For a town that professes no great love for the Sierra Club, they sure do a lot of our heavy lifting.

First it was lawsuits against developers over air pollution.

Now, it’s ag land preservation.

For the uninitiated, a couple of years ago, the Sierra Club sued over several developments that had been blithely rubber stamped by our elected officials with zero air pollution requirements.

The Sierra Club argued that because the developments would create more air pollution, developers should pay a fee used to reduce pollution elsewhere (that’s known as “mitigation”). Developers settled, and, in some cases,  voluntarily entered into contracts with the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District to avoid lawsuits.

You’d think the people elected to represent us would have our best interests (such as the ability to breathe) in mind and require air pollution mitigation right off the get. But no, the Sierra Club had to push the issue.

The same with farmland preservation.

Over the last three years, the Sierra Club has sued several projects saying they need to replace the prime farmland lost to housing, said Gordon Nipp, with the local Sierra Club.
Again, developers settled. The Sierra Club now has 15 ag land preservation agreements in place.

Farmland preservation, however, is more complicated than air pollution mitigation.
With air pollution, the Sierra Club simply gives the money to the Rose Foundation, a Bay Area based environmental group, which has used it to replace diesel school buses with natural gas ones for the Kern County Superintendent of Schools, among other things.

Ag land involves finding farmers willing to sell conservation easements on their land, meaning it can never be developed. Then an entity is needed to hold those easements.
Enter the Sequoia Riverlands Trust, based in Tulare County, which just secured grant money to start its planning phase in Kern County.

If you think these folks are a bunch of posey pluckin’, tree huggers, think again.

“We are not the Sierra Club,” Executive Director, Soapy Mullholland stressed. “We are a not for profit that holds easements.”

Mullholland, who used to be in real estate development, has seen both sides. She knows developers want a level playing field, a set of standards they can rely on and plan for when figuring costs. 

To that end, the trust will hire an outside expert to assess the land here, soil quality, water availability, etc. So, when a developer needs to replace land, the trust can make an equitable trade and the developer will know the costs ahead of time.

Right now, Mullholland is looking at an up front cost to developers of $2,500 per acre, plus a 1/4 percent transfer fee on each home’s sale price after the initial sale.

“That may not be enough,” she said. “But we’re sensitive to developers’ needs and that there’s a limit to how high those fees can be.”

Even with a structure in place to handle farmland preservation it still comes down to local planners and politicians saying this is a priority. Otherwise, we’re right back to the lawsuits.

The city and county are now looking at farmland preservation using a “menu” of options.

I have a few issues with the options, such as allowing developers to preserve land outside of Kern County, or even the San Joaquin Valley. Still, it is a step in the right direction.

It’s frustrating, though, that it had to come at the muzzle end of litigation.

The Sierra Club and others have complained about air pollution and loss of farmland for years. Nothing changed until developers got thrown for a loop and they put pressure on the city and county to come up with guidelines.

Talk about the tail wagging the dog.

Lois Henry’s column appears Wednesdays and Sundays. E-mail her at lhenry@bakersfield.com or call her at 395-7373.