DANA POINT : Council to Vote on Headlands Project

The City Council will hold the first of two crucial votes tonight on a controversial $500-million luxury hotel and residential development proposed for the 121-acre peninsula above Dana Point Harbor called the Headlands.

Tonight’s vote focuses on a land-use plan for the property that allows a maximum of 370 residential units, a 400-room hotel and two retail centers with 150,000 square feet of commercial space. Included in the plan are three public parks totaling 24 acres and six acres of public trails and parkways.

If, as expected, the council approves the plan, another vote will be held April 12 on a legal contract for the future development of the Headlands, called a development agreement.

For the past three years, the potential development of the Headlands--one of the last undeveloped coastal parcels in Orange County--has become the source of heated debate between local environmentalists who want to save the property as a natural resource and proponents of the project who claim it will provide financial assistance for the city.

The environmentalists’ outcry intensified last Feb. 1 when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed the Pacific pocket mouse, which lives on the Headlands, on the emergency endangered species list.

Indeed, if the council votes to approve the plan, its opponents have promised to petition for a local referendum to halt the development.

Since the 1940s, the Headlands property has been owned by the M.H. Sherman Co. and Chandis Securities Co. Chandis Securities, a firm that oversees the financial holdings of the Chandler family, is a principal stockholder of Times Mirror Co., which publishes the Los Angeles Times.

The meeting begins at 5:30 p.m. at City Hall, 33282 Street of the Golden Lantern.