MCC Backs 166 Banked Housing Permits as Chair Williams Resigns

The Midcoast Community Council navigated a leadership shakeup and a pivotal housing policy concession Tuesday night, unanimously endorsing the use of more than a decade's worth of banked building permits while electing new officers after Chair Kimberly Williams resigned hours before the meeting. The nearly 90-minute session also produced letters demanding coast-side emergency preparedness funding and a defense of the California Coastal Commission against federal rollback proposals.

• Council reluctantly backs their Option E, clearing the path for 166 unused housing permits to be built under the midcoast's 40-unit annual cap

• Chair Kimberly Williams resigns for personal reasons; Scott Bollinger elected chair, Connie Santilli named vice chair — both unanimously

• Safety element letter approved, pushing the county to budget for evacuation routes and emergency resources exposed as deficient during a 2024 tsunami scare

• Council directs follow-up to Caltrans demanding a traffic study and pedestrian crosswalk as Highway 1 bike lanes threaten to displace hundreds of parking spaces into residential El Granada

• Claire Toutant authorized to draft letter opposing Trump administration proposals to gut Coastal Commission funding and authority, due Aug. 22

The council's most consequential action was approving a letter supporting Option E — the county's proposal to allow all unused housing permits dating back to 2013, when the midcoast's 40-unit annual cap was first adopted, to be built. The math: roughly 166 banked permits would become available for development.