Fort Ord Reuse Authority finally approves draft transition plan.

It took a while. 

At a 4pm special meeting on Dec. 19, the board of the Fort Ord Reuse Authority finally approved the agency's draft transition plan it's required to submit to the Local Agency Formation Commission of Monterey County by Dec. 30. It outlines who will take on FORA's assets, liabilities and obligations when it hits its legislative sunset in June 2020. It's been three years in the making.

The board had already approved the plan at a Dec. 14 meeting in a 11-2 vote (Frank O'Connell, Gail Morton), but because the vote wasn't unanimous, the board had to take a second vote, as required by FORA's rules. 

At that meeting, there was an hours-long discussion about the draft plan, as well as an alternative plan prepared by the city of Marina (there was also a handful of other draft plans in the agenda packet). 

After former Del Rey Oaks mayor and FORA board member Jerry Edelen made a motion to approve the plan prepared by FORA staff, a substitute motion was made to approve Marina's plan, which failed 2-11, and a plan written by County Supervisor Mary Adams' office, which failed 4-9. 

The 14-page draft plan has changed much over the past several months, and now reflects that FORA cannot require any jurisdiction to take an action, but rather, just strongly encourage them. 

It's likely to keep changing: In a Dec. 12 letter that LAFCO Executive Director Kate McKenna sent to the FORA board, she writes "any plan adopted at this time will continue to evolve through stakeholder discussions, local implementation agreements and possible legislation in 2019." 

She writes that LAFCO—which will oversee the transition in the event of a FORA sunset—will write detailed comments on the approved draft plan in the coming weeks, and that she expects the plan to be adopted by LAFCO by fall 2019. 

She also asks FORA add another $200,000 on top of the $300,000 FORA has set aside for any FORA-related, post-sunset litigation in which LAFCO is the defendant. 

After Edelen made his motion, County Supervisor Jane Parker, now the FORA board chair, tried to make an amendment to Edelen's motion to add the extra money in the plan, but Edelen rejected the idea, saying he wanted to keep his motion "pure."