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1 Mr. John Punderbur Q 9 January 15, 2008' Page 3 of 5 i (5) There is no avail.able:and,su-itable proximate noncontracted land for tb'q,taste, proposed on the contracted land. The`petlbbn Iacks documentation to:support a find.ing'that there°isriff prc xirraate noncontracted land which is bothavailable and suitable for'tho-proposed use. Please ' nota the California Supreme Court pointedly stressed that: The purposes of the Williamson Act require that "proximate" not be construed to unreasonably limit the search for suitable noncontracted land. It would serve no purpose of the act to reject unrestricted property perfectly suited to fill the needs addressed by the proposal simply because that property is not in the immediate vicinity of the restricted land. In fact, tinder son-7e circumstances iand several mll�es from the proposed development site may be near enough to serve the same purposes. We therefore hold that "proximate" property means property close enough to the restricted parcel to serve as a practical alternative for the proposed Use. Sierra Club v. City of Hayward, 28 Cal.3d 840, 861 (1981 ). The Department recommends that all additional information regarding the availability i and suitability.of proximate non-contracted lands for this use be added to the record. This should include an.analysis of other non-contracted properties within a.severa1-mile radius of this site, and an analysis of why they are not available for the proposed alternative-use..- See Sierra.Club,-28-Cal.,3d at:.862 (requiring the-determirration.of. salient features of-aa-proposed project as relevant to.malcing a proximate land analysis): Such information in the record will help assure that-this cancellation will meet statutory requirements and avoid future challenges. Cancellation is in the Public Interest For the cancellation to be in the public interest, the Board must make findings with respect to all of the following. (1) other public concerns substantially outweigh the objectives of the Williamson Act and (2) that there is no.proximate noncontracted land which is availabte and suitable for the use proposed on'the' c:oniracted iand yr#,hat development of the contracted land would provide more contiguous patterns of urban development than development of proximate noncontracted land. Our comments above in section (5) have already addressed the proximate lands issue. In order to find that `other public concerns substantially outweigh the objectives of the Williamson Act," the California Supreme Court has directed that the County must ' consider the interest of the public as a whole in the value of the land for open space and agricultural use. Though the interests of the local and regional communities involved are also important, no decision regarding the public interest can be based exclusively on their parochialism.