Plan OK’d to open Foothills Park to public

Residents-only site will allow up to 50 permits a day for nonresidents to visit pristine preserve

For the first time in more than half a century, the exclusive Foothills Park could soon be open to nonresidents after the City Council approved a pilot program that allows such visitors to buy passes to the pristine preserve.

The move comes a month after activists resurrected the decadeslong conflict over the 1,400-acre park, a massive nature preserve off Page Mill road believed to be the only publicly owned park in California that excludes nonresidents unless they’re guests accompanied by Palo Altans.

In settling on a compromise between those who believe the restrictions are discriminatory and others who think opening it up to more visitors threatens the park’s ecosystem, the council members this week also set out plans to put the issue to voters in 2022 — the first time since the 60-year-old park was purchased that Palo Altans will have a say.

Under the pilot program, 50 nonresidents would be allowed per day to enter the park, and the city could adjust the number of such passes it gives out on busier days. Mayor Adrian Fine said the program — approved in a 5-2 vote — is still months away from going into effect.

The new program is the same plan the Parks and Recreation Commission crafted last year, which had been ignored by the City Council up to this point, causing the resignation of one commissioner in July.

In a letter sent to the city attorney on June 22, former Santa Clara County Judge Ladoris Cordell, who decades ago served on the Palo Alto City Council, threatened legal action, noting a Connecticut Supreme Court decision that analyzed a “residentsonly” ordinance similar to Palo Alto’s and found it to be unconstitutional.

She was joined by several members of Congress tied to the Peninsula and Santa Clara County who argued the policy sent a “terrible message” to neighboring communities. Others who wrote the City Council en masse decried the policy’s exclusionary nature as racist with its punitive measures targeting mostly people of color.

Those entering the park without proof of Palo Alto residency are currently subject to a misdemeanor — a punishment that hundreds of local activists, former mayors and council members have long argued should be struck from the city’s code.

One Palo Alto High school student who has worked in the park for an Eagle Scout project was baffled by the park’s rules.

“The fact that some of the people who volunteered to help on my project, digging into the hillside so that Palo Alto residents can use

that trail, cannot themselves access that park is beyond me,” Rohin Ghosh said at the meeting.

But for Mark Nadim, a long time Palo Alto resident who lives close to the park, framing the nonresident ban as racist is “an insult to every resident of

Palo Alto.”

“This is one of the most progressive cities in the country,” Nadim said. “Let’s not pay attention to words that are meant to intimidate you not opening the park to nonresidents.”

Council member Alison Cormack and Fine favored opening the park with no conditions, so they voted against the pilot program. Council member

Lydia Kou, however, was not as willing to open the park back up but voted for the plan on the condition that voters will decide in the future.

Firmly debating that opening the park could be expensive, increase fire danger and create environmental challenges, Kou advocated for keeping the policy as is and letting the voters decide in two years.

Kou raised eyebrows

from many in the audience when she supported previous council decisions to keep the park closed to outsiders, a policy which critics say has kept mostly brown and Black people out.

“We should respect the history and learn from the history and learn about why we are doing it and why people have put this (policy) in place,” Kou said. “There’s a reason.

That’s for our next generation. We open it too soon we could be taking it away from future generations.”

But Cormack didn’t feel opening the park up would be taking anything away. She voted against the plan because she felt a vote is unnecessary. Already park rangers turn away some 3,100 vehicles a year because of the policy.

“It isn’t going to make it any less special if we share

it,” Cormack said. “I firmly believe that there is room. We turn people away and there is room for us to share it.”

Fine said he didn’t want to “put civil rights to a vote” by letting residents decide if nonresidents should be allowed in.

He said “we are literally discriminating against people because they’re not wealthy enough to live in Palo Alto.”