In May the Board of Supervisors – citing code enforcement concerns and a loss of transient occupancy tax – determined that they wanted county staff to begin working on getting resorts, motels and RV parks that have turned into long-term housing back into compliance with county ordinances.
Two resorts, U Wanna Camp on Scotts Creek Road near Lakeport and D&G's Last Resort on Lakeshore Boulevard in Nice, both were on the Lake County Planning Commission's Nov. 12 agenda.
U Wanna Camp's owner, Houser Holdings CA LLC, is appealing a notice of violation issued on Sept. 3 for long-term occupancy of RV spaces with the resort having an expired use permit.
D&G's Last Resort's owner Dorothy Knevelbaard is appealing a Sept. 9 notice of violation alleging the conversion of a resort with six motel units and four cottages from transient accommodations to apartment rentals for long-term residential occupancy.
However, the commission granted both resorts time extensions until January in order to to allow them more time to prepare for the appeal hearings.
In explaining the reasons behind the notices of violation to the commission, Community Development Director Rick Coel referred to the board's direction and the issue of bringing back TOT money.
“We've lost a lot of that over the last decade or so and it seems to continue to fall off,” said Coel.
He assured the commission, “You're not going to see a whole rash of these all at once.” Rather, his department is dealing with them a handful at a time.
Coel said the board's direction included an admonition to look at the unique circumstances of each site and find solutions in an effort to help resort owners come back into compliance.
Over the next couple of months, four appeals of violation notices will go before the commission, Coel said.
In addition to the task of working with the resorts, Coel's department received board direction in September to go through the list of parcels under Williamson Act contracts to make sure they're following the program's guidelines.
The Williamson Act pays counties a subvention in return for the counties offering reduced property tax rates for property kept in agricultural production, Coel and County Counsel Bob Bridges explained.
Coel said Community Development began going through the list of contracted parcels, which included a total of 111 properties.
Some of them didn't meet the program's criteria, Coel said. For example, the program requires that prime agricultural soil properties not be less than 10 acres, and nonprime soil properties not be less than 40 acres.
He said his staff, working with the Lake County Farm Bureau and the Lake County Assessor's Office, has gone through the list and have about 70 left to review. Those that don't meet the standards have been sent notices of nonrenewal.
Coel said the board's direction was that if the properties aren't in compliance Community Development is to record notices of violation.
He said many of the contracts cover land that originally had been under a contract. However, Coel said that, about five or six years ago, they started to see underlying parcels – which had been bundled together under the contracts – being sold off. Some of those parcels were five or six acres in size, below the minimum Williamson Act sizes.
“That's mainly what our enforcement efforts are dealing with right now,” he said.
In the coming year, Coel said his staff will start reviewing the larger ranch sites for compliance and agricultural activity.
The process “generated a lot of work for the department,” said Coel, noting the amount of effort required to go through the property records.
Bridges told the commission that in this past budget the state eliminated its subvention payments to counties. County officials previously said that subvention amount totaled about $68,000 which, while a small amount, has done a lot to preserve ag land.
Many counties now are looking at the program and considering whether or not it's worth it to stay in the Williamson Act, Bridges said.
“Some counties have given thousands of notices of nonrenewal,” he said, while others are paying for it themselves in order to support agriculture.
Still others – like Lake County – are in the middle, considering what to do since the state pulled the “financial rug” out from under the program, Bridges said.
Coel said the California Department of Conservation audits counties and how they handle the program. He said it's not fair to legitimate farmers to let others who aren't following the rules take advantage of the program.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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