A view from a proposed portion of the Montini Trail. Photo by Ryan Lely.
A loose-knit agreement about a northwest Sonoma cow pasture – and the 98-acre preserve of which it’s part – unraveled at the Sept. 17 City Council meeting, as the agency voted 4–1 against a plan for installing hiking trails in and around the property.
“It just doesn’t make any sense to me,” former owner Bill Montini told the council, referring to the lower of two trails that would snake across the hillside above the General Vallejo Home. “If I would have known this was going to happen when we were negotiating this deal, we would not be having this conversation – because I would have never sold this piece of property to the Open-Space District.”
At issue was the extent and type of public access to the Montini Preserve, which was purchased by the Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District in December 2005. During the next two years, district officials developed a $225,000 plan for hiking trails, which would provide handicapped access, connect Sonoma’s east and west neighborhoods and connect with the Overlook Trail above Mountain Cemetery.
The idea got a mixed reception at a December 2007 council meeting, with some members of the public expressing concerns about visual impact and bovine/hiker conflicts on the 9-acre Fifth Street West pasture. A mediation process tried to reconcile these and other issues and reach a compromise, resulting in an April 3 agreement that includes a trail connection to, and along the frontage of, Fifth Street West and allows the cattle to graze – protected by a wire fence along the trail’s north side.
Two alternative trail openings were explored by the mediation group but ultimately rejected: one at the north end of Fourth Street West that was deemed too close to a neighbor’s front door, and another at the Vallejo Home parking lot that local parks officials said would conflict with their property’s protected cultural status.
But after the April meeting, Montini and former city councilmember Larry Barnett contacted state Assemblymember Jared Huffman in an unsuccessful bid for Vallejo Home access. Barnett and Montini repeated their concerns Wednesday night, with Barnett also noting that the purchase agreements don’t specifically refer to trails as part of recreational use.
City staff recommended accepting the agreement, but four of the five councilmembers didn’t agree. Stanley Cohen reiterated both the desirability and improbability of the Fourth Street West access point, but noted that the open-space district (as owner) could do as it liked. Councilmember Ken Brown said dividing and fencing the cow pasture would “dilute the purity of the experience we all share.” Councilmember August Sebastiani said his constituents opposed the plan, saying they saw the property as a hillside backdrop rather than a place for hiking trails. Mayor Joanne Sanders, who, like Brown, had no problem keeping access limited to First Street West (with parking available at the Sonoma Veterans Memorial Building) said neighbors would object to a trail opening on Fifth Street West.
Councilmember Steve Barbose, who cast Wednesday’s lone dissenting vote, acknowledged that the mediated solution wasn’t perfect – but noted that the Coastal Conservancy grant that provided the purchase funds mandated handicapped access, and that could be provided only by a trail opening at the corner of Fifth Street West and Verano Avenue.
“You folks are missing the entire handicapped-access boat and sticking your heads in the sand,” Barbose told his colleagues after the vote was taken, “Solve the problem of getting handicapped access.”
