A Silicon Valley entrepreneur proposing to build a winery to accompany his vineyard above La Honda is revising his approach.

Clos de la Tech winery is the pet project of Woodside resident T.J. Rodgers, president and CEO of Cypress Semiconductor Corp. Established in 1994, the operation consists of three vineyards — one in Woodside, the others elsewhere in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

For four years, beginning in 2005, Rodgers pushed a proposal to build a “scenic winery” on a 165-acre mountainside parcel east of La Honda proper and expand production from 2,500 bottles per year to 13,000. But in light of what county Planning and Building Senior Planner Mike Schaller calls some “big unanswered questions” illuminated in the draft environmental impact report, the winemaker is rethinking a key aspect of the project.

T.J. Rodgers, who is planning a winery to accompany his vineyards near La Honda, has hired a new consultant to work on the environmental impact report necessary for the project. He has backed away from seeking to create a new zoning category for '��scenic wineries.'��

In his initial proposal, Rodgers requested an amendment to zoning regulations that would create a “scenic winery” category, instituting a countywide allowance for wineries situated 1,500 feet in elevation. The winemaker has since pulled back on that idea, asking instead for a single exception. The change signifies “a completely different set of impacts,” Schaller said, and requires changes to the impact report.

The county Board of Supervisors last week approved a contract with new environmental consultants on the project, thereby initiating a fresh analysis of the proposal that will augment the current impact report and prompt another round of public comments later this year.

La Hondans who studied the initial impact report — released in the summer of 2008 — voiced concerns that such a sweeping change in ordinance would open the door to wealthy wine hobbyists looking to cut a piece of the county’s picturesque hillsides, and could ultimately provoke a transformation of the region’s pastoral landscape. Residents also took issue with Rodgers’ plan to draw water from a major groundwater artery supplying the town’s drinking water.

Now the new consulting firm, LSA Associates, is reviewing the initial hydrological analysis included in the first report. Rodgers is footing the $168,000 bill for the review.

“(Rodgers) had expressed unhappiness with the work of the previous consultant and, in review, we decided it was best to have a fresh set of eyes do what needed to be revised,” said Schaller, who is assigned to manage the project on the county’s end.

The county aims to have the revised report out to the public for comments in May.