First, the obvious conclusion from the Environmental Review Committee meeting Friday, is that Vallco is not compliant with SB35 due to the environmental problems on the site.
During the ERC Meeting, the consultant demonstrated knowledge of various "Recognized Environmental Concerns" such as Underground Storage Tanks at Vallco and stated that she 'thought there had been a couple of Phase II Environmental Site Assessments' done at Vallco. I have already requested that the city provide me with these alleged documents, but I do not believe you will find any because of how the previous Phase I ESAs were conducted (extremely limited records search and site recon) and if a Phase II ESA was ever performed, it has not been publicly disclosed, ever and was not included in any Vallco EIR documentation or appendices.
Finding Recognized Environmental Concerns is one of the prime reasons a Phase II Environmental Site Assessment is performed to assist in all sorts of decision-making, especially decisions regarding people's health. The EIR consultant could only guess at what was on the site, and the EIR was not complete in their review of documentation at the SCCFD missing PCE use, for example, which is dry cleaning fluid. The city is failing to protect the residents and failing to provide full disclosure to the public and anyone who may be financing the project or investing in it.
The city is in such a hurry to force this project onto the residents that you refuse to inform and protect us.
A Phase II Environmental Site Assessment will take a brief amount of time, and it may indicate that onsite air monitors during construction are necessary and extra precautionary steps are needed. That is the right way to take care of people.
The previous Phase I ESAs made claims that there either were no records at the SCCFD or did not even go to look. There were NO Phase II ESAs presented to the city by the Vallco owner, the Vallco and Hyatt House owners did not fill out Cornerstone Earth Group's environmental questionnaire.
In order to look at the Fire Department records you have to fill out a public records request and go to the Los Gatos Office where they give you a quick tutorial on how to look up the records. I did this with some assistants over three visits and 8 hours. I brought in the stack of records to the public comment period for the Amended EIR August 7. Cornerstone Earth Group could very easily link their PDFs of these documents.
The City, City Manager, and City Attorney, are now on the hook for the Underground Storage Tank issue along with the developer because this is your jurisdiction and your documentation would have all hazardous materials sites within the city. Sears apparently was allowed by the city to not be properly closed three years ago and the city did not do anything about that while the site groundwater drains into the storm drain system and the photograph of one of the 'alleged' USTs 'allegedly' been at the location since 1969 so it has had a good long time to rot while it sits 'allegedly' 2 feet from a storm drain inlet. How many more years do you plan to allow this to go on? The city must report this and have it cleaned up. Vallco could sit another 10 years before the developer does anything.
The CA Gov. Code statute for Underground Storage Tanks is thus:
25299. Violations; Civil and Criminal Penalties
(a) Any operator of an underground tank system shall be liable for a civil penalty of not less than five hundred dollars ($500) or more than five thousand dollars ($5,000) for each underground storage tank for each day of violation for any of the following violations:
(1) Operating an underground tank system which has not been issued a permit, in violation of this chapter.
(2) Violation of any of the applicable requirements of the permit issued for the operation of the underground tank system.
(3) Failure to maintain records, as required by this chapter.
(4) Failure to report an unauthorized release, as required by Sections 25294 and 25295.
(5) Failure to properly close an underground tank system, as required by Section 25298.
(6) Violation of any applicable requirement of this chapter or any regulation adopted by the board pursuant to Section 25299.3.
(7) Failure to permit inspection or to perform any monitoring, testing, or reporting required pursuant to Section 25288 or 25289.
(8) Making any false statement, representation, or certification in any application, record, report, or other document submitted or required to be maintained pursuant to this chapter.
(9) Tampering with or otherwise disabling automatic leak detection devices or alarms.
(b) Any owner of an underground tank system shall be liable for a civil penalty of not less than five hundred dollars ($500) or more than five thousand dollars ($5,000) per day for each underground storage tank, for each day of violation, for any of the following violations:
(1) Failure to obtain a permit as specified by this chapter.
(2) Failure to repair or upgrade an underground tank system in accordance with this chapter.
(3) Abandonment or improper closure of any underground tank system subject to this chapter. (4) Violation of any applicable requirement of the permit issued for operation of the underground tank system. CALIFORNIA CODES HEALTH & SAFETY CODES 25280 – 25299.8 54 (5) Violation of any applicable requirement of this chapter or any regulation adopted by the board pursuant to Section 25299.3.
(6) Failure to permit inspection or to perform any monitoring, testing, or reporting required pursuant to Section 25288 or 25289.
(7) Making any false statement, representation, or certification in any application, record, report, or other document submitted or required to be maintained pursuant to this chapter.
(c) Any person who intentionally fails to notify the board or the local agency when required to do so by this chapter or who submits false information in a permit application, amendment, or renewal, pursuant to Section 25286, is liable for a civil penalty of not more than five thousand dollars ($5,000) for each underground storage tank for which notification is not given or false information is submitted.
(d)
(1) Any person who violates any corrective action requirement established by, or issued pursuant to, Section 25296.10 is liable for a civil penalty of not more than ten thousand dollars ($10,000) for each underground storage tank for each day of violation.
(2) A civil penalty under this subdivision may be imposed in a civil action under this chapter, or may be administratively imposed by the board or a regional board pursuant to Article 2.5 (commencing with Section 13323) of Chapter 5 of Division 7 of the Water Code.
(e) Any person who violates Section 25292.3 is liable for a civil penalty of not more than five thousand dollars ($5,000) for each underground storage tank for each day of violation.
(f)
(1) Any person who falsifies any monitoring records required by this chapter, or knowingly fails to report an unauthorized release, shall, upon conviction, be punished by a fine of not less than five thousand dollars ($5,000) or more than ten thousand dollars ($10,000), by imprisonment in the county jail for not to exceed one year, or by both that fine and imprisonment.
(2) Any person who intentionally disables or tampers with an automatic leak detection system in a manner that would prevent the automatic leak detection system from detecting a leak or alerting the owner or operator of the leak, shall, upon conviction, be punished by a fine of not less than five thousand dollars ($5,000) or more than ten thousand dollars ($10,000), by imprisonment in the county jail for not more than one year, or by both the fine and imprisonment.
(g) In determining both the civil and criminal penalties imposed pursuant to this section, the board, a regional board or the court, as the case may be, shall consider all relevant circumstances, including, but not limited to, the extent of harm or potential harm caused by the violation, the nature of the violation and the period of time over which it occurred, the frequency of past violations, and the corrective action, if any, taken by the person who holds the permit.
(h)
(1) Each civil penalty or criminal fine imposed pursuant to this section for any separate violation shall be separate, and in addition to, any other civil penalty or criminal fine imposed pursuant to this section or any other provision of law, except that no civil penalty shall be recovered under subdivision
(d) for violations for which a civil penalty is recovered pursuant to Section 13268 or 13350 of the Water Code. The penalty or fine shall be paid to the unified program agency, the participating agency, or the state, whichever is represented by the office of the city attorney, district attorney, or Attorney General bringing the action.
(2) Any penalties or fines paid to a uniform program agency or a participating agency pursuant to paragraph (1) shall be deposited into a special account and shall be expended only to fund the activities of the unified program agency or participating agency in enforcing this chapter within that jurisdiction pursuant, to the uniform program specified in Chapter 6.11 (commencing with Section 25404).
(3) All penalties or fines collected by the board or a regional board or collected on behalf of the board or a regional board by the Attorney General shall be deposited in the State Water Pollution Cleanup and Abatement Account in the State Water Quality Control Fund, and are available for expenditure by the board, upon appropriation, pursuant to Section 13441 of the Water Code. (i) Paragraph (9) of subdivision (a) does not prohibit the owner or operator of an underground storage tank, or his or her designee, from maintaining, repairing, or replacing automatic leak detection devices or alarms associated with that tank.
Additionally, the air quality impacts are terrible at Vallco, both during construction and when operational. Air doesn't have borders.
Lastly, no study was ever conducted to indicate the safety of putting a 30 acre lid over streets next to a 200,000 vehicle per day freeway which has a potential added freeway cap being looked at. That is completely irresponsible.
I respectfully request that the USTs be investigated at Vallco.
I request that the EIR and all associated Development Agreement and General Plan Amendment documents NOT be approved for submittal to the City Council.
I believe the Vallco GPA requested is so far out of alignment, and not in accordance with the city legislated General Plan Authorization Process, or with the actual General Plan policies (such as noise, air quality) that an entire new General Plan with a new city-wide EIR needs to be performed.
Sincerely,
KM
No comments:
Post a Comment