Litigation regarding the 24th Street widening project is moving forward after attempts to settle proved unsuccessful.
Months of mandatory negotiations between the City of Bakersfield and the Citizens Against the 24th Street Widening Project ended in February after the attorneys representing the group declined the city’s offer to waive payment of $20,000 in court-awarded costs in exchange for the dismissal of the case. The group has agreed to pay the costs.
“The city thought $20,000 was enough leverage to get us to dismiss the appeal. That’s not acceptable,” said Jamie Hall, an attorney with Channel Law Group who is representing the citizens. “We’re dealing with a huge project with multiple pieces to it. The court costs are a minor issue.”
Deputy City Attorney Andrew Heglund said that while he is glad that the group has agreed to pay the city, he’s disappointed that there was no dismissal of the appeals case.
“We were hopeful that it would work out and we could move on, but that wasn’t able to come to pass,” he said. “We want to get the litigation process done as soon as possible and get it behind us.”
The citizens’ group initially sued the city in 2014, alleging that they violated the California Environmental Quality Act by approving a flawed Environmental Impact Report for the project, which would widen 24th Street from four lanes to six.
Kern County Judge Kenneth Twisselman ruled that the EIR didn’t delve deep enough into possible alternatives to the project and didn’t look into the effects of adding cul-de-sacs. Work on the project was halted and the city was ordered to make changes to the EIR.
After the city brought in a revised EIR for review, Twisselman ruled in the city’s favor, allowing work on the project to resume despite objections from petitioners. The court awarded the city $20,315 in legal expenses. The city sued the group in an attempt to collect the money.
Following Twisselman’s ruling, the group’s lawyers decided to appeal the case.
While Hall and Heglund said they couldn’t go into detail regarding what settlement offers were made during the negotiations for legal reasons, Hall said the group made several offers to the city but said it was unwilling to consider any of them.
“I think it’s in some ways an issue of pride,” Hall said. “No one wants to be perceived as a loser, someone who caved to political pressure. I think they’ve allowed their emotions to direct how they’ve handled the negotiations.”
Former City Councilman Terry Maxwell said he created a five-lane plan in an attempt to provide a compromise with the city. The plan consisted of four regular lanes, sound walls facing the street on the northern side and a fire lane on the other side of the walls.
Maxwell said one of the main goals of the plan, which runs from Elm to Bay streets, is to eliminate cross traffic by walling off the north side of 24th street, essentially splitting the Riviera/Westchester area into two separate neighborhoods. The fire lane allows for fire, police and emergency crews to easily access the north side.
“The city claims that traffic congestion on 24th Street warrants a widening, but the only times it gets congested are when people are doing cross traffic,” he said. “If you eliminate some of the cross traffic, there wouldn’t be a need for three lanes. Two is perfectly acceptable.”
While the plan was presented to the city’s legal team, the city didn’t accept the proposal.
“It would not work primarily because it would be new project. It would require us to start the process all over again, and we have no interest in doing that at this time. We want to continue with the project we have,” Heglund said.
The litigation hasn’t stopped the city from moving forward on some parts of the widening project. In January, construction off 12-foot sound walls between Beech and Bay streets began, with work expected to be completed by the end of May.
Project Manager Kristina Budak said that the $1.4 million sound wall project is being paid for through the Thomas Roads Improvement Program as well as some local funding.
The entire widening project, estimated to cost around $30 million, will be paid for through federal and local funding, with construction expected to begin this summer, Budak said.
“We’re trying to widen 24th Street for betterment of the community,” Heglund said. “The message we’re receiving from community is positive. People want this project to be built.”
Now that settlement negotiations have concluded, Hall said a hearing in the 5th District Court of Appeals in Fresno has been scheduled for sometime this spring. Hall said he doesn’t expect a decision to be made on the case any earlier than this summer.
Meanwhile, a separate lawsuit has been filed against the city in attempt to stop work on the construction of a new crosswalk on 24th and Pine streets, which was approved by the City Council last fall to make up for the removal of the existing crosswalk on Alder/A Street.
Hall said a case management conference has been set for March 16 at the Kern County court.
Joseph Luiz can be reached at 395-7368 or by email at jluiz@bakersfield.com. You can also follow him on Twitter @JLuiz_TBC.
