Google wants to build facility over Burrowing Owl habitat (LA)

[Donna]

This Tuesday the City Council will vote up or down on a 6.5-acre recreation facility that's got nearly every activity a Google employee could want. The rub is that it sits on foraging habitat for the rare burrowing owl.

The proposed Google Athletic and Recreation field, or G.A.R.field for short, is an outdoor buffet of recreation activities, including a soccer field, a basketball court, bocce ball courts, a horseshoe throwing area, a disc golf area and a barbecue area.

The entire facility will be private, which means it is for Google employees and their guests only.

The site is on the northeast corner of Amphitheatre Parkway and Garcia Avenue. Google purchased the property from Alza, a pharmaceutical company that got council approval (now expired) for a 117,000 square foot office building there in 1995. The site is currently used as a soccer field by Google employees.

An environmental report for the city by ESA and Albion Environmental describes the project as having a "potentially significant impact" on the burrowing owls, which numbered just over a dozen last year.

"The loss of foraging habitat and potential nesting habitat at this site would be a significant impact but this impact has already been mitigated through the creation and management of 19.5 acres of burrowing owl habitat north and east of the project site as discussed above. However, the proposed project could have additional indirect impacts on burrowing owls nearby as a result of increased lighting and predation that could result from increased raptor perches on light poles and trees," the report states.

The owls could disappear from the area entirely if their numbers continue to decline as they have in recent years, according to the report

"A recent population viability analysis of the three largest burrowing owl colonies in the south San Francisco Bay Area" at "San Jose International Airport Moffett Airfield and Shoreline Park showed that all three colonies have a high risk of extinction if population trends observed in the last 11 plus years continue," the report says.

Partly in response to pressures from the local Audubon society, the city is asking Google to pay $10,000 towards the city's burrowing owl preservation efforts, a sign that says why dogs won't be allowed in the area, "anti-perch measures" to keep other birds from preying on the owls, an "owl occupancy survey" during construction and limits on construction during owl nesting season.

Shani Kleinhaus of the Audubon Society also requests that the barbecue be removed from the plans because the resulting smell could draw burrowing owl predators to the area. The city disagrees, saying that barbecues at Shoreline Park have not caused problems for the owls there.