SACRAMENTO (CN) - The Sierra Club sued the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, claiming its new rules for Lake Tahoe would open more than 300 acres of undeveloped land to "resort recreation" on the California side.
Friends of the West Shore, a nonprofit community organization, joined the Sierra Club in its federal complaint.
Californians have been fighting for years to preserve the pristine west side of the highland lake, and stop it from turning into what they view as the glittery hellhole of the Nevada side.
In its 33-page complaint, the Sierra Club claims the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency illegally shifted authority for development decisions to local jurisdictions, failing to ensure that environmental impacts will be held to less than significant levels.
Fending off these claims, the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency said that the existing 1987 regional plan is outdated and that it has spent 10 years crafting these updates in an extensive bi-state consultation process.
In addition to approval from the TRPA Governing Board, the plan allegedly has wide support among private, public and environmental interests.
The Sierra Club is "out of touch" with the realities that face Lake Tahoe today, and the area needs a "modern approach to sustainability," one that "mixes incentives and a streamlined permit process with high environmental standards," TRPA Executive Director Joanne Marchetta said in a statement
"This lawsuit takes us back to the outdated environmental movements of 30 years ago," Marchetta said. "Simply demanding that development should go away or people should stop coming to Lake Tahoe is not a realistic plan."
But the Sierra Club said the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, or TRPA, adopted illegal amendments to the plan on Dec. 12, 2012.
"Most significantly, it delegated to local governments TRPA's project review and approval duties for projects up to 99,999 square feet in size," the complaint states. "This delegation runs counter to the Compact's intent to provide regional oversight of projects and violates the Compact's clear directive that it is TRPA's Governing Board's duty to review and approve projects and to make findings that any project it approves complies with the Regional Plan and its rules to effectuate that Plan."
The Sierra club claims: "(R)ather than being guided by the Compact's core purpose - to achieve and maintain environmental protection thresholds - and a proper environmental analysis of the Plan Update, TRPA allowed political considerations and ultimately the pressure for more development to dictate the Plan Update's terms. Because the Plan Update improperly delegates project review and approval to local governments, fails to require minimum regional standards, and is not supported by an adequate environmental analysis and proper threshold findings, the Plan Update is invalid, such that it must be set aside."
The complaint adds: "In addition, the Plan Update revises and loosens the standards by which new projects are reviewed and approved, while increasing the potential for new development throughout the region. It allows local governments to establish environmental standards that do not meet minimum regional requirements, including standards that limit how much land can be paved, or 'covered,' to protect natural soil function and prevent runoff into the Lake. This unlawfully leaves it to local governments to provide the standards that TRPA should be providing and fails to ensure that such standards are at least as protective as TRPA's."