June 10, 2026
Planning Commission
City of Brisbane
50 Park Place Brisbane, CA 94005
cc:
City Council
Julia Ayres, Director, Community Development [baylands@brisbaneca.org]
Re: Baylands Specific Plan Project Final Environmental Impact Report
Dear Brisbane Planning Commissioners,
The Sierra Club Loma Prieta Chapter, the Citizens Committee to Complete the Refuge, Green Foothills, and the San Mateo County Bird Alliance respectfully submit the following comments regarding the Final Environmental Impact Report (FEIR) for the Brisbane Baylands Specific Plan (BBSP).
We appreciate the substantial effort that has gone into this lengthy and complex environmental review process and acknowledge several useful clarifications and revisions made in response to public comments. Nevertheless, we remain concerned that critical decisions have been deferred to future approvals without sufficiently clear standards, decision triggers, adaptive management requirements, or accountability mechanisms.
This is a once-in-a-generation redevelopment proposal on a highly constrained and contaminated shoreline site expected to experience substantial sea level rise and groundwater change over the lifetime of the project. Because of the scale and duration of the proposed development, unresolved uncertainties should not simply be deferred. They should be addressed through enforceable conditions, adaptive management requirements, and transparent future oversight.
Recognizing the critical role that the Baylands Specific Plan will play in shaping the future of Brisbane and its natural resources alongside San Francisco Bay, we ask the Board to address the following remaining concerns before taking action on the FEIR and the Specific Plan.
Deferred Analysis and Decision-making
How will the City Know When a Course Correction is Needed?
The City is being asked to approve a project whose environmental protections depend on future oversight by other agencies, and assumptions about future conditions, remediation effectiveness, infrastructure performance, etc., that will be tested over decades. So too, the FEIR’s findings of less than significant impact rely on these uncertain assumptions. Yet the FEIR declines to require parcel-specific vulnerability assessments, baseline groundwater evaluations, or other mechanisms for determining when changing conditions may warrant additional action. (Response O-Joint-69, FEIR p. 13-628). There appears to be no mechanism for regularly reporting critical information about project performance and changing site conditions to the City or the community. Before approving the project, the Planning Commission and City Council should consider how it will know the following in a timely manner:
Whether the interaction of rising groundwater with the project is contributing to unanticipated risks to on-site or adjacent landfill caps, infrastructure, or contaminant migration,
Whether remediation systems, landfill controls, and other protective measures are performing as intended over time,
Whether changing sea level rise projections, groundwater monitoring data, or observed site conditions warrant adjustments to future phases of development, and
Whether adaptive management requirements are being implemented successfully and achieving their intended outcomes.
These questions matter because the project’s environmental conclusions rely heavily on assumptions about future conditions and future management actions. If conditions change or mitigation measures prove less effective than anticipated, then the City needs a way to identify those issues early in order to strengthen mitigation strategies as needed and make informed decisions about future phases of development.
ASK
To address this governance gap, the City should require a periodic public reporting framework that provides both site-specific and cumulative updates on monitoring results, adaptive management actions, and any implications for future development decisions. The goal would not be to duplicate the work of DTSC, the Regional Water Board, or other responsible agencies. Rather, it would help ensure transparency, accountability, and informed local decision-making throughout the multi-decade buildout of a project whose environmental and public health implications will continue to evolve long after initial approvals are granted.
Conservation Easements Are Needed to Ensure Permanent Protection of Conservation and Open Space Lands
Chapter 5 of the BBSP repeatedly emphasizes the importance of permanently protecting and enhancing open space, habitat, ecological connectivity and natural systems functions. The Plan draws from both the Brisbane General Plan and the 2001 Open Space Plan, which call for conservation measures that are comprehensive, enduring, and capable of preserving and restoring biological resources in perpetuity.1
These objectives are especially important given the Baylands' role in supporting sensitive habitats, regional wildlife connectivity, shoreline resilience, and adaptation to sea level rise. As the Specific Plan itself recognizes, the open space network is a central element of the site's ecological and hydrologic functioning and a key component of its climate adaptation strategy.2
Despite these stated goals, neither the Specific Plan nor the FEIR appear to provide a durable mechanism to ensure that open space and conservation lands remain protected in perpetuity. Without such protections, future changes in ownership, land use priorities, or development pressures could undermine the long-term conservation objectives that form a central premise of the Plan.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife identified this concern in its comments on the Draft EIR and recommended adoption of a mitigation measure requiring conservation easements over open space and conservation lands. CDFW noted that conservation easements provide a far stronger and more durable form of protection than deed restrictions or covenant restrictions, which may be modified or terminated over time.3
ASK
We strongly support CDFW's recommendation and urge the Planning Commission and City Council to incorporate conservation easement requirements directly into the Specific Plan and implement them through project approvals and other binding implementation documents. If the City intends for these lands to provide permanent habitat, ecological connectivity, and nature-based adaptation benefits, then permanent protection mechanisms should be established now.
This recommendation is also consistent with the Bay Conservation and Development Commission's Regional Shoreline Adaptation Plan framework, which requires Brisbane to evaluate and implement long-term adaptation strategies, including both nature-based solutions and natural infrastructure adaptation. Permanently protected open space may become an increasingly important component of future nature-based shoreline adaptation, making the establishment of durable conservation protections with the BBSP even more important.
Biological Resources
We were pleased to see the inclusion of several recommendations from our previous comment letter on the DEIR reflected in the FEIR. We especially appreciated the inclusion of a recommendation from the CDFW letter that updated Burrowing Owl mitigation requirements.
However, we believe that the omission of several changes recommended in our DEIR comment letter will constrain the Project’s ability to achieve its biodiversity objective. Actions addressing issues discussed below would improve habitat biodiversity.
Night lighting of Habitats
While the FEIR addresses night lighting with two mitigation measures (MM 4.A-4a, MM BIO-3b), neither is adequate for locations adjacent to wildlife habitats. Without additional protections from habitat-adjacent lighting, the project’s impacts on wildlife and habitat function may remain significant and unavoidable. Municipal code provides a city-wide standard for setting lighting in habitats that requires all light fixtures to be “fully shielded" and no brighter than a full moon, as described in MM 4.A-4A. BIO-3b uses the same standards to protect birds, generally, but not habitat, nor other species groups. Neither of those standards apply to areas where lighting adjoins sensitive wildlife habitats that this Project proposes to enhance, restore or recreate.
As addressed in our DEIR comment letter (O-Joint-33, p. 13-593), all wildlife have natural internal rhythms that directly respond to daily changes in light. Many nocturnal species rely on darkness for protection against predators. With natural changes in lighting dependent on the phase of the moon, these species adjust their behavior dependent on risk. Under consistent, artificial “full moon” lighting, and unshielded light fixtures, it will become especially difficult for these species to persist within the Project area. Amongst these nocturnal species is the federally endangered salt marsh harvest mouse, for which critical habitat already exists in the lagoon.4
Nocturnal animals are also more sensitive to cool-toned lighting as opposed to warm-toned lighting. Cool-toned lighting mimics the blue spectrum of the sun, simulating a false daytime, and disrupts wildlife’s circadian rhythms and natural behaviors. Cooler lighting also attracts insects and disrupts the natural distribution of insects and, consequently, the hunting behaviors of insectivores, which can have cascading impacts on the ecosystem as a whole.5
ASK
In order to protect these critical Bayland habitats, the Specific Plan should be amended to add policy and extend night lighting requirements to reflect Dark Skies International’s Five Principles for Responsible Outdoor Lighting.6
Requirements should include the following:
Wherever possible, artificial lighting shall not be installed or, if necessary for safety, equipped with timers, sensors or other devices to turn fixtures off when not needed.
Lighting fixtures installed near sensitive habitats shall be shielded to direct all light away from the habitat and use the lowest light level necessary for safety.
Lighting fixtures installed near sensitive habitats shall prioritize warm-colored light and limit shorter wavelengths to the greatest extent possible.
Avian Predators
Avian predators such as raptors, ravens, crows, and gulls hunt during the day, and do so from perches that overlook habitats. These species perch on structures such as lamp posts, power poles and powerlines, rooftops, balconies, or trees.
ASK
The Specific Plan should be amended to add policy and perching prevention requirements designed to protect sensitive habitats in the Baylands.
Within 100 feet of a sensitive habitat, install biologist-approved bird predator deterrents on all streetlights, power poles, roof edges or high points, high balconies, powerlines, tall rooftop equipment and similar locations that might otherwise serve as perching sites for avian predators. Extend requirements to 300 feet from the shoreline for any tall (4+ stories) structures.
Near Bay wetland habitats, do not plant trees within 100 feet of the shoreline and remove trees that exist in such locations. From 100 to 300 feet beyond the wetland shoreline, use only rounded-canopy native trees and avoid any spike-shaped trees.
Hazards and Hazardous Materials
Risks to human health from exposure to Chlorinated Volatile Organic Compounds (CVOCs) from the Schlage OU site are not adequately addressed by the mitigation measures proposed in the final EIR.
In its response to comments O-Joint-60 and O-Joint-66, the EIR makes the following unjustified assumptions:
That additional groundwater treatment required by the DTSC for the Schlage OU plume will reduce levels of CVOCs to below Cleanup Levels (CULs) within the planned timeframe for construction of residential housing,
That placement of clean soil or an impermeable cap over UPC-OU-SM, or diversion of groundwater flows to a collection and treatment system, will eliminate or minimize all pathways of exposure so as to reduce human health risk to within acceptable limits, and
That the impact of groundwater rise on future exposures to CVOCs can be disregarded.
DTSC’s comments on recent groundwater monitoring at the Schlage OU state that the levels of CVOCs in the subsurface are so high that they suggest the continued presence of a non-aqueous phase layer (NAPL) in the subsurface7. Dense NAPLs are notoriously slow to eliminate using the reductive dechlorination approach. It could be longer than the 10-year buildout planned for the Brisbane Baylands project before dissolved concentrations fall to acceptable levels. While it is true that the current project is not responsible for the DTSC cleanup approach and the performance of the Schlage OU remediation, the City of Brisbane is responsible for ensuring that future residents are not exposed to unhealthy levels of carcinogenic and toxic substances.
Although impermeable caps or sufficiently thick clean soil layers can reduce soil vapor intrusion (VI), the resulting human health risk cannot be assumed in advance. Soil vapor can also enter homes through sewers and buried utility conduits. Groundwater collection and treatment only mitigate dissolved CVOCs; as long as a NAPL persists, CVOCs will continue to contaminate the groundwater. Rising groundwater will reduce the thickness of clean soil between the plume and the surface, potentially increasing VI. None of the measures cited in the EIR responses demonstrate that future VI exposures will be reduced to health-protective levels under changing groundwater conditions. Site-specific soil gas sampling and human health risk assessment is needed.
ASK
The Specific Plan should add policies for future development that conform to the letter and spirit of the DTSC Vapor Intrusion guidance8.
Future buildings constructed near or over soil gas contamination may need mitigation systems to protect occupants. Ideally, all feasible interim and/or final remedial actions should be taken in a timely fashion to reduce or eliminate the need for VI mitigation. For sites where conditions prevent or limit the amount of remediation, mitigation may be necessary as a long-term measure to alleviate exposure.
Any construction projects within UPC-OU-SM that overly the Schlage OU must prepare a site management plan and health and safety plan that specify protective measures for construction workers.
Prior to any construction above the Schlage OU plume, the contractor must conduct soil gas testing according to the guidance set out in the latest DTSC VI guidelines, and prepare a human health risk assessment based on the highest detected CVOC concentrations.
Building plans must include calculations of expected reduction in VI and measures to prevent vapor migration through subsurface conduits. If indicated by the health risk assessment, building plans should include long-term VI monitoring and mitigation systems.
Bio Safety Levels
The BBSP intentionally allows BSL-3 by right and BSL-4 as a Conditional Use in the Baylands, yet the environmental analysis does not adequately disclose or analyze the foreseeable impacts of these specialized uses.
BSL-3 Facilities Should Be a Conditional Use
BBSP Table 3.4.1, Footnote 7 and Municipal Code Section 17.18.030(F) would allow Biosafety Level 3 (BSL) laboratories by right, while requiring a Conditional Use Permit only for facilities utilizing biological agents exceeding Risk Group 3, for example , BSL-4 laboratories. This approach allows a category of laboratory use with substantially greater public health, safety, and operational implications than conventional research laboratories without any discretionary review.
The threshold appears unusually high, allowing BSL-3 labs by right, without even requiring a Conditional Use Permit. The distinction is significant because BSL-3 laboratories present substantially greater risks to the community than lower-level research laboratories at Biosafety Levels 1 and 2, and raise important environmental, health, and public safety considerations.
BSL-3 labs handle pathogens capable of causing serious or potentially lethal disease through inhalation and require specialized containment measures, including negative-pressure ventilation systems, HEPA filtration, controlled access, decontamination procedures, and extensive operational safeguards. Such potential concerns associated with BSL-3 laboratories include:
Failure of containment, ventilation, or filtration systems,
Accidental release of infectious biological agents due to mechanical failure or human error,
Improper treatment or disposal of biological waste,
Power outages or failure of critical safety systems,
Increased emergency response and public safety requirements, and
Research activities involving particularly hazardous pathogens.
ASK
We urge the Planning Commission and City Council to, at a minimum, revise BBSP Table 3.4.1 and Municipal Code Section 17.18.030(F) to require a Conditional Use Permit for facilities utilizing biological agents exceeding Risk Group 2 or Biosafety Level 2 within the Plan area.
Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) Laboratories Are Not Appropriate in this Mixed-use Setting
The FEIR confirms that research and development activities using biological agents exceeding Risk Group 3 or Biosafety Level 3 (BSL-3) would be allowed subject to a Conditional Use Permit and City Council approval. As written, this appears to allow extremely dangerous labs such as Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) facilities, as a Conditional Use, within the Baylands Specific Plan area (Response O-Joint-5).9
BSL-4 laboratories are not typical life science uses. These are highly specialized facilities that handle the world’s most dangerous pathogens and depend on complex containment systems, rigorous operational protocols, and ongoing regulatory oversight to ensure safe operation. Currently there are a very few BSL-4 labs in the US and these are mostly within university and government settings. With such facilities, the consequences of a containment failure, operational error, or other safety breakdown would be substantially different, and possibly catastrophic, from those associated with more conventional research and development uses.
For this reason, we do not believe BSL-4 facilities are compatible with the mixed-use residential, recreational, and shoreline habitat setting envisioned by the Specific Plan. Siting a BSL-4 facility within the Baylands demands far greater scrutiny and transparency.
ASK
We urge the Planning Commission and City Council to revise the BBSP to expressly prohibit BSL-4 laboratories and related high-containment facilities within the Plan area and to update Municipal Code Section 17.18.030(F) accordingly. At a minimum, if such uses are to remain potentially allowable in the Plan area, the FEIR should disclose and analyze the reasonably foreseeable public health, emergency response, infrastructure, security, and land-use compatibility implications associated with siting a BSL-4 facility within the Baylands.
Data Centers
Exclusion of Data Centers, By Any Name, Should Be Explicit
The FEIR states that data centers are not permitted because they are not listed in the Brisbane Baylands Specific Plan, Table 3.4.1, Allowable Uses. As noted on page 3-172, "Uses not listed in Table 3.4.1, Allowable Uses, are prohibited."
However, data centers are commonly described by a variety of alternative terms depending on their scale, ownership, or operational characteristics, including data halls, server farms, hosting facilities, colocation facilities, cloud-computing facilities, and similar uses. While these facilities may operate under different names, they serve substantially the same function and can have significant environmental impacts.
Data centers and related facilities are typically characterized by high electricity demand, substantial water consumption for cooling, and greenhouse gas emissions associated with backup diesel generators and emergency power systems. Given these impacts, it is important that the FEIR clearly identify and prohibit such facilities rather than relying solely on the absence of the term "data center" from the allowable uses table.
This concern is heightened by the provision, on page 3-172, of the BBSP: The Community Development Director shall, however, have the authority to render administrative interpretations of uses listed in Table 3.4.1 to include a proposed activity not listed, based upon the finding that the proposed activity closely resembles a use listed in Table 3.4.1 as permitted or conditional with respect to purpose, type, function, and general manner of operation.
ASK
Because data centers may be proposed under a variety of industry-standard names and could potentially be interpreted as similar to other permitted uses, the FEIR and Specific Plan should include explicit language prohibiting data centers and similar facilities, with similar resource demands and environmental impacts, regardless of nomenclature. Such clarification would eliminate ambiguity, provide greater certainty regarding future land uses, and ensure that these energy- and water-intensive facilities cannot be approved through administrative interpretation.
Greenhouse Gas Emissions
The City’s Climate Commitments Should Not End Where State Requirements End
We recognize that the FEIR’s greenhouse gas analysis has been substantially revised and that several sustainability provisions have been strengthened. However, we are concerned that the revised analytical framework sets a precedent that weakens CEQA’s historic role in promoting transparency, accountability, and project-specific mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions.
While the FEIR now concludes that the project’s greenhouse gas impacts are less than significant based on consistency with statewide climate policies, that determination does not change the project’s emissions profile. We are particularly concerned about the precedent this approach may establish for future large-scale development projects. If substantial local project emissions can be deemed less than significant through a state-wide policy–consistency framework alone, the incentive to pursue additional feasible mitigation measures may be diminished despite the very real contribution those emissions make to the climate crisis.
The Baylands project will be built out over multiple decades, during a period of rapid technological changes and increasing climate urgency. The important question before the City now is not whether CEQA requires additional mitigation, but whether the Specific Plan sufficiently ensures that this once-in-a-generation development opportunity advances Brisbane’s climate goals through clear, enforceable, and durable project commitments.
ASK
Accordingly, we urge the Planning Commission and City Council to strengthen the Specific Plan by requiring periodic review and updating of the climate-related development and construction standards for future phases of the project. Such a policy could direct the City to evaluate advances in low- and zero-emission construction equipment, building technologies, energy systems, and transportation strategies at defined intervals or prior to approval of major future phases, and to incorporate feasible measures that would further reduce greenhouse gas emissions and support the City’s climate goals.
We thank you for your consideration of the above comments, and commend the work done to complete such an effort.
Respectfully,
Gita Dev
Chair, Conservation Committee, Sustainable Land Use Committee
Sierra Club Loma Prieta Chapter
Jennifer Hetterly
Campaign Coordinator
Sierra Club Bay Alive Campaign
Eileen McLaughlin
Board Member
Citizens Committee to Complete the Refuge
Alexandra Mendoza
Environmental Associate
Green Foothills
Chris MacIntosh
Conservation Chair
San Mateo County Bird Alliance
1 Final BBSP Chapter 5, p. 5-2: “The City of Brisbane will be a place...where open space lands have been set aside to protect the natural environment”...“and where residents reciprocate by respecting and maintaining the land and the waters for future generations. (General Plan, page 109)
2 Ibid. Ch. 5, p.5-2: “The Open Space Element of the General Plan outlines the City’s plan for stewardship”...”for the “comprehensive, long range preservation and conservation of open space lands ...” (General Plan, page 118).”
3 Baylands Final EIR, Chapter 13, pp. 13-80 to 13-82, Comment SA-CDFW-8 “Habitat Mitigation Land”
4 USFWS, Recovery Plan for Tidal Marsh Ecosystems of Northern and Central California, 2013. See Plan Segment Map J, Figure III-16, p. 268: https://ecos.fws.gov/docs/recovery_plan/TMRP/20130923_TMRP_Books_Signed_FINAL.pdf
5 Dark Skies International, “Responsible Outdoor Lighting Step 5: Choose Warm Colored Lights.” https://darkskytexas.org/responsible-outdoor-lighting-choose-warm-colored-lights/
6 Dark Skies International, “Five Principles for Responsible Outdoor Lighting.” https://darksky.org/resources/guides-and-how-tos/lighting-principles/
7 Geosyntec, 2025. Response to DTSC Comments – 3rd Quarter (August) 2024 Groundwater Monitoring Report (Dated 13 December 2024). March 31, 2025.
8 Cal EPA, DTSC, and RWQCB, 2023. Supplemental Guidance: Screening and Evaluating Vapor Intrusion, FINAL DRAFT. https://dtsc.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/31/2023/02/VI_SupGuid_Screening-Evaluating.pdf
9 Brisbane municipal code section 17.18.030(F) includes this conditional use definition:
"Research and development utilizing biological agents exceeding Risk Group 3 or Biosafety Level 3 as defined by the National Institute of Health or the Center for Disease Control, except that for such research and development uses the city council shall act as the reviewing authority instead of the planning commission. All research and development uses are subject to the performance standards set forth in Section 17.18.045." BSL-4 laboratories are not typical life science uses.