Tulloch legal settlement in the works

A tentative settlement has been reached in a lawsuit over Lake Tulloch Resort’s much-litigated proposal to replace the unprofitable waterfront business with a gated community of 30 townhouses.

The corporation that owns the resort agreed about two weeks ago to do additional environmental analysis of the effects of the development, then take the project back before the Calaveras County Planning Commission, according to Bernadette Abramson, the corporation’s managing member.
  

The fundamental features of the proposed development — 30 units built on pylons over the water, each with a personal boat slip — will remain unchanged, Abramson said.

The development has been stalled in court since late 2008, when the Tri-Dam Project announced it would sue the county following a 3-2 vote by supervisors to approve the project, which was rejected by the county’s planning commission. The eventual suit alleged the county had failed to do adequate environmental studies.

Tri-Dam’s lawsuit against the county is now “proposed to be settled,” though much rides on how the project proceeds before the Board of Supervisors, said Dan Pope, the project’s general manager. Messages left for Susan Larson, who has been Tri-Dam’s point person on the lawsuit, were not returned.

Tri-Dam is a partnership between the South San Joaquin and Oakdale irrigation districts and operates a series of water-storage and hydroelectric projects on the Stanislaus River, including Tulloch Reservoir.

 If the conditional agreement holds, the development’s legal battles could be over, at least for now. A second lawsuit by project opponents concluded earlier this year.

About six months ago, the resort settled a lawsuit brought by three neighbors by agreeing to pay nearly $10,000 in legal fees and move one of the townhouses back 20 feet to partially preserve the group’s view, according to Jackie Martin, one of the homeowners involved in the suit.

Yet Supervisor Russ Thomas, who voted last year against approving the project, feels the project may be headed down the same road.

“If the resubmitted project isn’t substantially changed to satisfy Tri-Dam’s concerns about the design and its impacts on the environment, it seems almost predictable that we’re going to have a similar outcome,” he said.

His main concerns are that the development does not comply with the area’s shoreline management plan and that the lakefront development does not include a single space for pickups with boat trailers.

“It’s a train wreck. It was then and it will be again if they don’t change it,” he said.

Abramson, however, dismisses Tri-Dam’s objections as “smokescreens,” the additional studies as a “waste of money” and said Tri-Dam has virtually no jurisdiction over the development. She sees it as a simple zoning issue — the development would downgrade the parcel from commercial to residential.  

 
“Basic logic says that when you go from a higher zoning to a lower zoning the impact is less,” she said.

The next step is for the county to rescind the project’s previous approval. That is not scheduled for either of the next two meetings, though the Jan. 5 agenda includes a nearly $19,000 refund to the resort from a legal defense fund it provided the county.

Going forward with the development is just one of many options the corporation is exploring, Abramson said. The resort will go on sale for $6.5 million when its current tenants’ lease runs out March 30, but is open to releasing the property to new tenants or, as once suggested, opening a drug and alcohol treatment center.

“We’ve got lots of options,” she said. “Basically we’re just waiting to get rid of these guys.” 

She’s referring to one-time lottery winner Dennis Sanfilippo, of Murphys, and his partners, who have run Lorenzo’s Grill and the Outcast Bar at the resort since July, but who are now fighting the resort in two lawsuits.

The resort filed the first suit, alleging that Sanfilippo and his partners had not paid rent since July and lack insurance, among other things. Sanfilippo later countered with a lawsuit against Abramson.

Copies of each suit had been pulled from the court files for Monday hearings, and each party declined to provide further details.

Sanfilippo said Tuesday that he would still like to renew the lease, an idea Abramson dismissed.

“I’m not going to put myself in this situation again,” she said.