Rebuttal letter to San Mateo County Times

October 18, 2009

San Mateo County Times

477 9th Avenue

San Mateo, CA 94402

Attn.: Glenn Rabinotwitz, Executive Editor

SUBJECT: Times article “Halt of home sale a historic blunder, couple say”, published October 14, 2009

Dear Editor,

I write in response to your recent article referenced above which contains serious misstatements and reveals a lack of fact checking by your newspaper. Most egregious was your statement that I “blocked the sale” of my neighbor’s house. This is patently false.

I was recently notified that my neighbor’s home at 1540 Newlands Avenue had been purchased by a developer with the intention of demolishing the existing structure and redeveloping the property with two new houses. The following day I went to see the Burlingame City Attorney to share public documents that detailed the history of the home as well as a detailed record of the Newlands neighborhood and its development history Concealing these documents would have been wrong and unethical.

I was advised that it was my duty to disclose the information which I provided to the City Attorney who in turn provided it to the Planning Department. I also delivered a copy of the materials to listing agent, Alisa Ruiz Johnson.

Despite your article’s claim that a precedent has been set, this is simply not true as the law pertaining to the requirements of the California Environmental Quality Act(CEQA) has been in place for decades. The city must follow this law. Your article also erroneously states that “thousands” of Burlingame residents will be affected. This is untrue. The circumstances of this situation are unique to this property because 1) the proposal was to demolish a single family residence, resurrect two lots and build two new houses. and 2) the homeowner commissioned a home history for the property in 2004 and there also exists extensive public documentation on the history of Newlands Avenue. Lastly, the article asserts that nothing can be done to the house without an historic evaluation. Only projects subject to planning commission review must consider CEQA and this particular house can be remodeled extensively without triggering CEQA review.

I have attached a memo from Community Development Director Bill Meeker written in response to a constituent inquiry which further outlines how the city came to contact the developer who had inquired into his ability to redevelop the property with two new houses.

I hope reviewing his memo will shed some light on what can and can’t be done with the property.

In the end, had I done nothing, the documents would have come to light during the CEQA evaluation process then the question would have been asked, “Why hadn’t I disclosed this information?”

I had no choice but to disclose documents that were publicly available and to comply with the law.

Sincerely,

Cathy Baylock

Burlingame City Council member

1527 Newlands Avenue

Burlingame, CA 94010

(650) 579-2623