Court Issues Further Ruling on Monterey High School Stadium Project

For Immediate Release

June 10, 2023

 

Contact: Marci McFadden, Chief of Communication

831-706-6971

                       

COURT ISSUES FURTHER RULING ON MONTEREY HIGH SCHOOL STADIUM PROJECT

Court further limits its prior ruling, allowing MPUSD to “easily remedy” limited remaining CEQA issues

 

Monterey, CA - On June 5, 2023, Judge Thomas Wills of the Monterey County Superior Court issued a further and final ruling in the case of Preserving the Peace v. Monterey Peninsula Unified School District. The case, filed on August 27, 2021, against Monterey Peninsula Unified School District (MPUSD) sought to set aside MPUSD’s Board of Education’s approval of the long-awaited Dan Albert Stadium Improvement Project at Monterey High School. This further ruling significantly narrows the remaining steps required of MPUSD to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), with the court concluding that MPUSD’s “environmental review . . . was sufficient, except in two respects which probably are easily remedied” by MPUSD. The court’s ruling was in response to a successful motion filed by MPUSD seeking clarification and narrowing of the court’s prior ruling in the case.

 

The project addresses necessary updating of the Dan Albert Stadium at Monterey High School and additional athletic facilities on campus, including:

 

• Converting an existing dirt field adjacent to the Dan Albert Stadium that is used for overflow parking into a softball/multi-use field
• A 1,920 square foot strength and conditioning center
• Improvements to the track and field event area
• Four new, permanent field lights at Dan Albert Stadium
• Renovation of the stadium to be compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)
• Replacement of the temporary press box
• New public address system
• Installation of separate visitor bleachers on the opposite side of the stadium 

 

“The benefit the project will have for our students cannot be overstated,” said Monterey High School Principal Tom Newton. “Once complete, MHS soccer programs will no longer have to end practices and games due to darkness, girls’ softball will no longer have to miss class to travel to Jacks Park for practices and games, and students will have the opportunity to play in front of a home crowd instead of traveling off-campus to the Monterey Peninsula College’s lighted athletic field for football games. Planned improvements to the stadium and lower field will also help ensure compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and Title IX and, most importantly, ensure safety for student athletes.”

 

Background

 

On July 27, 2021, following extensive study and public input, MPUSD’s Governing Board certified an approximately 2,000 page final Environmental Impact Report (EIR) that included legally binding mitigation measures that addressed neighborhood concerns including: 

1.   Lights will only be used from the months of October through March
2. Lights will be turned off by 8 p.m. except for five nights a year
3.   Lighted fields will not be used on weekends
4.   Outside groups cannot use the fields after 6:00 p.m. 
5.   No use of the fields will be allowed on Sundays
6.   The district will limit the use of the public address system only to necessary announcements  

Despite MPUSD’s attempts to find common ground with neighbors, petitioners “Preserving the Peace” filed a lawsuit on August 27, 2021, in Monterey County Superior Court to stop the project, alleging five causes of action:

1. Violation of CEQA, which requires that MPUSD have analyzed potential impacts for the Stadium and Field Project and adopted mitigation measures where those impacts were found to be potentially significant
2. Violation of CEQA relating to a previously abandoned parking project
3. Violation of CEQA regarding the alleged widening of Logan Lane
4. Violation of Government Code section 53094, relating to the district’s exemption from local zoning ordinances
5. Violation of local zoning ordinances.

Petitioner’s legal counsel has filed two other lawsuits related to the project, one of which remains pending and accuses the State Architect of having violated the law in approving the project. Additionally, there have been more than 100 Public Records Act requests related to the Stadium submitted to MPUSD over the past three years, resulting in considerable time and expense to produce tens of thousands of pages of records. Repeated litigation against MPUSD over a number of other actions it has taken related to school facility projects has also been threatened.

 

Rulings

 

On December 8, 2022, the court ruled in favor of MPUSD on all major components of the project, but also concluded that MPUSD should conduct limited additional CEQA analysis. The ruling resulted in further delay of a project that was originally introduced four years ago, in 2019. 

 

The court’s December 2022 ruling was in favor of MPUSD on four of the five causes of action. On the remaining cause of action, the alleged violation of CEQA related to the Stadium and Field Project, MPUSD’s extensive CEQA analysis was upheld in relation to every significant component of the project: MPUSD’s analysis of the lighting, the sound system, the ADA improvements to the stadium, the addition of visitor bleachers, the press box, the development of a new field, the improvements to the track and field area and the w ments, the court noted that many of the petitioners arguments were “unpersuasive,” “inaccurat[e],” “flawed,” “lack[ing] merit,” “not fully formed,” and “completely unsubstantiated.”

 

Despite the foregoing, the court initially concluded that the district should conduct limited additional CEQA analysis or prepare clarifying language in relation to seven specific categories related to the Stadium and Field Project. For example, the court indicated that the district should further address one construction staging area because of its vicinity to a small wall made of stone that is no longer quarried, should clarify the number of parking spaces on campus, and indicate that signage and flagger personnel would be provided at all streets as mitigation for construction-related traffic hazards.

 

In response to the December ruling, MPUSD promptly filed a “Motion to in Part Reconsider and/or Set Aside and Vacate and/or Clarify Order re: Petition for writ of Mandate” on December 27, 2022.  That motion both sought clarification of the judge’s ruling and also reconsideration of the seven specific categories that the court had found to be technically insufficient. 

 

After extensive briefing by the parties, multiple days of court hearing, and the passage of almost six months, the court, on June 5, 2023, issued its “Statement of Decision After Reconsideration and Vacating of Earlier Order,” linked here.  In that order, Judge Wills reversed his prior ruling as to five of the seven categories he had previously found to be insufficient.  This included reversing his decision on each of the specific examples above involving the stone wall, designation of the parking spaces, and the signage and flaggers.  The only two remaining issues -- which the court recognized as “easily remedied” by MPUSD -- are clarification of the EIR’s specific conclusion regarding parking supply and demand (which appears to relate to a typographical error in the EIR that had not previously been raised) and addition of a verification process related to the noise mitigation measure adopted by MPUSD, which measure was otherwise found to be sufficient. 

 

The court recognized that these two narrow issues are “severable” from the rest of the EIR, and that the remainder of the EIR and project complies with CEQA. In once again rejecting the bulk of Petitioners’ arguments, the court found that many of Petitioners’ arguments were: “lobbed in a scattershot way,” ”sorely lacking organization and clarity,” “extremely difficult for the Court to follow,” “poorly articulated,” “lacking in analysis,” “meandering,” and “disjointed.”  Despite this, the Stadium project remains delayed by litigation, four years after the process began. 

 

Despite the delay, MPUSD’s Board President Jeff Uchida stressed that MPUSD will continue fighting for students. “We remain committed to providing our students and community with this greatly needed and now long overdue project. We are delighted that the court’s most recent ruling opens the door to moving this important project forward at last,” says Uchida.

 

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