By Christy Scott
The Alpine Sun

     CAMPO — Campo planners voted Monday night to deny a long-debated and hard-fought project for a 250-bed foster care facility planned for the Flying A Ranch in Campo. After a heated meeting between planners, residents and proponents, the nine-member board voted 6-3 to advise the San Diego County Board of Supervisors to disapprove the project.
     Dubbed “A Children’s Village” by planners with Father Joe's Villages, the project would span 118 acres between Buckman Springs Road and Lake Morena. The proposed development would include 25 free-standing homes, an on-site school, medical clinic, interfaith chapel and sports facilities.
     “This is a very important project for our community — it is one of the two largest projects we’re facing,” said Chairwoman Bev Esry at the Monday planning group meeting.
     The facility would be a year-round home for children who have been removed from their families. The foster care ranch is billed as a stable home where children would be offered the skills to become productive members of society.
“Thousands of boys and girls of all ages are forced onto the streets because their families fall apart for whatever reason,” said Father Joe Carroll, who attended Monday’s meeting. “We need to be concerned about these kids, about how they are living and about how they will end up in the future.”
     At A Children’s Village, up to 200 homeless and foster care children would be housed on-site with 50 live-in house parents. There would be a school on-site, though planners say students could attend local public schools if they choose. The stated goal of the program is to keep siblings together and give them a solid home environment.
     At Monday’s meeting, many audience members voiced their support for the project and the program offered there. Others questioned the environmental impacts and studies that make up the current environmental impact report and argued that the project does not fit in with community character. 
     The planning group is charged with voting from a land use standpoint, but many audience members who participated in the discussion sought approval on grounds of compassion, rather than land use issues.
     “Shouldn’t we be considering the betterment of our youth over the impossible comfort levels of certain bitter, insecure geriatrics?” said Felix Sundown, a recent graduate of Freedom Ranch, a local substance abuse recovery facility. “I think children should come first. We’re trying to empower children that have been given up on. We should be considering them first, rather than these other questions that have really nothing to do with helping these kids.”
The project has been in the works for many years, with several iterations of a draft EIR having been presented over that period.
     “When we first got this ranchland, we had discussed selling the property to fund more programs in the city,” Carroll said. “Then, when we went out to the site and the land just cried out ‘send me children.’ It was just a natural, wonderful setting to bring children into.”
     Last October, the county requested additional information from developers, and revisions to make the documents in the draft EIR adequate and ready for review.
     In a Jan. 31 letter to SVDP, the county planners wrote that a review of the project’s third screen check draft EIR and technical studies, have determined the documents not to be adequate pursuant to CEQA and the county’s EIR format and general content requirements.
     Brian Mooney, of Mooney, Jones and Stokes, which conducted environmental studies, opined that project planners have more than addressed the concerns raised by the county.
     During a presentation to the group, project planners talked about the various findings of the EIR.
     “Our job is to provide an objective analysis of the environmental effects of the project,” Mooney said. He said that all of the studies conducted are governed by county and state guidelines. “Everything that could possibly be affected by this project has been addressed in the EIR.”
     Some of the significant effects that were identified and mitigated through the EIR are biological effects, archeological resources, noise, hydrology and groundwater. According to the project EIR, all of these concerns are mitigated through various actions that project planners will have to complete.
     “We know that there are a lot of community issues and environmental issues facing this project, “ said Director Rick Newmyer, of SVDP’s Toussaint Academy in San Diego. “But the drive to work through these technical issues and solve these problems, is that this is about helping children, even saving children’s lives.”
     Planning group member Bob Shea wondered what effect the additional residents and vehicles would have on local emergency services. According to Mooney, project officials have received correspondence from the sheriff’s department and the rural fire protection district stating that both groups have reviewed the project and can handle the additional people.
     Another major concern for project opponents was community character.
     “This project has no place in the community character of Campo,” said planner Bill Slaff. “Your study findings don’t meet muster.” 
     Many residents in the audience were vocal about their concerns that board members were biased about the particular project.
     “I’ve seen a lot of projects come through, that have been approved here, that people in this community really don’t approve of,” Mike Pectoro, opined. “This project is one that has widespread support in this community.”
     “There’s some good and bad sprinkled into the project all over, I’m sure, but I’d hate to see the people of Campo get the name that they don’t want to help children,” said Lake Morena resident John Long. “I think we ought to be concerned about children no matter where they are and give them somewhere that they can go and get a better chance at life if we can. And we can out here. We can share our resources with these kids and help them out.”
     The planning group approved the Flying A property for a GP 2020 density of one home per 10 acres in July 2003. While this is a higher density than the 1:20 and 1:40 placed on most other large properties in the area, it still equals only about 11 single family homes.
     The county’s new rainfall limitations map would allow a minimum parcel size of 11 acres, or 10 single family homes — less than half the 25 sought under the SVDP plan.
     Community members and the planning group have discussed groundwater issues related to the project many times in the six years since it was originally proposed for a ranch donated by Alpine’s Tom Dyke, who hoped to see a Boy’s Town-style facility placed there.
     There has also been some discomfort with SVDP’s conflicts with other host communities and relationships with alleged or convicted criminals.
     Dyke, who originally brought SVDP into the community, eventually denounced it bitterly, saying the group had misrepresented its intentions in order to get his Dyke Ranch property and publicly called for the organization to return to the original plan to house troubled teens for free.
     After escrow closed on the donation deal, SVDP had changed its stated intention and announced that it would house children from the county’s foster care system and named a reimbursement figure far in excess of what the public would pay to the private homes where foster care children are currently placed.
     Critics said the plan had the potential to generate a profit for SVDP at children’s and taxpayers’ expense. Placement of the planned institution on the later-donated Flying A also frees the Dyke Ranch property to be sold or developed — a further source of financial benefit to the organization.
     Father Joe savaged the community on radio and national television and sued neighbors and, later, Dyke, to force them to allow use of private roads to access the property.
     On a motion to deny, made by Slaff and seconded by Shirley Driscoll, the board vote was 6-3,. Jean Bates, Bob Shea and Larry Johnson voted in favor of the plan.
     According to A Children’s Village officials, they did not expect the project to be approved by the CLMPG, due to long and ongoing controversy. The next step for project planners is a to work with county staff to address problems and prepare a presentation to the San Diego County Planning Commission in the fall. If the project is approved there, it will move forward. If not, it will go before the San Diego County Board of Supervisors for a final decision.
     The comment period for this project will expire June 5 at 4 p.m. The draft EIR and maps for the proposed facility may be reviewed online, or at the DPLU Project Processing Counter, 5201 Ruffin Road, Suite B, and at the Campo–Lake Morena Library, at 31356 Highway 94, Campo.
     Comments must be sent to the DPLU address listed in the document and should reference the project numbers and name.
     For further information, one may call Kristin Blackson, (858) 694-3012.
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