A small business promotion group in Fort Bragg has filed suit in San Francisco court, claiming the California Coastal Commission improperly approved the request of a supermarket developer to build a new store in their community.
Best Development Group wants to build a store on a 1.63-acre site in the small coastal community about halfway between San Francisco and Eureka, the suit said.
It would demolish a 16,436-square-foot vacant former office building and replace it with a 16,157-square-foot, one-story, retail store with a 53-space parking lot, the suit says.
In July 2021, the city determined that the project would have no "significant unmitigated environmental impacts," according to the suit. The town's local small business promotion group, Fort Bragg Local Business Matters, appealed, requesting the city to perform an environmental impact study on the project. The suit was settled with the city agreeing to conduct the study. On June 5, the city certified the study and approved the project. The business group on June 21 appealed the approval to the California Coastal Commission, which rejected it on Sept. 6, finding that it "raised no substantial issue," according to the lawsuit.
In the lawsuit, Fort Bragg Local Business Matters asks the court to set aside the Sept. 6 decision by the Coastal Commission. It also seeks a preliminary and permanent injunction directing the city and Best Development to "cease and refrain from engaging in any future actions predicated upon the approval actions challenged herein."
The plaintiffs are represented by attorney Mark R. Wolfe, of M.R. Wolfe & Associates P.C., of San Francisco.
Fort Bragg Local Business Matters v. California Coastal Commission, San Francisco Superior Court, CPF-23-518371