A lawsuit settlement between Santa Clara County and San Martin
citizens was supposed to be a happy ending to a five-month battle
over expansion plans at South County Airport. It still may be.
However, the timing of a press release announcing details of the
agreement
– before San Martin parties had blessed it with their signatures
– put a sour taste in some mouths.
A lawsuit settlement between Santa Clara County and San Martin citizens was supposed to be a happy ending to a five-month battle over expansion plans at South County Airport.
It still may be. However, the timing of a press release announcing details of the agreement – before San Martin parties had blessed it with their signatures – put a sour taste in some mouths.
“I’m purely and simply surprised right now, because I thought all the ducks would be put in a row before something of this significance would go out,” said Sylvia Hamilton, chairwoman of the San Martin Neighborhood Alliance, the group that brought the lawsuit. “Until (the agreement) is signed it isn’t necessarily official.”
Since the middle of August, county staff and San Martin leaders have been hashing out details of a settlement agreement, dropping a lawsuit the community’s neighborhood group brought forward in June.
The lawsuit challenged the approval of 100 new airplane hangars at San Martin’s South County Airport and the adequacy of an environmental study concerning them.
The suit alleged that an environmental analysis done by the county violated the California Environmental Quality Act and does not properly address community impacts. The county’s study argued there would not be significant impacts if certain mitigation measures are followed.
As a result of the agreement they reached, the county and San Martin leaders decided to produce two documents, the actual settlement and the press release describing it to the public.
County staff was to write the settlement and then let San Martin leaders make amendments before finalizing the document. For the press release, San Martin was to draft the document and then let the county make its changes.
Everything seemed copasetic until the press release went out, one day after the board approved the settlement agreement, but before San Martin leadership signed off on that document.
Both parties had agreed that the press release would represent “the extent of their comment.”
“I’ve answered as much as I can,” county Spokeswoman Gwen Mitchell said after confirming the settlement agreement was approved by the Board of Supervisors at a closed session Sept. 8.
Lawyers for the county and San Martin approved the press release prior to that, Mitchell said.
Hamilton steered clear of accusing the supervisors of rubber-stamping the agreement, but expressed concern that her group’s comments were received and apparently reviewed and then approved all in the same day.
