A estimated 300 Angwin residents filled the auditorium of the Howell Mountain Elementary School last night, to oppose the PUC/Triad plan to develop 885 acres in Angwin.

The meeting was held by Save Rural Angwin to rebut claims of Pacific Union College and the Triad corporation of Seattle, Washington, that their proposed development of 591 more houses in Angwin would be beneficial to the College and the community. Billed as "The Other Side of the Story," SRA presented speakers reporting the negative impacts of traffic, loss of natural environment, loss of agricultural land, and the probability of need for a new elementary school. Save Rural Angwin Spokesman Allen Spence opened the meeting by restating that SRA does not oppose the construction of 191 housing units for Pacific Union College's staff, but is adamantly opposed to 400 units beyond that which are not needed locally. 591 units would boost the population of the village by 50% and destroy the semi-rural environment of the village, he asserted. "The idea of plunking down 400 too many households at this remote location makes no sense," he said. "It is 100% contrary to Smart Growth planning policy which maintains that new construction should be close to where the jobs are."

John Tully presented a comprehensive forecast of what traffic in and through Angwin would be like. Calculations indicate that the traffic would double, because most of the new residents would be commuting down Deer Park Road to Napa and Santa Rosa.

Steven Booska questioned Pacific Union College's need for $85 million, the price Triad corporation of Seattle, Wash., reportedly will pay for college land.

In its Strategic Plan for 2002-2007, the College stated that it needed to boost its endowment to $25 million and that that would make it competitive for students, Booska reported. Then, in 2003, when the idea arose of selling some of its 1900 acres, the "need" was boosted suddenly to $100 million. "What is going on here?" he asked. "Is this some kind of shell game?" He presented statistics from other Adventist colleges, which indicated that a $100 million endowment would be eight times as large as competing institutions.

Duane Cronk took issue with the College's claim that the Triad subdivisions would not produce a loss of agricultural lands. He went from location to location of the various subdivisions, showing pictures of lands being farmed there continuously for decades.

The College would keep a 700-acre Nature Preserve at the outskirts of its holdings, but it would be a mile from the campus dormitories. "This is not exactly a natural environment," Cronk asserted.

"This whole pitch about a so-called eco-village is marketing hype," he charged. "Some 591 more households in this village of 1219 households would be an environmental disaster."

Volker Eisele, veteran campaigner for preservation of open space and agricultural land, gave an overview of how the Angwin development was inconsistent with County land use policy. "This is a project which has to be opposed countywide," he said. "It makes no sense."

The turnout was probably the largest seen in the little school, with standing room only. Anticipating a large turnout, SRA volunteers had made trips to the Pope Valley Farm Center for additional chairs.

SRA claims that it represents the vast majority of the Angwin population with only the College and some of its employees supporting the land sale.

"If there were any doubt at all that the Angwin community is vigorously opposed to this development, the turnout at this meeting should wipe that out once and for all," Spence said.