The California Coastal Commission approved a $75,000 grant to the City of Half Moon Bay in support of its Local Coastal Program (LCP) planning process.
The funds are in addition to a $70,000 Ocean Protection Council grant that the City earned in November, bringing the total amount of LCP grant funding to $145,000.
Similar to the Ocean Protection Council funds, the purpose of the California Coastal Commission grant program is to support local governments as they work to complete new LCP certifications or to update an existing LCP to reflect new scientific information and conditions, such as climate change and sea-level rise. Of a total of 28 applicants submitted during this application phase, 11 were awarded grants by the Coastal Commission.
As part of its comprehensive General Plan update, the City is creating a new land use element dealing with land use issues generally and a separate Local Coastal Program Land Use Plan that is specifically geared towards implementation of Coastal Act policy. In Half Moon Bay, the LCP has a heightened level of importance because the entire City is located in the coastal zone. The City's LCP was last updated in 1993.
The California Coastal Commission is a state agency that was created in 1972 to protect, conserve, restore, and enhance environmental and human-based resources of the California coast and ocean for environmentally sustainable and prudent use by current and future generations. Its purpose is to plan and regulate the use of land and water in the coastal zone.
The state budget allocated a total of $1 million for the grant program to fund community LCP update efforts.