Doing so, however, would require a costly remediation effort — one Valero is legally required to undertake— that would likely take a decade to complete before any development takes place. During that time, the city would receive no revenue, Young said.
Valero has taken the land off the market, which implies that it’s given Signature the exclusive right to negotiate for it, he said.
“So [Signature’s] got a year to sort of do their due diligence, look at redeveloping options and then at the end of that year presumably buy the site and then move forward with who knows what kind of development options,” Young said.
He noted, however, “there are so many unknowns that probably things will pivot a month from now, three months from now. Six months from now, we might be doing something different.”
Councilmember Terry Scott, whom Young asked to help lead the redevelopment group, said his priority is to focus on the 400 acres of the Valero property that haven’t been used for manufacturing and processing operations. That land wouldn’t require the same degree of remediation, and could potentially be turned into housing and other uses within several years.
As for the refinery property, he said, the city would need to court industries that could operate on land that will remain fairly contaminated, even after the remediation process.
“There’s gonna be some pretty bad brown spots there,” said Scott, who is hoping to attract less-polluting industries to replace the refinery. “This will not be growing gardens, and having front lawns and having kids running across it.”
Valero’s announcement in mid-April to “idle, restructure or cease” operations at the refinery that it’s operated since 2000, caught Young and other city officials completely off guard. The company cited California’s tough “regulatory and enforcement environment” as the main driver behind its move to consider closing the sixth-largest refinery in the state, which makes up about 9% of the state’s total crude oil capacity.
The news dropped less than two weeks after the City Council unanimously approved modest rules to increase their oversight of the refinery, and some six months since regional and state air regulators fined the company a record $82 million for secretly exceeding toxic emissions standards for more than 15 years.
