Finer points of California-Sonoma agreement on SDC’s future

A week after the announcement that the state was funding a local, Sonoma County-based process to decide the fate of the 945-acre Sonoma Developmental Center property, details are emerging on how that agreement was reached, and what it could mean for open space and affordable housing in Sonoma Valley.

Supervisor Susan Gorin, whose 1st District includes Eldridge where the SDC campus and open space are located, said that much has been happening “behind the scenes” during the past four years since then-Gov. Jerry Brown announced the closure of the developmental center at the end of 2018.

Since then, Gorin said she has been involved in ongoing negotiations between the county and the state over the future of SDC “and coordinating communications with the SDC leadership team.”

The “leadership team” she refers to is more formally known as the SDC Coalition, led by Richard Dale, director of Sonoma Ecology Center, John McCaull of the Sonoma Land Trust, and Kathleen Miller of the developmental center’s Parent Hospital Association, as well as Gorin. The SDC Coalition was formed when the state first laid out plans for the eventual decommissioning of the center nearly five years ago.

While Gorin, Dale and McCaull continue to be engaged in future planning for SDC, Miller may be stepping away from an active role with the Coalition. “I think there is a long road ahead for SDC that will hopefully lead to protecting the open space and creating workforce housing on the developed footprint,” she said.

But Miller said that with the closure of SDC, the organization she has headed might be changing its name and mission and possibly finding new leadership. “However the main role of PHA continues to be advocating for those individuals with developmental issues.”

One significant change that occurred since 2015, when the impending closure of SDC was first announced, was the 2016 passage of Measure K, which secured hundreds of acres of Eldridge land as “community separators,” or protected swaths of natural open space.

Teri Shore, of the Greenbelt Alliance which lobbied heavily for the passage of Measure K, said she was “thrilled” that the community separators vote had made a difference in the fate of SDC. Calling the natural lands at Eldridge “among the most at-risk greenbelts in the Bay Area,” she said, “designating 825 acres of those lands as community separators with voter protections in 2016 definitely sent a clear message that the community and the county want to protect open space at the Sonoma Developmental Center.”

One aspect of the community separator status for the Eldridge campus is its significant positioning in a “wildlife corridor,” a continuum of open space between Sonoma Mountain (including Jack London State Historic Park) and the Mayacamas Mountains on the other side of the Sonoma Valley. The SDC property has been called a “pinchpoint” for this wildlife corridor, and extensive development of the 945-acre site would threaten the ability of wildlife including mountain lions, bobcats, black bear and other animals to move across their natural range.

The resolution passed by the Board of Supervisors at its April 5 meeting specifically calls out the “important wildlife corridors and preserved ecosystems” of the SDC property as one in a litany of factors in regarding the property as a community asset that should be preserved “through a locally controlled expedited land use planning and stakeholder engagement process.”

“It is very gratifying that the state acknowledges the importance of the wild lands of SDC for the ongoing function of this important wildlife corridor,” said Tony Nelson, the Sonoma Valley program manager for the Sonoma Land Trust. “The state’s support provides a nice boost for the efforts of many individuals and organizations working to protect this corridor for wild species as well as humans on into the future.”

Another factor that entered into the agreement, negotiated and announced on April 2 by state Senators Mike McGuire (D-Healdsburg) and Bill Dodd (D-Napa), and state Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry (D-Winters), was the crucial need for affordable housing not only in Sonoma County but state-wide as well.

Just days after his inauguration in January, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order to spur affordable housing development on state land. As the Department of General Services takes formal management of the SDC property on July 1, that executive order would seem to apply.

In addition, Sonoma’s Board of Supervisors in December endorsed a post-fire goal of producing 30,000 new housing units countywide by 2023. Both of these housing mandates are cited in the supervisors’ resolution, and seem to further focus the state’s path forward in working out a future for the SDC property.

The resolution also expresses support for increased housing for individuals with developmental disabilities, the preservation of the SDC cemetery, and the establishment of a museum to recognize the history of the facility, first opened in 1891. Funds to support those efforts would come from “property sale proceeds” as the facility and its grounds are reallocated.

What elements of the campus and its open space would be for sale is not clear at this time.

A key element of the proposal is a “specific plan” to work out the details on land use, housing proposals, possible additions to the state and regional parks (the property adjoins both Jack London State Historic Park and the Sonoma Valley Regional Park), and the overall vision for Eldridge.

That plan will be developed and overseen by Permit Sonoma – “including a robust community engagement process” – with $3.5 million in funding provided by the state’s General Services office over a three-year period.

Contact the reporter at christian.kallen@sonomanews.com.