The irony is that council itself created Ulistac Natural Area 15 years ago from an abandoned golf course that was “going natural”… Here’s a very recent Yelp review:

The beauty of Ulistac is that it is left natural and a bit on the wild side. The amount of wildlife here is incredible. I can’t take a walk through here without seeing many new things each time. There is great variety in this small area. When the traffic along Lick Mill isn’t too crazy, you can really soak in all the sounds of nature. It’s incredible that you can get away to a natural and relatively undisturbed spot right in the midst of the Valley! I hope they keep it this way and don’t make it all tidy and manicured (for example, leaving the brush piles around is good as it provides habitat for birds and other creatures).

Here’s the city’s own website:

Ulistac Natural Area, 40 acres of open space that showcases seven distinctive natural habitats, opened in Santa Clara in 2001 after months of volunteer efforts to restore California native vegetation and preserve wildlife habitat. This land was originally used as a seasonal encampment for the Ohlone Indians (Ulistac was the name of an Ohlone chief)

Here’s the crazy proposition to turn it into a soccer field:

Members of the Santa Clara City Council want to move the city soccer field facility away from the NFL stadium on Tasman Drive.  They tasked the Dept. of Parks & Recreation to find new locations for the soccer fields and associated clubhouse and maintenance building.  At a strategy session on Thursday, Sept. 12,  the department presented the council with 5 options.  The council narrowed it down three and asked for further work to be done.  One of the three sites is Ulistac Natural Area.

If the soccer facility is built at UNA, it will be a rectangle that starts just north of the Hetch Hetchy aqueduct and goes north almost all the way to the wetlands.  The rectangle will also extend back almost all of the way to the levee.  All that will be left will be the wetlands and the area immediately around and south of the bird and butterfly habitat garden.

Councilmembers Gillmor and Mahan spoke in favor of placing the soccer fields on Ulistac.  Councilmembers O’Neil and Matthews advised against it.  Councilmembers Marsalli, Davis, and Kolstad did not indicate their positions.  The stadium is supposed to become active in June 2014 and the general consensus was that the fields need to be moved before then.  Any of the sites will cost around $10 Million dollars to create.

I’d love to know whether the 49ers are picking up the tab, or is this something the city council, in the rush to get the stadium “forgot” about.  Moreover, I’d love to know how much current council members received in contributions from developers.  I’d also like to know whether Council feels that all the fast food restaurants in Santa Clara contribute to public well-being.  Because if not, why not use the funds to buy and raze a couple blocks of fast food restaurants and turn *them* into soccer fields.