A lawsuit on behalf of West Dublin Alliance, a local neighborhood group, against the City of Dublin has gathered interest from local news media. The lawsuit challenges the City’s approval of an expansion for Valley Christian Center, which includes an evangelical church and a K-12 private school. The neighborhood group’s opposition centers on plans to build a stadium/sports complex. The complex would be located along the northeast edge of the Center’s developed area. The stadium will hold 600 people in its grandstand (although they could easily be expanded to double that amount). Its site is directly uphill from the nearest neighbors.

The City approved a prior master plan for the Center in 2003. The City based that approval on an environmental impact report prepared the previous year. Neither that plan, nor the EIR, addressed the possibility of adding a stadium. Nevertheless, the City relied on that EIR in refusing to prepare an EIR on the new expansion plans.

The neighbors’ primary concern is noise from the stadium. The stadium’s site is subject to strong afternoon winds. Those winds blow to the northwest – into the downhill neighborhood. The neighbors submitted two letters from sound experts. Both experts expressed strong concern about potential noise impacts.

The sound study that the City prepared for the project found there would be no noise impacts on neighbors. However, it did not take the winds across the site into account in its analysis. The challenge is currently pending in Alameda County Superior Court. The case number is RG19009622.

Here is a link to KPIX’s coverage of the case; and here is a link to the East Bay Times’ coverage of the case.