Justin Cummings’ future on powerful Coastal Commission uncertain as Speaker Rivas reopens application process

Santa Cruz County Supervisor Justin Cummings, who has chaired the powerful California Coastal Commission since December, learned earlier this week that his future on the state land-use agency is not secure. 

Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas, responsible for appointing Cummings’ and three other seats on the commission, announced he will not be reappointing Cummings outright. Instead, Rivas has opened the application process for the Central Coast and the San Diego Coast seats, whose terms expire in May. City councilmembers and county supervisors from Santa Cruz, San Mateo and Monterey counties are eligible to apply.

The California Coastal Commission, a quasi-judicial branch of the state government, oversees every aspect of land use within the state’s coastal zone, a 1,100-mile stretch that covers more than 1.5 million acres, with an eye toward public access and environmental health. The 12-member commission has been called the most powerful land-use authority in the United States, considering the value of the land and environmental assets along California’s coast.

Rivas, who began his speaker tenure in June 2023, represents a broad district that stretches from the Salinas Valley into Watsonville and Aptos. In a statement, his office noted that appointing the Coastal Commission’s Central Coast seat offers Rivas an opportunity to choose from what is essentially a menu of political hometown friends. 

“This is the first time the speaker will have an opportunity to make this commission appointment from his home region, and he would like the input and recommendation of local elected officials and community members,” the emailed statement said. “Our office is happy to consider the current appointee, as well as any other candidates recommended through this important public process.”

After Carole Groom vacated the seat in December 2022 with her departure from the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors, Cummings was tapped to finish out an abbreviated term on the commission in March 2023. Despite the quick ascent and rare opportunity to serve on one of the state’s most influential political bodies — Cummings was barely four months into his first term on the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors — Cummings knew he wasn’t guaranteed appointment beyond the expiration of the term, in 2025. Cummings was appointed by outgoing speaker Anthony Rendon, who, by that time, had already lost his speaker bid to Rivas. 

Although Cummings and Rivas hail from the same California region, Cummings was picked by Rendon, who became one of Rivas’ political rivals amid a messy fight for the speakership. 

In late January, Cummings met Rivas for a scheduled talk about the Coastal Commission seat. Cummings described the meeting as “brief,” saying that the then-raging Los Angeles wildfires had pushed all other topics to the bottom of the priority list. Cummings said Rivas told him he was leaning toward opening up the seat to a formal application process.

“I wasn’t necessarily expecting that, but it was always a possibility” that he wouldn’t be Rivas’ outright pick, Cummings said. “I’m going to reapply, and will be putting my name to be reconsidered. I feel pretty good about it. But it really is up to the speaker.”  

Only two public decision-making bodies can nominate Coastal Commission appointees: a county’s board of supervisors, and what’s known as its City Selection Committee, a group made up of a county’s mayors and board of supervisors chair. 

After Santa Cruz County submitted an initial list of Coastal Commission nominees to Rendon in January 2023, a Lookout investigation found that the City Selection Committee had voted on its nominations in private without public knowledge, participation or input, an illegal practice that had been ongoing for decades.

The county then invalidated the list of nominations, which initially left out Cummings and included District 2 Supervisor Zach Friend, Santa Cruz Mayor Fred Keeley and Capitola City Councilmember Yvette Brooks. After a public revote by the City Selection Committee, and a separate nominations vote by the board of supervisors just days before the deadline, Santa Cruz County submitted Brooks, Cummings and District 1 Supervisor Manu Koenig as its Coastal Commission nominations.

The supervisors and City Selection Committee have until April 18 to submit Santa Cruz County’s nominees to Rivas.

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