Dana Point Planning Commission sets hours for embattled Headlands bluff-top trail

The Dana Point Planning Commission set public hours Monday night for accessing the Bluff Top Trail through the Dana Point Headlands preserve.

Since a 2022 court order, the trail is supposed to be open 7 a.m. to sunset daily; the commissioners made the hours official with the permit approved Monday night.

But the city and the Center for Natural Lands Management have disagreed for years on how much time the public should have on the trail, with officials from the center saying Monday night that the city was overstepping by issuing the permit on their land.

The Center for Natural Lands Management, with a grant from the Steel Foundation, bought the land from developer Sanford Edward in 2005 for $11.9 million with the purpose of preserving the endangered Pacific pocket mouse and the California gnatcatcher, which populate the blufftop.

As the Headlands Development and Conservation Plan requires, CNLM is responsible for the preservation and day-to-day management, and the public trail, for which the city has an easement, must also be accessible.

The trail, which opened in 2009, had the same public hours until early in the coronavirus pandemic when the trail was closed by CNLM. Once reopened, access was limited until 2022 and the court order.

Since then, the California Coastal Commission has said a conditional use permit must be obtained to establish hours for public use on the trail, which is what the Planning Commission did Monday night.

Sarah Mueller, an attorney for CNLM, spoke during the meeting opposing the city’s application for the permit. The group is concerned too much public access could affect the health of the pocket mouse population.

“The city, while holding a conservation easement, lacks the legal basis to apply for a development permit to manage the preserve, including the trail,” she said. “The city’s application was submitted without our consent and without notifying the necessary federal and state wildlife agencies. This unilateral action by the city not only disregards our ownership and management rights, but also contradicts the Local Coastal Program, which designates CNLM to set the hours.”

The public has been cut off from access to this area of the coast for decades, with it first belonging to a private community and then blocked off for development, Eric Nelson, vice-chair of the Planning Commission, said.

“History does repeat itself and history has shown that access to the coastal region has been on and off,” he said about ensuring public access now. “We’ve had legal challenges and issues with gates, and at one point, we had an owner trying to lock off the community. Now, we have an owner who wants to control access.”

“As a public agency, an agency that holds access rights, it’s our job to make it available to the public,” he said.

A handful of people from the public spoke at Monday’s meeting, with all but one advocating for more public access.

“Dana Point residents have almost no access to wilderness areas,” said Capo Beach resident Toni Nelson, adding that in her review of the staff report and correspondence regarding the issues she did not see much data on damage occurring from keeping the area open. “There’s very little documentation on the damage alleged.”

Heather Johnston, executive director of Visit Dana Point, also supported the city’s proposed hours at the trail.

“The local trail is a significant tourist attraction,” she said. “We feel trails promote responsible tourism.”

The half-mile trail – accessed at Scenic Drive or North Selva Road – stretches through the preserve, which is home to mice and other native coastal plants, animals and birds.

The pocket mouse was thought to be extinct until a single one was found on the Headlands in 1993.

There are now three colonies of the mouse, some at Camp Pendleton, a transplant population at the Laguna Coast Wilderness Park that came from mice bred at the San Diego Zoo, and the population at the Headlands. In 2020, the count there was 77 mice.

City officials also have a concern about how the CNLM is addressing the pocket mouse population’s rebound at the preserve, including a refusal to cross-breed the mice with other colonies and whether the group is managing the preserve in a way that is ideal for the mouse habitat.

In a letter to the California Coastal Commission, the city contends that CNLM “failed to spend its resources” for vegetation management, which Fish and Wildlife studies have found is “most important” in the “health of the mouse.” Studies and correspondences from scientists associated with the state and federal wildlife agencies also strongly advocate for cross-breeding the mice.

“CNLM has refused to comply with the recommendations of the resource agencies to cross-breed the mice at the Headlands with mice at the other two known habitats,” the city’s letter sent this month says. “This poses a threat of genetic inbreeding that could decimate the mouse at the Headlands.”

City officials argue, based on internal CNLM emails obtained as part of the 2022 lawsuit, the organization wants to save its financial resources for projects other than managing the preserve and that is why, City Attorney Patrick Munoz said, they are opposing the longer trail hours.

In the past, the center has proposed the trail being open four days a week from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. in the summer and until 4 p.m. in the winter.

A statement Tuesday from the public relations agency representing CNLM said the city made “false assertions at the public meeting” in an effort to smear the group’s name and mischaracterize its “ongoing commitment to maintaining public access at the preserve, our close collaboration with USFWS on conservation, and our decades of support of the Dana Point community.”

Mueller said the group’s chief concern over access is the delicate ecosystem.

“Since opening the trail in 2009, visitation has surged and put enormous pressure on the habitat and its species, particularly the pocket mouse,” she said. “Their existence is precarious at best.

“In 2009, there were 87, then 57 and then 6,” she said of the effects of the time period when trail access was at its most. “We’re not seeking to prohibit public access, but to create chances of survival of this endangered species.”

The number of mice now living on the headlands preserve suggests otherwise, Munoz said. “The objective facts and available data demonstrate daily public access to the trail, as required by the Headlands Development and Conservation Plan, does not pose a threat to the (mouse). The only ‘threat’ at the preserve is the result of CNLM’s conscious decision not to spend its considerable financial resources to properly manage the preserve.”

The Center for Natural Lands Management could appeal the Planning Commission’s decision to the City Council or also lodge an appeal with the California Coastal Commission.

Munoz said the new hours are effective immediately.

Source: Orange County Register