Opinion ID: 2575737
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Helicopter Ordinance

Text: Like the zone district ordinance's specification of permissible zone districts for timber harvesting, County's helicopter ordinance is a locational zoning provision that regulates not how timber operations may be conducted, but rather where they may take place. (See Big Creek v. San Mateo, supra, 31 Cal.App.4th at pp. 424-425, 37 Cal.Rptr.2d 159.) The helicopter ordinance does not attempt to locally regulate the removal of timber, as it speaks neither to whether nor how helicopters may be used to remove timber. County concedes it lacks authority to prohibit timber removal by helicopters or to regulate the manner in which any such removal is conducted. The helicopter ordinance requires simply that any helicopter staging, loading, and servicing facilities associated with timber operations be located either on a parcel of land zoned for timber harvesting or on a parcel adjacent to such, and within the borders of an approved timber harvesting plan. Accordinglyand for the reasons reviewed in detail abovethe helicopter ordinance is preempted neither expressly by section 4516.5(d) nor impliedly by general state forestry law. In the case of the helicopter ordinance, which County apparently enacted to address citizens' fears created by helicopters transporting multi-ton logs by air over or near their neighborhoods, and citizen concerns with throbbing and unbearable noise, the conclusion is buttressed by the fact that both the FPA and the TPA expressly contemplate the survival of localities' power to abate nuisances endangering public health or safety. (See especially Pub. Resources Code, § 4514; Gov.Code, § 51115.5, subds. (a), (b).) Specifically, the FPA provides that [n]o provision of [the FPA] or any ruling, requirement, or policy of the [B]oard is a limitation on ... the power of any city or county or city and county to declare, prohibit, and abate nuisances. (Pub. Resources Code, § 4514, subd. (a).) And the TPA provides that, while timber operations conducted within a TPZ pursuant to the FPA shall not constitute a nuisance (Gov.Code, § 51115.5, subd. (a)), that limitation is inapplicable to any timber operation that endangers public health or public safety or ... prohibits the free passage or use of any navigable lake, river, bay, stream, canal, or basin, or any public park, street, or highway ( id., subd. (b)). (See also Civ.Code, § 3479 [definition of nuisance closely mirrors language preserving nuisance-abatement power in Gov.Code, § 51115.5, subd. (b)].)