Brown vetoes bill to fund purchase of beach path
SACRAMENTO >> Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed a bill on Sunday that sought to create a pot for money that could have been used to purchase an easement over a billionaire’s land to a popular beach.
In his veto message on SB 42 by Sen. Jerry Hill, DSan Mateo County, Brown said that the bill related to access to Martins Beach “does not meet the author’s intent.”
“This bill precludes the use of eminent domain in this instance and limits the state’s options,” he wrote, adding that public access to beaches and parks is a “core value to this state and must be protected.”
“Here however, the public’s right to access Martins Beach will be determined in further judicial and administrative proceedings,” he continued.
Hill’s bill sought to create an account to collect money that could be used to buy a 6.4-acre swath of land — by force if necessary — across tech titan Vinod Khosla’s coastal property. It passed through the Senate on a May 31 partisan vote.
The State Lands Commission has the power to use eminent domain to take the easement, should it choose to do so, but did not have a funding source.
Hill’s bill did not actually provide the money — that would come through other means. For example, San Mateo County budgeted $1 million for the purchase.
It could also use money transferred from the State Lands Commission’s Kapiloff account that’s set up to buy land, but there’s a catch: A June amendment to the bill precludes that money from being used for the actual eminent domain land acquisitions. Only money contributed to the account could be used to buy the land — Kapiloff funds could only be used for “studies or other expenses related to acquisition.”
Hill’s office did not immediately have a comment Sunday night.
Khosla unlocked and opened the gate leading to the beach last week, although only at certain times. He had faced fines of more than $11,000 a day if he kept it closed, after the California Coastal Commission warned him last month that he committed “numerous and significant violations of the California Coastal Act” going back to 2009 by locking down the beach, which had been enjoyed by surfers and families going back to the 1920s.
Khosla began locking a gate for a path to the beach shortly after he bought his 89-acre property in 2008. It’s the only way to get to the picturesque, crescentshaped, cliff-lined stretch of sand. Like other California beaches, it is public land by state law.
Hill’s bill was the legislative arm of action to keep the beach open. In the courts, the Surfrider Foundation confirmed a victory in August when the First District Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled 3-0 that Khosla violated the California Coastal Act when he ended decades of public access to the beach.
The appeals court judges on Aug. 10 ordered Khosla to open the gates immediately.
Another suit filed by Friends of Martins Beach claims that Khosla’s predecessors dedicated the road to the public half a century ago. That matter is slated to be heard Oct. 30.
Khosla’s attorneys have argued the case is a violation of his private property rights. On Wednesday, lead attorney Dori Kilmer referred to a 2016 blog post with no further comment.
“The ownership is very aware of the larger community’s interest,” reads the blog’s conclusion, “and it is unfortunate that the legal process is necessary to defend fundamental property rights rather than a conversation with members of the public community about appropriate invitational use.”
Kilmer confirmed that they submitted a petition for review to the state Supreme Court, and Surfrider attorneys expect to file a response this week. They believe Khosla will take the matter to the U.S. Supreme Court if the state’s top court denies the request.