After hearing city and community concerns about the project, ITS, the terminal builder and operator, tried to strike a compromise.\u00a0 ITS\u2019s proposed compromise included: a.) building a state-of-the-art terminal with hermetically sealed loading and transporting systems to prevent dust from escaping during the processing of coal and all other commodities, b.) a community benefits package totaling $6 million a year for 66 years controlled by a citizen commission which would decide how money should be allocated, and c.) a phasing out of coal processing by 2040, which is five years ahead of Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s goal of ending fossil fuels usage by 2045 as published in SB 100. ITS\u2019s proposal was not accepted.\n<\/p>\n
The city played a risky game and lost.\u00a0 Now that the Court of Appeals has affirmed the lower court\u2019s decisions in favor of the developers, ITS is not required to offer any mitigations or community benefits under the terms of the court ruling.\n<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, ITS\u2019 CEO, John Siegel, has said he will stand by his commitment to community benefits under the Oakland Initiative. \u201cNo matter whether the court requires this or not, we want to help underserved communities with jobs and benefits. We believe we all do better when everyone has a chance to benefit.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
Siegel went on to say he is still willing to talk to the city about other concessions and that ultimate decisions on those issues depend on how the city moves forward.\n<\/p>\n
The City Council approved a development agreement with a unanimous vote on June 18, 2013.\u00a0 Importantly, Judge Chhabria found, and the court of appeals affirmed, \u201cthe agreement did not limit the types of bulk goods that could be shipped through the terminal. And prior to its execution, Oakland had some indication that coal was one of the potential commodities that might be handled.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
The Court ruled that after the city had entered into an agreement, to prevent the shipment of coal through the terminal, it would have to prove that such shipment created a substantial health and safety risk to residents.\u00a0 On June 27, 2016, the City Council passed a resolution declaring that the transport of coal posed a health and safety hazard to residents.\u00a0 They based that determination in large part ESA\u2019s severely flawed study presented at a City Council hearing.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cThe question now is will the City Council throw good money after bad?\u201d asked Greg McConnell, a consultant working with ITS.\u00a0 McConnell \u2013 who has more than three decades of experience navigating choppy political waters \u2013 points out that the city currently has an estimated $120 million deficit, and he questioned whether it makes sense to spend hundreds of thousands more continuing to appeal a decision that has already lost twice in court.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cAt a time when the city is reeling from major budget shortfalls and planning to lay off workers and cut vital services that taxpayers desperately need, it does not make sense to continue wasting money on this losing case,\u201d McConnell stated. \u201cThat would be a double whammy to Oakland residents.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
Paul Cobb, Post News Group\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The City of Oakland was rebuffed for a second time in its attempt to prevent the shipment of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":83182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[184,93,100,143,145,144],"class_list":{"0":"post-83181","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oakland","8":"tag-bay-area","9":"tag-featured","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-oakland","12":"tag-oakland-headlines","13":"tag-oakland-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}