Wow, thank you so much for you all your help with the City Council meeting last night!
There were 16 people that wrote thoughtful, honest, and substantive comments that were read into the record by the City Clerk. And, there were 12 people (1 community member, our 10 speakers, and the developer) that spoke verbally. Great job everyone!
All in all, 27 of the 28 speakers effectively asked the City Council to follow through on its requests sent to the County, which included making sure the developer had the rights to grade the land needed for the Esperanza Hills roadway. While the developer says all is done, we haven’t seen those documents and will be submitting a Public Records Act request to see what if anything in our files is missing.
And, while we may not know what is happening behind the scenes with the Council and city staff, we were less than impressed by the Council’s response to our comments. The comments were of the tone: “Thanks for commenting,” rather than something of substance, like: “We appreciate all the comments and will be sure City staff takes these into consideration while reviewing this application. And, let’s schedule an update on this at the next City Council meeting.” There is a big difference between the two.
We’ve researched a lot over the last five days and one of the biggest finds came from the documents submitted on the grading plans. The city-certified and accepted secondary emergency exit for the Hidden Hills development will be functionally removed if this entryway is approved and allowed to occur as planned. In other words, the City required the Hidden Hills development to create this emergency exit in case of a wildfire–and now the City will allow that exit to be permanently removed. This is unfathomable to us.
Many thanks to those that took time out to write comments, speak with city leaders and staff, read a speech, etc. You are all rock stars in our book!
We’ve tried to avoid asking for funds, but if we want to continue to fight (now) focused on the City, we will need to build our reserves.
We know some of our friends have been hit by the pandemic and job losses. We know that you support our efforts and will help financially–if you can–to continue the fight against this dangerous development.
Please donate if you are able. Big and small, it all helps. Checks can be mailed to Hills For Everyone (memo line: YL Defense), P.O. Box 9835, Brea, CA 92822-1835 or donate online.