Thanks to all who came to the 9/8 City Council meeting and/or sent email to show your support for Moraga Canyon. Because of your efforts, the Council voted 3-2 to delay moving forward with the EIR for two weeks to give the community time to review the proposal. Here’s a report by Jim Semitekol, who attended the meeting:

The Piedmont City Council was presented with the supplemental design summary and technical proposal for development of Blair Park along Moraga Avenue into a sports field complex which is to be the basis for the Environmental Impact Report (EIR). This supplemental design includes a pedestrian bridge with an elevator over busy Moraga Avenue, small and big play fields, concrete retaining walls to a height of 38’ (plus 8’ fencing on top), steep landscape berms along Moraga Avenue up to a height of 15’ (plus 12 to 15’ fencing on top), an elevated snack bar with roof viewing, restrooms and two parking lots with a total of 40 spaces on the 5.62-acre site.

Numerous concerned citizens from both Piedmont and Oakland voiced concerns over the size and scope of the project, traffic, safety, fiscal planning and destruction of the last open space in Piedmont asking that the project be referred to the Recreation, Planning and Parks Department for community-wide review before proceeding with an expensive EIR. Of major concern to at least 3 council members was the issue of the public access to the proposed plan. The plan was not made available to the public until its posting on the Piedmont city web site on the Friday before the long Labor Day Weekend. The city’s web site went down sometime late Saturday or early Sunday and was not back on line until Tuesday morning severely limiting the public’s chance to review the plan in detail prior to that evening’s Council meeting.

Councilmember Fujioka also asked for an estimate of maintenance costs and was told by staff that was unavailable within this timeframe. Although not indicated on the plans submitted, Councilmember Keating stated there are large drainage holding tanks planned for the site which he had questions about.

After more than 2 hours of presentation and comments, a lengthy debate by council resulted in a 3 to 2 vote to delay acceptance of the plans in order to allow citizens two weeks to review the plan in more detail.

The issue will be on the agenda for the City Council meeting on Monday, September 21st. Concerned parties are urged to attend the council meeting and voice their opinions.