Huntington Beach City Council Approves Controversial Magnolia Tank Farm Development

On September 17, 2024 The Huntington Beach City Council approved a controversial hotel and housing development that has environmental activists up in arms.

The Magnolia Tank Farm project, located on Magnolia Street north of the Pacific Coast Highway, includes a hotel, park and housing units.

“They chose to ignore all the concerns of the community,” said Nancy Buchoz who attended the City Council meeting on Sept. 17. “We feel disappointed.”

Environmental activists, such as Residents for Responsible Desalination President Dave Hamilton, are convinced that the City Council has made a mistake.

“It will be built on bad ground in the coastal zone right next to a toxic Superfund site,” said Hamilton who lives in Huntington Beach.

Residents for Responsible Desalination opposes the privatization of the local water supply.

In July, the Coastal Commission approved a change in land use designation that is paving the way for the City Council’s approval and for Shopoff Realty Investments to break ground on the development.

“The wellbeing and health of the people who will be inhabiting that space is at stake,” alleged Charming Evelyn, a Los Angeles based grassroots organizer who works with the Sierra Club. “Their future health bills are going to skyrocket because their family members are going to come down with all kinds of diseases that they never had in their family.”

Meanwhile, Buchoz was surprised by the Coastal Commission’s approval because she had expected the state agency to be concerned for the staff and families who would work and live in the buildings, which are the adjacent to the Ascon toxic landfill in Huntington Beach.

Safety Concerns of Magnolia Tank Farm Development

“They’re ignoring the known health risks in favor of appeasing our governor who wants affordable housing,” Buchoz told OrangeCountyLawyers.com.

The married mother of two children has resided within a block of Ascon for 32 years and doesn’t believe it’s safe. Ascon borders the Magnolia Tank Farm, which was used to store fuel tanks from 1972 to 2013. The three 25-million-gallon tanks have since been removed.

“Your eyes are burning,” Buchoz said. “Your throat is burning. You have a sinus infection. A lot of people had the same symptoms and we started talking and wondering if it was because of that because we could smell it all the time.”

Shopoff Realty Investments did not respond to requests for comment but, according to Courthouse News, has reportedly set aside 20% of apartment units for low-income hotel employees and 25% of hotel rooms will be affordable as well.

As a result, members of the hotel workers labor union, UNITE HERE, are in favor of the development.

“It represents hope for families like mine,” Jimena Baclomena, a hotel housekeeper from Anaheim and a member of UNITE HERE, said at the July Coastal Commission meeting.

Neither UNITE HEAR nor representatives from the Coastal Commission replied to requests for comment but Kate Huckelbridge, Coastal Commission executive director, argued at the summer meeting that the project will not substantively make things hazards worse or better for the city of Huntington Beach.

“We don’t really see any evidence that this project would create new problems for this city nor would it solve many problems the city already has,” Huckelbridge said.

Screenshot courtesy https://magnoliatankfarm.info/