By Bruce Barton

Residents say revised LAH pathways map violates state law

A revised town pathways map is heading to the Los Altos Hills City Council for approval, while trails supporters are up in arms over a document they see as massively flawed and politically motivated.

Town officials, meanwhile, see the map as a legitimate update, even an improvement over the last map, done in 1981.

The council will consider approval of the map, detailing 108 miles of existing and future pathways, at its Oct. 17 meeting. The Los Altos Hills Planning Commission last week accepted the map as proposed by the town’s pathways committee and recommended council approval. The town is updating the map as required by state law.

Commissioners accepted the map with requests that planned paths on Commissioners Bill Kerns and Carl Cottrell’s properties be vacated, drawing additional outcry from the sizable audience at Thursday’s meeting.

Longtime resident and pathways supporter Dorothea Schreiner said commissioners agree to eliminate paths on the basis of obtrusiveness to the property owners without first sending the issues back to the pathways committee.

She also complained that commissioners all but dismissed the concerns of 35-50 speakers about the flawed map.

“Over and over again, what you heard were errors, omissions, specific examples where there were mistakes,” she said.

Commission chairwoman Janet Vitu countered the revised document is “the most accurate map we’ve had,” and that there were off-road paths “actually added.”

“There are no existing paths that are going to be eliminated,” Vitu said, and she dismissed the notion that residents on the current pathways committee were biased against off-road paths.

“They are very pro-paths,” she said. “The budget for paths has increased and we have a good maintenance program.”

But protesting residents continue to think otherwise. They hired a law firm to draw up a letter to commissioners noting the initial study and mitigated negative declaration for the town’s pathway element in its general plan is “legally invalid” under CEQA and that the commission “must therefore either substantially alter the proposed project or prepare an Environmental Impact Report” analyzing impacts.

Especially targeted is the town’s assertion that the new map eliminates only 3.9 miles of paths. Pathways supporters point to town officials’ “slight of hand” that lumps on-road and off-road paths together in making that assertion. The new map, in fact, eliminates 15 miles of off-road paths, 89 segments in all. The trail lovers hold the off-road paths in much higher regard. “Off-road pathways offer a variety of recreation, scenic and circulatory benefits that on-road pathways do not,” according to the residents’ letter. “On-road paths have much less recreational value - especially for equestrians, and have far less scenic and aesthetic value than off-road trails.”

Commissioner Bill Kerns noted the revised map is the result of numerous town attempts to get public feedback, including two study sessions. He also allowed that changes and corrections would be added to the map.

“I think there are parts of the map that may be questionable, but it’s impossible to have a map that’s 100 percent correct,” he said. “This map is far better than the 1981 map. There’s been a lot more input. A lot of effort has been put into this. We haven’t been negligent in doing this.”

But numerous residents still believe the commission and pathways committees are tied to councilmembers Toni Casey and Steve Finn’s beliefs than many off-road paths are more intrusive than beneficial. Resident Twinkie Lyman even cited “cronyism” among commissioners Vitu, Kerns and Cottrell for supporting each other’s attempts to get rid of pathway easements. “If our ‘commission-council-committees’ political body of Casey-appointees would look at the rest of their town as friends, perhaps the easements wouldn’t scare them so much,” Lyman said.