Category: Central Coast

SLO Median Price Heads Higher

The median price of a SLO County single-family home sold in June jumped 3.9% from May and was up 19.4% from June 2012 says the California Association of Realtors.  The median price in June 2013 was $462,550 up from  $387,550 a year earlier. The median time on the market in SLO in June was 24.7 days compared to 42 days a year ago but up from last month when it was only 23.8 days.

Where is the hottest market in the state? Santa Clara where the time on the market is just 17.8 days.

Meanwhile in SLO County homes sales are up 0.4% year over year  but down 7.5% from last month.

Pismo Campground Getting New Visitor Center

The State Parks wants to build a new 14,500sf Visitor Center and kiosk at the entrance to the Pismo Beach campground. SLO County Planning Commission will hold  a hearing July 25  to consider a request by CALIFORNIA STATE DEPARTMENT OF PARKS AND RECREATION for a Conditional Use Permit/Coastal Development Permit to allow modifications and upgrades to the Pismo State Beach Campground including a new visitor center and entry kiosk, and relocated entry, access road, parking lot and camp host site.

SLO Hotel Sales In June Higher

Hotels in SLO County enjoyed 7.1% more room revenue in June 2013 compared to the same month in 2012. Smith Travel reports SLO County hotel occupancy was also up 2,3% with 3.4% more rooms sold. On a year to date basis rooms  room revenue was up an even stronger 9.3%.

New Slant On Drilling For Oil

The U.S. Air Force announced this week will consider leasing land on Vandenberg Air Force Base for private oil firms to extract offshore oil and gas from off the central California coast.
Under the plan oil companies based on land could drill offshore using slant drilling technology.

Over the next  few months, the military said it will study whether the new type of drilling is compatible with the base’s space and satellite-launching missions and determine if it is “economically, environmentally and politically feasible,” the Air Force said.

That would put the closest refinery in Santa Maria at the Phillips 66 Refinery  undergoing expansion currently. Plains Exploration & Production with fields near Pismo also has wells on the base.
Developer Throws In Towel On Lompoc Wind Farm

ACCIONA Energy North America has announced it will not proceed with the development of the Lompoc Wind Farm, a proposed 90 MW to 120 MW project located above the town of Lompoc in Santa Barbara County.

Originally approved in 2008,  the project called for the installation of up to 65 wind turbines along a ridgeline southeast of Vandenberg Air Force Base. The applicant,a subsidiary of a Spanish company, has gone through a lengthy court case vs some neighbors and won and recently had been granted an extension of time from Santa Barbara County to finalize some issues.Some believe the company had grown tired of the endless delays and money spent.

In an email,company spokesperson Peter Gray wrote, “We are grateful to the landowners and county officials who have supported the development of this project. While the area has great potential for clean energy generation, the best decision for our business is to focus on the development of other U.S. and global projects in the company’s pipeline.”

Santa Barbara County has said it has yet to receive a formal request from the developer to pull the plug.

The company had said that a power purchase agreement has been executed with PG&E and has been approved by the CA PUC but the project hoped to be on line in 2007 or 2008. Now its five years later.

The next chapter at the historic York Mountain Winery is taking place this summer. The new owners of both York Mountain and next door Stephens Cellars,Epoch Estate Wines,will combine the properties and restore the old York Mountain winery and tasting room.

The winery was SLO County’s first to make the stuff back in 1882.

Epoch, founded in 2004, bought the York holdings through the bankruptcy process in 2010 from Martin and Weyrich. They bought Stephens Winery in December 2012.

Epoch already has two vineyards that supply them east of Paso says Kristen Carrillo, director of marketing.”All of our fruit comes from two specific and unique sites which we bought and planted: Paderewski Vineyard and Catapult Vineyard.”

The company currently produces about 4000 cases a year.

In the process Epoch plans to build a new winery on site.”We hope to open in 2015” she says. Epoch does not have a wine production facility now.

Epoch is seeking a conditional use permit from SLO County to allow for the phased construction and expansion of winery facilities including: expansion of the existing ‘Stephen’s Cellars’ winery facility the rehabilitation of the condemned York Mountain Winery to restore the historic winery and tasting room uses, the construction of a new wine processing building and the conversion of the existing tasting room to administrative uses and commercial kitchen.

The York Mountain winery buildings were heavily damaged in the 2003 San Simeon earthquake says Carrillo. The winery – off Hyw 46 east of Paso Robles – was last operated in 2010.Founded by Andrew Jackson York, the place was run by three generations of York family members until 1970.

Epoch is requesting 25 special events with no more than 200 attendees and modifications of ordinance requirements involving setbacks, signage, and amplified music (noise). Winery build-out (includes existing winery structures) will total 49,351 sf on two parcels. The project will result in the total site disturbance of 6.9 acres on two parcels totaling 165 acres.

Epoch is owned by Bill and Liz Armstrong.Although there is much work to be done you can visit the winery tasting room now at 7505 York Mountain Road Templeton, CA 93465. Phone 805.237.7575.

Seeking a broader range of crude oil to process Phillips 66 refinery in Santa Maria seeks to add rail capacity at its Santa Maria refinery site. Expansion of the Phillips 66 refinery near Nipomo will require a 2.7 mile rail spur extension the company says.But the public would get a 1.5 mile long 30ft wide pedestrian  and bike trail through the dunes close to the coast.

More refiners are seeking to get oil by rail as cheaper varieties become availabe.

The county will hold a scoping meeting on the project July 29, 2013, 6:00 to 8:00 P.M.at the Blacklake Golf Resort Banquet Room, 1490 Golf Course Lane, Nipomo.
The scoping meeting discussion will focus on environmental issues, feasible ways in which project impacts may be minimized, and potential alternatives to the project. Additional information about the project and EIR is posted on the SLO Planning website: www.slocounty.ca.gov/planning under “Environmental Impact Reports” then “Environmental Impact Reports and Major Projects…”, under “Santa Maria Refinery Rail Project”.

Rail Spur Extension. The proposed rail spur extension includes a request by Phillips 66 Company for a Development Plan/Coastal Development Permit to allow for the extension of an existing rail spur at the Santa Maria Refinery and construction of a railcar off-loading facility, above-ground conveyance pipeline, restroom facility, and an unpaved emergency vehicle access road from the end of the proposed rail spur to State Route 1. Development of the extension would include approximately 1.3 miles of new rail (with a construction width of 270 feet), 0.7 miles of new above-ground pipeline, and a 0.7-mile-long emergency access road. The rail spur extension would include up to five parallel ladder tracks, each long enough to accommodate a train of approximately 80 tank cars, with associated locomotives and supporting cars. The project would also include work within the existing refinery, connecting and upgrading existing infrastructure. The extension is intended to allow the Santa Maria Refinery to access a wider range of competitively priced crude oil.

The total area of disturbance would be approximately 48.9 acres; however, almost half of the proposed disturbance would occur within the existing refinery or coke storage areas, with the remaining portion being constructed in an area currently used for grazing and other open/undisturbed areas within the existing refinery area. This project component will be analyzed on a project-specific basis in the EIR.
Coastal Access. The project also includes a conceptual plan for provision of vertical Coastal Access through the project site located to the Oceano Dunes State Vehicular Recreation Area. As part of a separate permit issued for the project site, initiated by Phillips 66 in 2008 and approved by the County Board of Supervisors in February 2013, Phillips 66 may be required to construct vertical public access from State Route 1 to their western property line to comply with the coastal access provisions of the County’s Coastal Zone Land Use Ordinance. Although the provision of coastal access is not integral to, and has independent utility from, the Rail Spur Extension project, it is appropriate to include an analysis of the potential environmental impacts of the accessway because of the shared environmental setting and regulatory framework of the two adjoining components. The size and alignment of the coastal accessway, as well as the appropriateness of access at this location based on the environmental setting, public safety concerns, and current land uses in the area, is currently under consideration by the California Coastal Commission.

The Coastal Access component of the project will be analyzed in a separate section of the EIR and at a programmatic level to help inform the decision makers on potential impacts associated with development of a public accessway at this location.

The project is located in southwest San Luis Obispo County, approximately 1 mile southwest of State Route 1, and 3.5 miles west of the community of Nipomo, in the South County Coastal planning area. The rail spur extension would be located entirely on the Phillips 66 property lying east of the Union Pacific Railroad and zoned for industrial use, at the site of the existing Santa Maria Refinery. The proposed coastal access trail would cross this portion of the project site and also extend into open space lands west of the railroad.

 

 

July 8, 2013
A zone of ambient acidity shows algae growth. In waters with lower acidity, “grazers” like sea urchins, help keep algae in check. (Kristy Kroeker/UC Davis photo)
Ocean acidification may create an impact similar to extinction on marine ecosystems, according to a study released today by the University of California, Davis.

The study, published online in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that ocean acidification can degrade not only individual species, as past studies have shown, but entire ecosystems. This results in a homogenized marine community, dominated by fewer plants and animals.

“The background, low-grade stress caused by ocean acidification can cause a whole shift in the ecosystem so that everything is dominated by the same plants, which tend to be turf algae,” said lead author Kristy Kroeker, a postdoctoral researcher at the Bodega Marine Laboratory at UC Davis.

“In most ecosystems, there are lots of different colorful patches of plants and animals — of algae, of sponges, of anemones,” Kroeker said. “With ocean acidification, you lose that patchiness. We call it a loss of functional diversity; everything looks the same.”

In the waters surrounding Castello Aragonese, a 14th century castle off the coast of Italy, volcanic vents naturally release bubbles of carbon dioxide gas, creating different levels of acidity among the marine-animal and plant communities there. These gradients of acidity gave the scientists a glimpse of what a future marked by increasingly acidic ocean waters could look like, and how the creatures and plants living in those environments may react to it.

The researchers selected three reef zones—of low, high and extremely high acidity, representing world ocean conditions for the present day, 2100 and 2500, respectively. Then they removed animals and vegetation from the rocks there. Every few months for three years, Kroeker dived to the study plots to photograph them and watch how the plots in each zone recovered.

By examining how recovery differed among zones, the study found that acidic water reduced the number and variety of species. In the non-acidic plots, many different plants and animals, including turf algae, would colonize and grow. Calcareous species, such as sea urchins and snails, would then eat them, allowing for variety through time.

However, in both the high and extremely high acidic plots, fleshy turf algae increased steadily and overtook the zones, as the urchins and other grazers were either not present or did not graze on the algae while in these zones.

Calcareous grazers play key roles in maintaining the balance within marine ecosystems. They are also considered among the most vulnerable species to ocean acidification.

“Our research is showing that if the role of these grazers changes with ocean acidification, you might expect to see cascading effects of the whole ecosystem,” Kroeker said. “If the pattern holds for other calcareous grazers, this has implications for other ecosystems, as well.”

Co-authors in the study include Maria Cristina Gambi of the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn in Naples, Italy, and Fiorenza Micheli of Stanford University.

The research was supported by a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, a Stanford University Chambers Fellowship, a Pew Fellowship in Marine Conservation and the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn.

The study, “Community dynamics and ecosystem simplification in a high-CO2 ocean,” is available at http://bit.ly/15rFhIk.

After years at sea, sockeye salmon returning to their freshwater homes may be guided by an early memory of the Earth’s magnetic field, encoded at the site where natal streams empty into the Pacific Ocean, according to a an Oregon Sea Grant-supported study published today in Current Biology.
Oregon State University’s Nathan Putnam and David Noakes, along with researchers from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, the University of Washington, and the University of California Davis, pored over 56 years of dta from federal fishery scientists who tracked the movements of salmon at the mouth of British Columbia’s Fraser River, where fish must choose to swim north around Vancouver Island, or around to the south. They matched that data with  measurements of the Earth’s geomagnetic field, which shifts predictably in strength and orientation over time and found that fish tended to choose the path where the field strength was more similar to that of the river mouth when they’d left, two years before.
Scientists hope the finding will help solve the mystery of how salmon find their way back to the rivers of their birth across thousands of miles of ocean. It’s already accepted that in the final stages of the journey to their breeding grounds, salmon use odors to guide them back to the stream or inlet where they hatched. But how the fish find their target river remains a mystery, although scientists have suspected for a while that magnetic cues play a role. Last summer, a team including UNC-Chapel Hill researcher Kenneth Lohmann – also part of this study – reported that rotating magnetite crystals in a fish nose responded to magnetic field orientation, providing a possible biological mechanism for magnetic field tracking.
The OSU researchers hope to further investigate the magnetic field correlation by subjecting captive fish to artificial magnetic fields and studying their behavior.

From Breaking Waves – Oregon State University

Buffalo Wild Wings Could Replace Former Taco Bell In SLO

The former Taco Bell at 309 Madonna Rd may be the new home of  a Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant. Plans for the new eatery are scheduled  for an administrative hearing July 8 in front of a SLO city hearing officer.Unlike Taco Bell the restaurant plans to offer late hour alcohol service until 2 am according to a city report.Taco Bell closed their location at Madonna Plaza last year. Buffalo Wild Wings – the fast growing Nasdaq traded company added 70 stores in the past year  and had over $1 billion in revenue; $57 million in net earnings in 2012 with
932 restaurants in 49 states & Canada. Some 525 are franchised and 
407 company-owned. The closest outlets are in the Valley in Visalia and Bakersfield.

Two Local Tech Companies Moving Forward with Expansion

Plans: Local firms iFixit and MindBody have submitted plans for building permits for new headquarters buildings inSan Luis obispo. Both firms were founded here in San Luis Obispo and have seen growth in the demand for their services. They have similarities in that they are clean industries that provide many higher-paying head-of- household jobs according to a city report.
iFixit is a company whose website sells repair parts and publishes online repair guides for consumer electronics and gadgets. They are proposing to use the former car dealership building at 1330 Monterey Street as their corporate headquarters. The adaptive reuse project includes adding a new second-floor at the rear of the building, adding two mezzanines between existing roof trusses, and incorporating roof decks at the front of the building. The remodeled building will have a total square footage of 17,215 square feet. Here is a rendering:

Mind Body is a business that specializes in software programs for fitness studios. Their proposed headquarters building at 651 Tank Farm Road will initially contain a total of 59,248 square feet of floor area with the possibility of increasing the total floor area to 64,022 square feet in the future. The company already occupies much of the space within the existing series of buildings to the immediate east. The new building has been sited and oriented to have a symbiotic relationship with the adjacent development and function as a campus for the business. The applicant is also proposing a four-level parking structure containing 373 spaces at the rear of the site to accommodate the demand of employees.
They expect to submit plans for the main office building on July 1st and submit plans for the parking structure on July 15 . The goal is to issue a building permit for the project by September 2nd and have occupancy of the building by September of 2014 says the city.

 

 

Los Osos Makes Sunset Cover

Los Osos California is on the cover of Sunset Magazine’s July edition with a photo of Point Buchon near Montana De Oro State Park.  But the short travel advice article is about nearby Cayucos. Point Buchon has a neat bluff top walking trail along the crashing surf through PG&E property. Walk to Windy Point for a view of Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant.

Albertsons Opening Second Store This Week In SLO:

Albertsons is opening their new new 30,000sf grocery store June 26  at 1321 Johnson in San Luis Obispo.The former Scolaris market has been closed for around a year.  The property is owned by local developer Nick Tompkins of San Luis Obispo-based NKT Commercial who purchased the Scolari family-owned properties in Paso Robles, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara last year.  This will the second Albertsons in town besides the store on Foothill near the college.

Panera Bread Coming To Arroyo Grande

The popular food chain Panera Bread will open a new restaurant at 1390 W Branch St in Arroyo Grande this December says developer  Nick Tompkins. Construction of the new 3850 sf eatery has begun with a permit  for a $750,000 shell building issued.The restaurant will also have a drive thru. Panera has a location in SLO.

Hotels Sell More Rooms

San Luis Obispo County has had a nice growth in hotel room revenue in May 2013 compared to the same month a year ago – up 9.8%. Occupancy was up 2.7% in May. Year to date rooms sold were up 4.7%.

Median Home Price In SLO County Up 16.4%

The median price of single family home rose to $445,160 in May – up from $431,250 in April 2013 and up 16.4% year over year from  $382,470 a year ago. Home sales rose 13.8% from April 2011 but fell 6.4% year over year. Time on the market has dropped from 42 days to 24 days year over year.

Pierside Restaurant In Pismo Getting Makeover

Pierside Restaurant, next to the Pismo pier is getting a full makeover as the landmark eatery will add a second oceanfront deck on the second floor and add an additional 639 sf to second floor interior. The old exterior and interior will get a major upgrade as well. The commercial building at 175 Pomeroy is undergoing demo work  currently. No word if the reopened Pierside will get a new operator.The food got mixed reviews on websites like Trip Advisor.

Epoch Winery on York Mountain Road Expanding

Epoch winery will expand its operations at 7575 York Mountain Rd in Tempelton. Owned by Catapult Vineyard of Denver – a building permit valued at over $1 million was issued this month.

Los Osos McDonalds To Be Discussed

The Los Osos Community Advisory Committee Meeting will be held at 7 p.m. Thursday, June 27 at the South Bay Community Center taking up the subject of opening a McDonalds in Los Osos. The eatery would be located in a former Bank of America building in front of Miners and Vons and include a drive thru. A county staff report done in 2012 says the applicant wants to use some 3078 sf of the 4000 sf building and leave the remainder for another tenant. The applicant says the eatery will have a water demand of 58 gpm – the rough equivalent of the water use of around 60 homes.

Three Thousand Fewer  Jobless

The unemployment rate in the San Luis Obispo County was 5.7 percent in May 2013, down from a revised 6.0 percent in April 2013, and below the year-ago estimate of 7.9 percent. This compares with an unadjusted unemployment rate of 8.1 percent for California and 7.3 percent for the nation during the same period.

At 5.7% rate the number of unemployed  has dropped from 11,300 residents in May 2012 to 8300 this May – a 26.5% drop with 3000 people off the rolls. A closer look shows some 4400 more people employed  year to year  – all in in non farm jobs while the number of farm jobs has held the same at 5000.

SLO County’s May jobless rate has not been this low since 2008 when it was 5.1%.

Across California  the state’s unemployment rate decreased to 8.6 percent in May, and nonfarm payroll jobs increased by 10,800 during the month for a total gain of 767,200 jobs since the recovery began in February 2010, according to data released today by the California Employment Development Department (EDD) from two separate surveys.

MORRO BAY — The San Luis Obispo real estate market is booming in 2013, but uncertainty about the future of Federal Reserve stimulus policy unleashed after Wednesday’s FOMC meeting has resulted in much higher mortgage rates says a local lender. Central Coast Lending of Morro Bay put out a news release today that suggests that  rising rates threaten to curtail the real estate recovery or maybe not.

“In the past 24-hours, the slumping bond market has moved the 30-year fixed mortgage rate from 3.625% (3.722% APR) up to 4.000% (4.097% APR). Controlling for situation, the difference in monthly mortgage payments for the two rates is about $90.

It was a difficult day for people actively engaged in mortgage transactions who have not locked their interest rates. The jump reduces real estate affordability and has the potential to slow the accelerating recovery on the California Central Coast.

Now for some measure of good news: we believe that market’s reaction to the FOMC meeting and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s press conference was completely off base, and speculation about the imminence of the “tapering” of Fed stimulus policy (quantitative easing) is overblown.

We would expect to see mortgage rates to drop back again once everything calms down. However, if we don’t see downward movement, the effect on the accelerating local real estate recovery (13% to 20% median home price growth in the past 12 months) could be troublesome.”