Coastal to Act on Light Fight at Its Meeting

• MHS Night Games

BY SUZANNE GULDIMANN

Malibu High School’s request for a permit to allow temporary field lighting for the school’s football program is on the agenda for the October California Coastal Commission meeting in Oceanside on Oct. 8.
The coastal agency will hear a request by the Santa Monica Malibu Unified School District for a Coastal Development Permit amendment to allow temporary night lighting of the football stadium for a maximum of 16 nights (eight practices and eight games), or 62 hours per year, including potential playoffs.
According to the application, team practices would be scheduled for “select” Thursday nights, running until approximately 7:30 p.m. Football games would take place on Friday nights until approximately 10:30 p.m.
A special condition was imposed on the Malibu campus as part of its 1999 CDP prohibiting permanent or temporary athletic field lighting. For the past six years, the district has operated lights in violation of that condition.
Commission staff proposed replacing the special condition banning lights with one that would permit limited use of temporary lighting.
The revised special condition would require the lights to be “promptly removed at the end of the season.” The five 53-foot-high portable light standards would require “Total Light Control (TLC) visors affixed to each light fixture to direct light downward and reduce light spill and glare.” Electricity would be provided by two 50 kW diesel-powered generators.
The special condition stipulates that “Any proposed changes to the approved plan shall be reported to the Executive Director. No changes to the approved plan shall occur without a Commission amendment to this coastal development permit unless the Executive Director determines that no amendment is legally required.”
The staff report states that “Because the lights are temporary, no construction will be required and the lights will be put in place at the beginning and removed at the end of each football season.” It concludes that the lights as described in the application would not negatively impact the environment. Staff recommend approval for the project, although the commission is requiring the school district to make two additional studies; a “viewpoint luminescence” study and “additional analysis and diagrams for the biological report.” The board of education, at its Sept. 17 meeting, approved general funds for both new studies.
Residents of the Malibu Park neighborhood have hotly contested the district’s statement that only “a few members of the public have asked questions and raised concerns over the duration of the use of the football lighting, but no member of the public has ever made a formal complaint in writing to the District.” A 16-page petition and 12 letters, including one by a well-known biologist, opposing the plan accompany the staff report. Apparently the commission did not receive any letters supporting the plan.
“Upon examination of the District’s evidence, the Executive Director has determined that the new information makes it clear that the condition can be modified without in any way compromising the intended effect of the Commission’s lighting condition,” the report concludes. “Accordingly, the Executive Director accepted this amendment. As conditioned, the Commission finds the proposed project consistent with the visual-scenic resource protection policies of the Malibu LCP.”