SARATOGA — After deliberating for nearly eight hours, the Saratoga City Council decided not to move forward with talks to annex the Mountain Winery, an entertainment complex on the Santa Cruz Mountain foothills that has been under Santa Clara County control for decades.
Any chance that Saratoga had of locally controlling the future development of the winery is all but gone as council members split over the issue voted to end talks with the winery’s owners and return the money the winery spent to study the annexation.
More than 140 people tuned into Wednesday evening’s Zoom council meeting to voice nearly unanimous opposition to bringing the winery under the control of the city, which would have meant the addition of millions of dollars in tax revenue to its coffers but also the potential for unwanted development on the hillside.
Bill Hirschman, managing partner of the winery, said during a brief interview Thursday that he was disappointed with the outcome.
“What the hell happened?” Hirschman said. “It was a disappointing decision. There’s so much work that went into this both by the city and us. We got caught up in a situation that was quite strange.”
The political divide in the city made clear by the hundreds of letters and comments made to the council by concerned residents apparently swayed the council to vote 3-2 to halt the two-year-long annexation process and leave it for a future council to revisit or abandon altogether.
For Mayor Howard Miller, a longtime advocate of bringing the winery under the control of the city, the conversation around annexation careened off a hill when it was impossible for him to get answers for what he said is the main question: What is the city willing to give up to take the winery under its control?
“That question is unanswerable,” Miller said early Thursday morning. “Nobody has offered an answer to that fundamental question. What happened is we’ve slipped off that question, and in that way we’ve clearly failed our citizens. I don’t see a viable path for us to even move forward on this particular annexation.”
The annexation would have seen the winery — which has been under county control since its inception — become part of the city of Saratoga, giving the City Council oversight over its expansion plans.
Fixated over a hypothetical 300-room hotel the council offered as an example in planning for the site, many Saratoga residents staunchly against annexation favor the winery’s limitations to expand under the county’s supervision. Many feared striking a deal with the city would make the massive hotel project an inevitability.
For years Saratoga residents already have seen the winery — built in 1878 at the top of the winding Pierce Road — undergo major expansions that included the addition of an amphitheater in the 1950s and other amenities throughout the last half of the century, making the site a mainstay for retreats, weddings, business meetings and special events attracting thousands.
It was music to the ears of council member Rishi Kumar — who is running for U.S. Congress to replace current Peninsula representative Anna Eshoo — when it appeared the votes were finally there to end a conversation he thought from the very beginning was unacceptable.
Voicing the major concerns of residents he spoke with, Kumar frequently butted heads with the mayor and other council members as he presented his case for discontinuing the annexation process, arguing it would allow future massive development of the area, disrupt the natural environment and also threaten the quality of life of those living near the winery.
“I don’t think this is the best use of our time,” Kumar said. “We should be focusing on water issues, crime and working on COVID-19 issues. Let’s work on the important challenges. Simply stated, I don’t agree having more meetings will solve this issue.”
Kumar subsequently introduced a motion to stop all annexation proceedings, pay outstanding expenses and shut the project down. The motion initially was not taken up by the council, although ultimately it decided to do just that, including giving money back to Cheateu Masson, LLC, the owner and operator of the Mountain Winery.
After a 4-1 vote, with Kumar dissenting, the council decided to pay back half of the about $247,000 the company already spent on consultants for the annexation project. Hirschman said he would have preferred that the annexation move forward than get the money back.
“We wanted to have the project heard and have a discussion and get all the uncertainty that existed in the community out there so there could be a public discussion about what the issues were,” Hirschman said, adding that the annexation process failed largely due to “misinformation.”
Hirschman said his company was already hesitant to give money to the city for various annexation proposals over the years essentially “begging us to come into the city” because of the lack of control Saratoga had over the winery. His company wasn’t a developer or applicant for a project because there wasn’t one, Hirschman said. The city ran the whole process, he added.
Asked what the winery intends to do now, Hirschman said it will continue on a current project to build four new facilities for the winery’s various functions as an events space. Any future plans will go through the county board, a body with whom the winery has had a 22-year working relationship.
“We’re going to finish up what we’ve got,” Hirschman said. “If we’re going to do some more improvements, we’ll go to the county and they’ll say it’s good or not. If we decide we want to build lodging, we’ll go to the county. It makes no difference at all who we ask.”
For Glenda Aune, who lives on Pierce Road just downhill from the winery, the decision early Thursday morning was encouraging. She said she was happy to see the mayor change his mind about the process after hearing from the dozens of residents who are against it.
“I think that took a lot of courage and strength of character for him to stop this annexation when he was so committed to it and believed it was the right thing to do for the city,” Aune said.
