dude ranch/theatre? And the crown jewel of this virgin piece of coast? The dump that serves half the county’s residents. Might be the only dump with an ocean view, for all I know.

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The only thing I haven’t mentioned is a couple of gas stations and a restaurant that were torn down, and the remaining shell of an elementary school.

Oh, I almost forgot the remains of the former WWII POW camp.

To present this area of our county as the last rural, pristine, undeveloped piece of coastline in Southern California is a stretch of imagination.

Recently, a family trying to build a home on their 17-acre parcel on a hill overlooking the freeway and the ocean, just barely outside the Goleta city limits, were held hostage by NIMBY neighbors and a bully with a law degree. The claims were the house would violate the county’s policies protecting the views of ridgelines.

To ensure the house couldn’t be seen from the freeway, as if that were a crime against humanity, the property owners volunteered to move the house back from the ridge and construct an earthen berm to shield the house from view.

Well, the lawyer then claimed the project had to undergo environmental review, because the project had been changed in the course of a public hearing. Even though single-family homes are legally exempt from this requirement, the Board of Supervisors exercised caution and ordered a review to be done.

One year, $50,000, and 65 pages of environmental review later, the study confirmed the berm did, in fact, hide the house from the freeway. The environmental attorney then argued the house could still be seen from roads on the hills above the project site.

In essence, selfish people who own property on the South Coast and are enjoying the same are trying to save the coast from their neighbors who haven’t developed yet. This is not a noble venture. It is coveting of the worst kind. And quite frankly, I don’t give a darn about saving the view for people driving the freeway.

Andy Caldwell is executive director of COLAB, and a 40-year resident of the Central Coast. For contact information, visit the COLAB website at www.colabsbc.org.

July 24, 2008