Open space at the lake

Proposed land sale at Berryessa promises more access to trails

By KERANA TODOROV
Register Staff Writer

The general public could one day have greater access to sweeping views of Lake Berryessa, with the county’s proposed purchase of a 224-acre parcel from the Land Trust of Napa County, a nonprofit agency dedicated to the preservation of open space.

The Napa County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a plan to buy the land for up to $127,000 in Prop. 12 funds — state money the county has to spend or risk losing by March 2008  — said John Woodbury, Napa County Regional Park and Open Space District general manager. The district’s directors approved the plan Oct. 8.

The property, which was appraised at $185,000 in 1995, is being re-appraised, Woodbury said.

“They’re getting a great bargain,” said John Hoffnagle, executive director of the Land Trust.

Woodbury reported to the Napa County Regional Park and Open Space District that Berryessa Vista has the potential to be a pleasant, low-intensity regional park that includes trails and a possible backcountry campground.

The land, home to blue oak, gray pine and chaparral, will also be a link to more public land, he said.

The property — actually three parcels known collectively as Berryessa Vista, is located between lands owned by two federal agencies — the Bureau of Reclamation and the Bureau of Land Management.

Eventually, the dirt roads that criss-cross the Land Trust property would be linked to a planned trail around the lake. The segment of the proposed Lake Berryessa Shoreline Trail across Berryessa Vista will connect Steele Canyon Road to Knoxville-Berryessa Road.

Carol Kunze, executive director of Bay Berryessa Trails and Conservation, a nonprofit organization that’s planning the 100-mile plus trail around the lake, said Berryessa Vista will give access to land owned by the Bureau of Land Management.

“It creates an access to public land on top of the hill that otherwise (wouldn’t) be accessible,” she said.

Woodbury and Hoffnagle explained in separate interviews that the Land Trust wants to use the sale proceeds toward the purchase of 1,000 acres near Dunn-Wildlake Ranch, a 3,000-acre property owned by the Land Trust since 2006. The 1,000 acres, owned by the Duff family, will link Dunn-Wildlake Ranch to Robert Louis Stevenson State Park. The Land Trust has until Feb. 15 to raise the money to buy the $4.1 million Duff property, Hoffnagle said.

A small percentage of the sale’s proceeds — about $10,000 — will also pay for the construction of a solar-powered water pump at the Jack and Bernice Newell Open Space Preserve, 640 acres the city of American Canyon owns east of its city limits. The pump will be another source of water for grazing cattle, away from a creek that flows through the open space.

Woodbury said the $127,000 is what’s left of Napa County’s share of the Prop. 12 funds, a pool of money created after California voters approved the $2.1 billion state parks bond act of 2000.

In 2002, Woodbury explained in his staff report to the district directors, Napa County allocated $468,000 to nine different projects.

The construction of the $10,000 solar pump at Newell was originally scheduled to be paid with Prop. 12 funds, Woodbury said, but time has run out. The pump would have had to have been built by now in order to meet the state’s deadlines, he said. Instead it will be built with Land Trust money. Plans to build the pump are under way, Woodbury said.

Hoffnagle said the Land Trust board will vote on the Berryessa Vista sale early November. A committee has recommended the sale. Three Napa physicians donated two-thirds of the land to the Land Trust in 2003, Hoffnagle said. The Land Trust then purchased the rest of the property for $113,000 acres, according to Woodbury, who said the nonprofit wanted to hold onto Berryessa Vista until an appropriate public agency could manage it as a public park.

Woodbury has visited Berryessa Vista.

“It’s very pretty,” Woodbury said.

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