LAKE COUNTY — A BMX area could soon be coming to the county park on State Street in Kelseyville.
The Board of Supervisors (BOS) discussed the idea Tuesday morning and voted 4-0 to support the project moving forward. District 4 Supervisor Anthony Farrington was absent.
A group of BMX, or bicycle motocross, riders had utilized a piece of private property in Kelseyville but had to find a new place to practice several months ago at the landowners” request.
“The Kelseyville kids need a place in Kelseyville,” BOS Chair Rob Brown said.
Jeremy Holt, a Kelseyville High School graduate, presented to the supervisors a basic concept for placing a dirt BMX track on about one half of an acre at the southeast corner of the county park.
The riders and their supporters are willing to help build and maintain the proposed facility, Holt said.
Brown, in whose district the park sits, added that citizens and local businesses have offered to financially support and fund-raise for the project.
About 25 to 30 people who supported the idea attended Tuesday”s meeting at the Lake County Courthouse.
Public Services Director Caroline Chavez said the county would need to address potential issues about having a BMX track at the park, including safety and erosion control.
After the BOS vote, Chavez stated that she hopes to hold a predevelopment meeting within the next couple of weeks.
Brown said the BMX facility could be completed by this summer.
In other business, the supervisors approved a lease agreement for the Probation Department to operate a satellite office in Clearlake east of Highway 53.
District 2 Supervisor Jeff Smith called the building”s location, at 4477 Moss Ave., “a real win-win” for the county.
The new office was to be positioned in downtown Lower Lake but that plan received some pushback from the town”s community.
The three-year lease in Clearlake begins Sunday.
The office space will house two to four probation officers conducting field services for adult caseloads, according to Interim Chief Probation Officer Steve Buchholz. It will also serve as a check-in center for south county residents, he added.
Buchholz said he hopes to assign an officer for juvenile cases to the Clearlake site some time in the future.
The BOS approved of using recently received grant funds to purchase 5,000 linear feet of floating boom for algae mitigation.
The devices are used “to help protect shorelines from becoming impacted with matted algae,” Water Resources Director Scott De Leon wrote in a memo to the supervisors.
The BOS voted 4-0 to waive the formal bidding process and authorize a purchase order not to exceed $34,000.
The department has not decided where in the lake it will place the new booms, but its goal is to have the equipment set up by Memorial Day weekend, De Leon said.
The purchase will increase the length of county booms by more than seven-fold, bringing the total to 5,800 linear feet, according to De Leon.
During the afternoon session, the BOS and Planning Commission held a joint public hearing regarding proposed updates to the Housing Element of the Lake County General Plan.
At the end of the discussion, the commission voted 4-0 to recommend the BOS approve a mitigated negative declaration for the proposal on the basis it would not have a significant environmental impact.
The commissioners then recommended the supervisors approve the 2012 Housing Element Update. Commission Chair Olga Martin Steele was absent.
The BOS decided to continue its hearing on the matter for one week. It will consider whether to adopt the update during the April 3 meeting.
Contact Jeremy Walsh at jwalsh@record-bee.com or call him at 263-5636, ext. 37.
