March 10, 2004

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Palo Alto Online

On Deadline: Will the real history of the Arastradero Preserve please stand up?

by Jay Thorwaldson

I first came face to face with the 500-plus acres that have become core of the Arastradero Preserve back in the late 1960s.

I had been assigned the city beat for the erstwhile Palo Alto Times, and there was this huge development proposed for Palo Alto's lower foothills -- the designation for everything downhill from the city's Foothills Park, a 1,400-acre jewel reserved for city residents only.

The Arastradero property -- now a dedicated 609-acre preserve owned by the city -- has again hit the headlines thanks to a proposal to rename it in honor of former City Council member Enid Pearson. From the late-1950s to the mid-1970s, Pearson was a leader in a struggle to resist large developments in Palo Alto. Her greatest legacy is the 1965 "park dedication ordinance," which requires a citywide vote before any park land is used for any non-park use.

The Arastradero land was proposed for 1,776 housing units, three times the one-house-per-acre zoning at the time. The proposal was a gamble by the firm that owned the land: Sunset International. Sunset had created a holding firm called Sunradero, which in turn owned the company proposing to build there: Arastra, Ltd.

The family of firms was represented by a handsome fellow with a wonderful name: Brett LaSchelle. His entire demeanor, down to his fashionable string tie, could have been modeled on a character from Gone With the Wind, perhaps a riverboat gambler to match the corporate gamble he was playing out in Palo Alto. He flew in from Southern California and was an eloquent spokesman for a long-shot plan.

Back to the issue at hand: renaming the property for Pearson. The proposal was made by a group of close friends and longtime allies after she became seriously ill last year. She is now recovering.

The renaming was proposed publicly by Councilwoman Yoriko Kishimoto. Initially, the proposal was reported as a way to honor Pearson for her extensive work in helping acquire the property for the city.

But that shifted into naming it for her to recognize the general contributions she has made to the community -- after several former council members objected quietly that Pearson had little to do with the acquisition or the negotiations that led up to it. In fact, Pearson wasn't even on the council when the case was settled in June 1976 -- she had lost a reelection bid in the spring 1975.

One Pearson admirer, attorney Jennifer Hagan, has since meticulously researched the history of the Arastradero property -- now at more than 600 acres due to add-on acquisitions by the city. After she made a couple of corrections and tweakings, her final work is posted on the community Web site, www.PaloAltoOnline.com.

In 1972, the city rezoned the lower foothills to require 10-acre lots, and Arastra Ltd. sued in U.S. District Court, claiming confiscation of its land -- and won its case after many months, based primarily on statements by city officials that they wanted the lower foothills preserved. Attorney Scott Carey, elected to the council in 1975, began negotiations that resulted in the city acquiring the land for $7.5 million -- with much behind-the-scenes work by Councilman Stan Norton and some others.

There are many footprints on Palo Alto's open spaces, it seems.

But Hagan wasn't the only one doing some research. Greg Betts, Palo Alto's superintendent of open space and science, after reviewing Hagan's history began digging in his own memory and files and added some detail about a history of naming places in the city.

Betts corrected a misperception of Hagan's about there being little discussion on naming the Arastradero Preserve in the mid-1980s.

"In fact there was quite a bit of debate and discussion surrounding the name," Betts wrote in an e-mail to Hagan. "The name recommendations actually went back to the Palo Alto Historical Association three times in 1984 and 1985, before the City Council, after much debate, finally settled on the name Arastradero Preserve.

He said five names were seriously considered: Maximo Martinez Preserve, for the holder of the original land grant that included the Arastra property; Rancho Corte Madera Preserve, after the name of the original land grant; Rockland Preserve, after a lime and lumber company that operated there in the early years; Anson Parsons Hotaling Preserve, after a well-known whiskey distiller who once owned the land; and the Russel V. A. Lee Preserve, after the physician founder of the Palo Alto Medical Clinic who owned adjacent land and sold Foothills Park to the city.

Other names considered earlier included "Costanoan Preserve," and after Virginia Bothwell and former Planning Commissioner Frances Brenner, who played roles in the ultimate preservation of the land.

But the Historical Association's naming committee felt that "additional persons were involved and selecting Mrs. Brenner would not be appropriate," Betts noted. The five names plus Arastradero generated a "lively discussion" at the March 1985 meeting of the council's Finance and Public Works Committee. Additional research was done on the names, and on July 3, 1985, the council voted to retain Arastradero Preserve.

"History shows, I guess, that the naming process has never been easy!" Betts concluded.

Jay Thorwaldson is editor of the Weekly. He can be e-mailed at jthorwaldson@paweekly.com.

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