Oregon Coast Alliance Newsletter
New, Continued and Cancelled Hearings
Nesika RV Park Application Withdrawn!
 
Nesika Beach, Oregon. Courtesy Wikimedia
 
The applicants have withdrawn their proposal to build an RV park in the coastal zone, next to the crumbling and dangerous cliff at Nesika Beach in rural Curry County outside Gold Beach. The hearing was going to be rescheduled to January, but now that the applicants have withdrawn, there will be no hearing at all. It was prudent of the owners to stop trying to move this project ahead. ORCA provided testimony that Curry County needed to apply the Shorelands Overlay zone, which for some unaccountable reason they failed to do. The "application" was so sketchy it scarcely deserved the name, and certainly did not meet any of the requirements for a development of this kind, especially in consideration of the major geological hazards, and the many public health and safety questions.



Bandon Beach Hotel Application Still in Hearings
 
Revised Bandon Beach Hotel, View from the Southwest. Courtesy City of Bandon
 
The Bandon planning commission held a second hearing on the proposed Keiser Bandon Beach Hotel application, which would replace the existing motel with a bigger, 32-room glass box that includes a 60-lot parking area across the street. The planning commission will make a final decision in February. There are serious geological hazard issues at this site, as the Coquille Point bluff is unstable. The amount of excavation the new hotel would require, as much as twelve feet, would likely interfere with groundwater flow and accelerate the landslide movement taking place just a few feet from the applicant's property. That there is a landslide in the area is well known; a 2015 report on the nearby U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service stairway marks it clearly as an active landslide. Yet the Keiser application never mentions an active landslide on and adjacent to the hotel property. On the contrary, it erroneously describes the base of the bluff as "hard resistant bedrock." Both groundwater interference and the active landslide pose significant risk to the function of the adjacent National Wildlife Refuge, which is prohibited in Bandon ordinance.

Edge Cable Facebook Project in Tierra del Mar: OPRD Hearing February 12th
 
The TDM Facebook Project Briefly Began on January 28, 2019
 
On January 28th, residents of Tierra del Mar were astonished to see equipment lining up on the rural highway in front of their homes, for the Edge Cable Facebook project to begin doing right-of-way work as a "public utility." It was pointed out by angry residents that this project has no permits or approvals apart from the County-granted public utility status. Edge Cable needs permits from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Department of State Lands, The Oregon Department of Parks and Recreation and Tillamook County. None have been granted. The equipment was withdrawn from the roadside later that same day.

The first hearing will be an Oregon Parks and Recreation Department hearing on the required ocean shore permit. Note that it is in Pacific City, not in Tierra del Mar itself:

Tuesday, February 12th
6:00 PM
Kiawanda Community Center
34600 Cape Kiwanda Drive
Pacific City

Testimony may be sent to Jay Sennewald for those who are unable to attend the hearing. The application is available here.






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Contact Executive Director Cameron La Follette by  email
or phone: 503-391-0210
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