Quarry FAQs

If you are disturbed by noise, blasting, vibration, truck traffic, dust or debris from Quarry activities, please email complaints, questions, or comments to the Marin County DPW contacts listed on our Quarry Committee’s Important Addresses page. Please copy your complaint and paste it into the Message field of the Quarry Committee’s Contact Form so the Pt. San Pedro Road Coalition can keep track of complaints. If you mail your complaint to the County, please send us a copy to our mailing address as well.

As a brief overview of the recent history of the Quarry, the site has been used as a mine and brickyard since the late 1800s. Rock quarrying began in the 1920s, and in 1941 the site was zoned “heavy industrial.” With no environmental review, the owners of the Quarry obtained a “legal use” operating permit to quarry in 1972 and, pursuant to the requirements of the Surface Mining and Reclamation Act (“SMARA”), the Quarry submitted a reclamation plan in 1976.  (A reclamation plan is a written plan that describes how a mining operator intends to clean up the mining site after mining has concluded.)

In 1981, the County of Marin adopted the General Plan governing land use, including the Peacock Gap Neighborhood Plan which covered the Quarry property. In response, the Quarry owners submitted an amended reclamation plan in 1982 that contemplated residential usage as the eventual end use of the site. Later that year, to accommodate the 1982 amended reclamation plan, the County rezoned the Quarry property from heavy industrial to residential commercial. This rezoning caused the Quarry operation to become a legal “nonconforming use.” This meant that the Quarry could continue to use the property in a manner inconsistent with its new residential zoning status, but only to the extent that it had so used the property at the time of the rezoning, and with no right to expand. In 1986, the Dutra family purchased the Quarry property. For more information, see the the Quarry History page.

n 2001, the Coalition joined by the California Attorney General, the County of Marin, and several individual neighbors of the Quarry, filed a lawsuit against the Quarry alleging that the Quarry was operating outside the scope of its legal nonconforming use. That is, the Quarry had illegally expanded Quarry operations beyond the operations level that was established when the site was rezoned in 1982.

After a trial, in 2004 the Court found the following:

1. The Quarry owners relinquished their right to mine South Hill beyond the point at which South Hill would lose certain natural features and scenic qualities.
2. The Quarry owners agreed to the rezoning of its property to residential/commercial and benefited from the rezoning because it enhanced the property’s long-term value.
3. The Quarry owners knew that mining operations had a negative impact on its neighbors and took effective steps to mitigate those problems by reducing? blasting and truck traffic.
4. The succeeding Quarry owners (Dutra) should have known all of the above.
5. In contrast to the prior owners that worked to mitigate impacts on neighbors, Dutra  conducted mining operations that failed to comply with SMARA, County ordinances and the Peacock Gap Neighborhood Plan.
6. Mining operations under Dutra have changed substantially since 1982, making life unbearable and unhealthy for a number of its neighbors and others living along the PSPR corridor through increased truck traffic and expanded operating hours.
7. Mining operations have, apparently, not been conducted in conformity with the 1982 reclamation plan, though it is not possible to determine the resulting effect on the property’s end use.
8. Dutra has violated SMARA by not submitting an update to the 1982 reclamation plan.
9. The County failed in its responsibility to monitor the Quarry for the purpose of ensuring that it was operating consistent with SMARA and County law.

The Court then concluded that it was not the proper forum to determine what to do about all of these problems, and that many competing interests needed to be weighed. For more information, see the Court Order of April 19, 2004 in the Committee’s  Library/Archive.

In July 2004 (as amended the following month), Judge Sutro imposed “interim operating conditions” that applied until the Quarry’s operating permit was amended. The stated purpose of the Court’s order was to encourage (effectively force) the Quarry and the County to review Quarry operations and get the Quarry operating in compliance with the law. The Court’s decision included the following statement: “If the people who are supposed to be policing operations of the quarry do not do so, and the quarry operator continues to operate beyond the law, this court will shut down the quarry, regardless of it being a regionally significant mineral resource for the North Bay Area.”

The Quarry submitted a proposed Amended Reclamation Plan and a proposal for an Amended Surface Mining and Quarrying Permit to Marin County authorities. After years of studies, hearings and public meetings, a Final Environmental Impact Report (EIR)  (scroll to bottom of the page) was released on January 29, 2009. In October 2009 the Board of Supervisors voted to certify the final EIR, ultimately leading to the issuance of an amended operating permit containing 172 operating conditions.

The 2001 lawsuit had several important consequences. It generated an EIR that put on the table publicly many of the health issues about which the community was concerned. It resulted in an updated EIR that will control the reclaiming of the property after mining on the site is concluded. It led to a comprehensive and detailed operating permit that established operating procedures designed to reduce the mine’s impact on local residences. It impressed on the County the imperative that it perform its role seriously as the primary regulator of the Quarry. And for the Quarry’s part, it established its right to mine the site indefinitely, subject to its status as a nonconforming use.

The Quarry submitted a proposed Amended Reclamation Plan and a proposal for an Amended Surface Mining and Quarrying Permit to Marin County authorities. After years of studies, hearings and public meetings, a Final Environmental Impact Report (EIR)  (scroll to bottom of the page) was released on January 29, 2009. In October 2009 the Board of Supervisors voted to certify the final EIR, ultimately leading to the issuance of an amended operating permit containing 172 operating conditions.

The 2001 lawsuit had several important consequences. It generated an EIR that put on the table publicly many of the health issues about which the community was concerned. It resulted in an updated EIR that will control the reclaiming of the property after mining on the site is concluded. It led to a comprehensive and detailed operating permit that established operating procedures designed to reduce the mine’s impact on local residences. It impressed on the County the imperative that it perform its role seriously as the primary regulator of the Quarry. And for the Quarry’s part, it established its right to mine the site indefinitely, subject to its status as a nonconforming use.

In October 2013, the Board of Supervisors approved a permit amendment proposed by the Quarry allowing it to import recycled asphalt onto the site. The Coalition promptly filed a lawsuit against both the Quarry and the County requesting that the amendment be nullified.

After various procedural objections by the Quarry, a renewal of the amendment by the County in 2015, and the filing of another lawsuit by the Coalition challenging the renewal, Judge Paul Haakenson issued his decision in September 2016 holding that the County’s 2015 renewal of the 2013 approval of a permit change allowing the Quarry to import onto the quarry site recycled asphalt material was an improper expansion of the Quarry’s nonconforming use. Shortly thereafter, the Quarry appealed the court’s decision to the California Court of Appeals. The appeal is still pending. All the documents related to this asphalt recycling issue can be found in the Quarry’s Library/Archives under the title “SRRQ PERMIT and AMENDMENT”.

No. We seek to ensure that the Quarry operates safely and within the constraints imposed by its status as a legal nonconforming use.

Since the approval of the new permit in 2010 and through 2018, though complaints are still filed occasionally on blasting and trucking issues, there have been few complaints about Quarry operations relative to the 1990s and early 2000s. This likely is partially the result of the more restrictive operating conditions that the Coalition successfully argued should be included in the operating permit. However, the Quarry has been operating during this period at a fraction (about a quarter to a third) of its maximum allowable production. Only when the Quarry ramps up production closer to its maximum capacity will we have a clear sense of the effectiveness of the conditions placed in the 2010 Operating Permit.

Planned reclamation work in the site’s northeast quadrant (close to the Marin Bay Park neighborhood) that had been delayed due to environmental concerns, commenced in 2018. Although there was concern that the reclamation work would generate complaints, the ten-week project came off relatively smoothly with no formal complaints to the Quarry and minimal informal complaints among neighbors. That is a good omen, since reclamation work will return each year for ten weeks during the summer months. Air quality testing took place during reclamation activities. The results of the testing will be made public in 2019.

The current reclamation plan has mining ceasing in 2024. However, in December 2018 the quarry filed an application with the County to amend its reclamation plan to allow the site to be mined through the end of 2039. The future of the Quarry site is now a matter for consideration by the Marin County Board of Supervisors as well as the City of San Rafael in its developing 2040 General Plan.

Three years before termination of quarry operations, the Quarry is required to submit a development plan by 2021 for the post-mining use of the site. However, if the Quarry is granted a continuation of mining the site beyond this date, the submitted development plan will also be delayed accordingly.