PC Minutes 1978-01-11Arroyo Grande Planning Commission
January 11, 1978
The Arroyo Grande Planning Commission met in special session with Chairman
Gerrish presiding. Present are Commissioners Harris, Moots, Ries and Vandeveer.
Commissioner Cole is absent. One vacancy exists on the Commission. Also in
attendance are Planning Director Castro, Planner Sullivan and City Engineer Karp.
CONTINUATION OF PUBLIC HEARING - EIR FOR RANCHO GRANDE PROPERTIES.
Chairman Gerrish reopened the public hearing and asked Planning Director Castro
for opening remarks,
Planning Director Castro advised that at the first public hearing held in
December that in the department's publication, staff did request from the citi-
zens of this community any written concerns they might have in regards to this
Environmental Impact Report and, to this date, we have not received any written
communications except those included in the Commissioners' packets from other
public agencies and the County, Also, Mr, Castro indicated that the purpose of
this meeting is to receive testimony on the Environmental Impact Report and on
the preliminary development plan, He pointed out that there are certain areas
which staff has been unable to prepare final reports on for the Commission; one
is in regard to the C.C. & R.'s, He stated he discussed this with City Attorney
Shipsey and they are to review the document together and bring about a recom-
mendation to the Commission. In regard to the phasing program, Mr. Castro
advised he did ask some questions of Mr. Shipsey with regard to the position of
the City in that area, and he has discussed the matter with the City Administrator,
and the staff will be addressing that particular matter; a report is to be sub-
mitted to be reviewed by the department heads to see if they have any comments
and. suggestions in regard to phasing, He stated in regard to the school situation,
they are still pursuing alternatives and solutions to the matter, There is a report
to be furnished by the District and is to be presented to the Board on the 24th
of this month. We have received a letter from Dr, Hoagland saying we will be
given a copy of the report which basically includes some of the characteristics
of the enrollment factors,
William Langworthy, Rt, 2, Box 738R, Arroyo Grande, stated he understood,
according to what Mr, Castro said at the last meeting, that tonight both the
project and the Draft Environmental Impact Report were to be considered. He
stated that he had talked to Dr. David Harrow, who is the County Environmental
Coordinator, and he advised that the language of the Environmental Quality Act
is very specific that the Environmental Impact Report will be used in making a
decision on the project, What we have here is a draft Environmental Impact
Report, one for which we are still receiving comments, and Dr. Harrow advises
that if we approve the project before the final Environmental Impact Report has
been approved, then we haven't considered all of the material and, therefore,
he would conclude we would be in violation of the law. Mr. Langworthy referred
to the City of Arroyo Grande's Ordinance on Environmental Impact Reports, Page
f, second paragraph, stating "Each responsible agency shall consider the final
EIR before acting on or approving the project," He stated he has difficulty
seeing how we can accomplish the two missions when we have to do one before we
do the other, and we won't have the final Environmental Impact Reports until all
of the public agencies' comments have been received and until the public input
has been received and attached to it,
Planning Director Castro advised he would have to disagree with Dr. Harrow
on the interpretation. He advised that the purpose of the Environmental Impact
Report, in his opinion, is to address itself to the impact of the findings that
have been found by the Consultant. It is then our responsibility to look at
the project and use those concerns in the Environmental Impact Report and try
to mitigate them. He stated he didn't believe that by addressing ourselves to
the EIR and what it is saying are its concerns, and then addressing ourselves to
the development plan is in violation of the rules... He didn't believe we could
address ourselves to the report without addressing ourselves to the plan.
Mr, Langworthy referred to the flow chart on. Page j, of the same Ordinance,
and stated it seems that we are at the point where the Coordinator has found
the Draft EIR to be satisfactory and has sent it out for comment, and that what
we are accomplishing tonight is comments being submitted by the public; and not
until after that is the final EIR assembled; and not until after that does pro-
ject approval or denial take place,
Mr, Castro stated the reason that we are here this evening is to hear any
comments. or concerns that the public may have in regard to the Report.
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Arroyo Grande Planning Commission .• 1/11/78 Page 2
After further discussion on the procedure, Chairman Gerrish instructed
Planning Director. Castro to get an opinion from the City Attorney as to our
procedures in approving this and whether the Environmental Impact Report can
be approved, and then if in the same meeting the zoning, tract map, etc. can
be approved,
Mrs, Langworthy, Printz Road, stated she has been very concerned by the
initial plan that she saw on Rancho Grande, which did show a development of
R -1 lots on the northern tier of the property in the center section, and the
roads running through to Printz Road. She stated that,has been changed in
the final plan and that, in some ways, she agrees with it She called the
Commission's attention to Mr. Protopapas' report, which talks about the lo-
cation of Brisco Road being punched through to Printz Road, She states it
indicates an offer to dedicate for public road purposes from the proposed
Brisco Road location at the northern tract boundary of Printz Road.. This read
is constructed at the present time although not accepted in the County main-
tained system. She stated she feels this road should be spoken tc in the EIR,
and she is wondering since the EIR spoke to a different layout than we have
here; is, this a "dead duck ". She inquired if this has been answered or even
considered..
Planning Director Castro stated the City was advised by the County that
there was this consideration about extending Brisco Road along this County
property on to Printz Road:. We were also advised that one of the concerns
about the extens.ion,was, topography was such that it didn't lend it-
self to it so it would have to be brought in in a different manner to come up
at a point in this area as opposed to where it was originally intended. He
further advised they have discussed the matter at a staff level, and working
with the developer they were advised that the City would rather see this cir
culation element loop into the,Oak Parkdevelapment and not necessarily ex-
tended on to the County property.
Bernard Landsman, Newman Drive, stated it was his understanding that Mr,
Butch advised that the growth rate in the City would run about 3 to 3 -k% per
year and that he was concerned about the impact of heavy growth on the citizens.
He urged the Commission to consider the rights of the small builder who should
be given the chance to develop within the City, plus the rights of the citizens,
many of Whom are very unhappy about the large scale growth - ;.hat is going on.,
Planning Director Castro commented in regard to the 3 -'k'% growth rate, Mr.
Butch did make that statement in a water report that he developed. He did
indicate that the average of the last 10 to 11 years have developed more or
less a 3 -k% growth rate for the City It is not a constant thing, in fact, if
you look at the graph in the report you will see that sometimes it is less
than 3 -k% and sometimes it is more than 3 -k% growth
Mr Langworthy commented he would like to confine himself at the present
time to the Environmental Impact Report.., He stated it is a good report over-
all and very comprehensive, however the major problem, it seems, for the people
writing the Environmental Impact Report was that'the entire project is exceed
ingly vague. He referred to Page 5 of the EIR stating ":,,other items essential
to the EIR process were not present in the development proposal, so certain as-
sumptions and proposals are made by the Consultant, which means that the en-
tire Environmental Impact Report concerns a project which is somewhere between
the Consultant's ideas and the developers original proposal, because the pro-
posal was not specific enough;. He stated the concept of the 10 years phasing,
for instance, is something which he has never seen in any material presented
in either the original project or in the later material, and yet the 10 year
phasing number is crucial to.the evaluation of the impact that the Environmental
Impact Report addresses itself to,, That is just one of the several assumptions
that the consultant had to make in working with the project, The project has
changed a great deal since the draft EIR was first made available to the project
developers. He stated that it has changed so much that he sometimes worries
that .the EIR is addressing.a,,project that no longer exists, in that we now have
quite a different, project that has things - buil into it like phasing; which now
has identified what will be open space; changed the densities and has changed the
circulation. The developers have said they have addressed.many of the mitigation
measures and incorporated many of the mitigation measures that the EIR suggested
He further stated it wooid seem that the best thing to do would be to enter into
a sub - contract with the EIR consultants asking them to do an analysis of the
project as it now stands, otherwise, he is not sure that we can fully say to what
extent the project has addressed the mitigation measures
Arroyo Grande Planning Commission -- 1/11/78 Page 3
Planner Sullivan commented that the function Mr, Langworthy suggests is ex-
actly what the staff has dune since the staff accepted the EIR as adequate; The
staff has had a series of meetings with the developer; the staff has gone through
and helped the developer transform a rather vague parcel map of the density allo-
cation plan into a conceptual master plan. Precisely, what you alluded to another
consultant doing is exae:tly what your City staff has done.
Mr, Langworthy commented on the Broad Brush •map on Page 12 which locates
the project site, stating.it is a very old map and does not take into account the
intensity of the rural subdivision in the Printz Road /Noyes Road area in which he
lives, and he felt that: if we are going to spend this much time on it, we should
have a more current map, With regard to traffic, Mr, Langworthy stated he felt
the overall traffic analysis was quite good, however, he did not find, except on
Page 52, any analysis of Oak Park Road west of the freeway going past the Wayside
Motel up the hill and around the "S" curve. He •pointed out that there is a fairly
nasty downhill curve which the traffic consultant stated is already "Current
Street Capacity for Existing Traffic Inadequate" for that section He stated
he doesn't think that problem has been further addressed, and he considers that
to be an important problem in this project because at least a good deal of the
traffic generated within project will be outward through James Way to Oak
Park Boulevard, and if it is then bound for one of the Five City areas, quite
possibly it will take Grand Avenue which requires the traffic to go up and over
Oak Park Boulevard, a section of street that is already inadequate for present
traffic.
Mr Langworthy further 'commented that it seems to him that the EIR has not
taken into account the potential impact that the project will have on the rural
subdivision area at the fringe of Arroyo Grande The revised project does speak
to that somewhat, turning off the Brisco Road extension to Printz Road will help,
but he did not believe that the 'onsultants took proper heed of the impact that
this project will have on the people that already live there
On Page 38, Mr_ Langworthy commented that the heavy rains occurred in 1973
and not in 1972, He stated that on Page 39' there is a formula there that he can-
not understand because it implies that the rainfall varies from 13 an ,hour to
3 4" an hour over 'less than - half a mile, and he believes there is something wrong
there on the calculations which leads to the determination of how much water run-
off there is going to be,. He feels that is important because later on the con-
sultants conclude that certain of the present•drainage system would be, after the
project is developed', inadequate to handle the so- called 100 year storm, On Page
49, he stated - , in talking about history and archaeology, he understands that the
area has been surveyed by an archaeologist and nothing of any significance was
found, however, he still feels that the language which says that an archaeologist
"should" be notified if any such archaeological evidence is found during construc-
tion, that the word "should" be changed to . "must "..
On Page 59, Mr Langworthy stated that on the sane page we have two different
1977 population figures for the City of Arroyo Grande - 9,650 and 9,874, On Page
84, Mr, Langworthy stated he would like to emphasize another point that the con-
sultants brought out about cutting frees - "Cutting these oaks, the Torrey Pines,
or other trees would be a major negative impact " He stated he is in agreement
with that. He further referred to Page 106, second paragraph, where the consult-
ants state that "The low traffic volumes do not warrant that Brisco be required
to connect to Printz or that James Way be required to extend to Tally Ho Road
as the General Plan indicates ". He stated he agreed with that, and e._pecially the
Printz Road area would have a very negative impact if the roads were pushed through.
On Page 118, Mr, Langworthy stated he found an exceptionally sound analysis of the
school system. He further stated that he did not agree with Mr. Castro's analysis
of the school system.
Mr, Langworthy stated that on Page 143, he had difficulty understanding the
statement that a project generates more revenue than it costs. Lots of .. ∎::
have shown that as cities grow bigger, their need for infr-aac.:::.re becomes more
and more complex and their tax rate goes up accordingly. He stated that, all in
all, he believes that the Environmental Impact Report has been a very valuable
document and that it has lead to an improved project
Moffatt, Noyes Road, inquired as to what the common open area shown
on the map means, Planning Director Castro explained that common open area is
that which will be used by the owners of that particular project. Mrs. Moffatt
inquired if the lots along the inside of that area run all the way through to
Noyes Road, Mr., Castro advised that the property line will, and that there is a
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Arroyo Grande Planning Commission - 1/11/78 Page 4
proposed 50 ft. buffer strip located on the rear of that property line. Mrs.
Moffatt inquired.: as to the process of requiring the developer to have more like
150 ft. to 200 ft. buffer between the very densely populated area and the rural
area on the other side:. Planning Director Castro advised there is nothing pre-
venting the Commission from making that requirement if they see fit
In answer to Mrs, Langworthy's questions regarding the planting of the
buffer zone, Mr. Ed Comport, Landscape Architect for the project, advised that
he felt this is an opportunity to foster growth of some of the native plants
and that it is an opportunity for the Oak trees to spring up. Also, it might
be possible to use some Torrey Pines in that area,. With regard to the Poison
Oak, he stated he felt it would be a good idea in this case if it were removed.
Planning Director Castro stated in regard to the same concern, in staff's
discussion with the developer, the buffer strip was reviewed but there were no
suggestions as to the type of planting
Mr. Pete Giambalvo, Printz Road, stated he is one of the owners of the
bordering property on this project, and that he also owns 700 ft, of the road
that was in question earlier this evening joining this to Printz Road, He
advised that he can see this tract from his home and he is also concerned about
the minimum 50 ft; buffer zone., He suggested that this not only be a buffer
zone to block out this project from the rural area outside the city limits,
but also possibly to discourage traffic of any kind going from this area to
the rural area, such as foot traffic,mini bikes, motorcycles, etc,
Bill McCann, 428 Tanner Lane, stated that on the open space area for this
particular project, there has been no mention as to whether any of this park
will be allocated as general park, whether it is going to be dedicated to the
City or not and be open to the general population of the City„ Mr, Castro ad-
vised that none of it will be open to the general public. Mr. McCann then
asked if the developers are going to pay park fees on the complete acreage. Mr.
Castro advised that they would be required to pay park fees on the development
that is affected by the Ordinance. Planner Sullivan stated that the park fees
would be approximately $107,000 plus possible dedication of park land could be
required. Mr.: McCann stated he heard that some of these trails in this green-
belt area were going to be equestrian, hiking and bicycle type trails, and that
if it is all going to be land that is under the ownership, and
reserved for the people of this development, he saw nothing in the EIR or any
of the proposals that allows anyone to have horses in that development and in-
quired why have equestrian trails? He stated he also had a concern on the
buffer zone across the top of the project, and felt a 50 ft. zone is not very
wide and it would be more appropriate to have an area of a lower density type
of development along there as a buffer between your higher residential units
and the low density areas in the County He felt it would be better to put
it under private ownership in the form of a larger parcel and create a buffer
strip between this development and our County lines, He further stated he has
been thinking why we have to have all of this, or none of this. The possi-
bility exists that rather than getting ourselves into a phasing type situation
that we may not be able to control, that we should, right from the start,
consider the possibility that a very sound alternative would be to only consider
rezoning part of this 464 acres, and the best way the City has of controlling
the phasing of how fast this particular development can go along is through the
rezoning procedure. He also suggested that a good possibility on that would
be the 200 ft. level that the City is now able to service under its present -
water system.
Mr. McCann stated another of his concerns is the section of 13 units that
are right in the middle of the greenbelt area, and he felt this was uncalled
for. He stated further that there are a number of areas in the EIR where, in
his opinion, conclusions were drawn without having proper information and a
few statements were made that did not go quite far enough; for example, on Page
116 when they talked about fire protection, they did not go on to say how- much
this is going to cost the City: He stated in Mr Castro's report on Page 3,
there was a statement "..,,,that information concerning potential fire service
needs was obtained from Tony Marsalek, Fire Chief. It is anticipated that no
additional equipment will be needed as a result of this proposed development ",
and he would find it very hard to believe that we could have all of those de-
velopments without additional equipment
Arroyo Grande Planning Commission — 1/11/78 Page 5
Ella Honeycutt, 560 Oak Hill Road, inquired if anyone has checked into
whether or not this will raise our insurance.rates, and she felt this is some-
thing that should also be put into the cost analysis as to how it will affect
all of our fire insurance rates because we are in an area where there is a lot
of brush. City Engineer Karp commented that one major addition that no one is
considering is the fact that with the new reservoir and all the new transmis-
sion lines and pumping facilities, we are acquiring fire protection to an area
that was not protected prior to this point. The underwriters place a major
role on the distance the fire hydrant is from the structure, particularly in
a County area.
Mrs. Langworthy inquired with regard to the school site, the statement
saying it will be made available to the School District for five years and if
at the end of that time i was not developed, it would revert to the owners
of that property. She stated that, in :case it isn't developed, she felt that
the Planning Commission should require that the developer make a school site
available for the construction life of the project, because that is a logical
spot for the school and five years is not a very long time.
Bill Langworthy stated it is not clear in anything that he has read
whether the developer has set a parcel aside so the School District may pur-
chase it, should the School District find the money, or whether a school site
has been donated to the School District with a five year string attached, Mr.
Castro advised he believed that the proposal now is to set the property aside
for school purposes, should the School District need the land for construction.
Rudy Ortega, 1474 Anita Street, Carpenteria, Architect for the Developer,
stated that the State requires that the school site be made available to the
School District for a period of ten years, and that at this point he is not
certain whether the availability would be on a purchase basis or on a donation
basis, however, this is something they can address themselves to and respond
at a later date.
Elizabeth Jackson, 208 Fair View Drive, stated she has gone through the
Environmental Impact Report which is going to greatly increase our population,
and to save further discussion and problems, if they would drop their request
for a change in zoning and go back to the original zoning, and put 350 houses
on the property, we would have no more problems_
Madeline Steels, 1598 Hillcrest inquired as to the number of school chil-
dren that will be generated by this project, Planning Director Castro advised
that 677 is noted on the EIR report and that assumes that the enrollment would
all be in the public schools systems, He further stated that the involvement
of the private school systems should be recognized also as a contribution to
the education of the children in the City of Arroyo Grande, Mrs, Steele fur-
ther stated that, obviously, we are going to need another school and, under
the present circumstances, have any requests been made of the developers to-
ward the building of a school? This is what she would regard as a truly miti-
gation measure.
Planning Director Castro advised that there are several proposals on miti-
gating the school problem. We have looked at the suggestions offered by the
Consultant, and in his opinion, we have addressed to one of the possibilities,
which is the surcharge which we are exploring to "detertiitie; whether or not
it would be valid to impose on any new construction within the City. He
vised staff still has some ways to go with getting that resolved.
Lou Caballero, Route 2, Arroyo Grande, inquired as to the size of the
school site, and if it is available for a private school or is it mandated that
it be a public school. Planning Director Castro advised that it is mandated to
be a public school, and the site is 5.4 acres.
Mr. Jim Nokagawa, resident of San Luis Obispo., stated he works for the
Grover City Planning Department, and he was surprised that Jim Bremmer of the
State Fish and Game Department was not here to speak about the concerns that
he indicated in the Grover City office with regard to the siltation basins. He
had some fears that sediment would get down into the Pismo Lagoon and the con-
cern of Grover City is the possibility of flooding within our City limits. Plan-
ning Director Castro stated that he has reviewed, in general, the project with
Mr.: Wilson Hubbell, Director of Planning for Grover City and had expressed the
staff's thinking with regard to the plan,, He stated he will not try to respond
to the drainage concerns, except to say that, in his opinion, the City is ad-
dressing itself to it. City Engineer Karp advised there is a siltation basin
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Arroyo Grande Planning Commission - 1/11/78 Page 6
which is to be built on the tract boundary and that basin, in addition to what
we will wind up with on Oak Park Acres, staff feels, is more than adequate.
He stated that revegetation of a lot of these areas will also minimize the silta-
tion. The maintenance of these two structures, in his opinion, will eliminate
the problems of Meadow Creek other than perhaps what might be coming through be-
tween the Freeway and Pismo.
Ella Honeycutt referred to the recent rains, recommending the Commission
take the trip out Oak Park Road past Erhart Lane to a street called "Padgett ".
She advised that there are gullies there that are 5' deep that are the washouts
from the recent storms; and this is the soil we are talking about in these areas
of development. She pointed out a little further on Ormonde Road there is poor
compaction. Consequently, she feels we need some enforcement; when we have had
Negatives with conditions that are on file with the County, these conditions
have not been followed through and, therefore, in order that this EIR not be-
come a lesson in futility, we need to see that all of these conditions are met,
and she urged that the Planning Commission work to get the amount of help the
City needs so that what they put on this tract is enforced,
Bill Langworthy referred to Page 119 in the Environmental Impact Report
with regard to the school site, wherein it states "The present site as proposed
would be reserved for five years, within which time the school district has the
opportunity to begin development of the school or control of the site would re-
vert back to the owner who could develop it as residential." Mr. Langworthy
stated he assumes that the five year number has transferred to the relocated
school site, and he believed that he heard Mr. Ortega mention that the State
requires setting aside a site for ten years, and a mitigation measure to pro-
pose by the Environmental Impact Report consultants is to extend the reservation
period from five to ten years.
Mr. Langworthy stated another thing he would like to comment on concerns
the open space, and in the C. C. & R.'s it said that all of the open space, ex-
cept that which is privately owned, will be under the control of the Master
Homeowners' Association, which he assumed to mean that it is not the intention
of the project to dedicate any open space to the City.
Planning Director Castro advised that in discussing the matter with the
City Administrator and our parks people, we have never envisioned asking for
park land to be dedicated to the City, There are parks being furnished at the
end of La Barranca and that maybe Halcyon Hills could add more to that park
site, and we have another park site on the Oak Park development to be dedicated
to the City, but none of the open space area, whether it is the Oak Park project
or this particular project, are we seeking for any of it to be dedicated to the
City,
Mr, Abbott, Attorney for the Developer, stated in answer to Mr. Langworthy's
question as to whether or not the open space will be open to the public, the
answer is "no ", Mr. Landsman asked how they proposed to stop the public from
going through the development. Mr. Abbott stated if the general public come in-
to the development and abuse it, they will be asked to leave.
In answer to Mr. Landsman's question with regard to the price range of these
homes, Mr. Ortega advised at the present time, based upon current construction
costs, the range would be somewhere in the mid $40,000 approaching $100,000. He
further advised the intent here is not at all to create a country club environ-
ment; that they are merely the victims of inflation and the trends in construction
costs, and their problem is not any different than any other builder with respect
to the price range that these homes will reach. With respect to the use of the
actual open space, Mr. Ortega stated he didn't believe the City is desirous to
accept 125 acres as a public dedication and assume the maintenance and costs in-
volved in developing and maintaining such an area. He advised that was one of
the major factors in consideration in maintaining the area in common open space.
In answer to an earlier question, as to how they intend to keep the public out
of the project, Mr. Ortega stated that is physically impossible, However, the
facilities that will be developed in this greenbelt are being developed at the
developer's expense - not the City's expense, and the facilities are designed
and being provided expressely for the enjoyment and benefit of the residents of
the project. If the public happens on the project property and are not abusing
the facilities, in all probability that person will not be asked to leave, how-
ever, under circumstances where someone did, in fact, enter the premises for the
purpose of creating a nuisance, then they would be in a position to require that
individual to leave.
Arroyo Grande Planning Commission - 1/1 Page 7
Mrs. Ella Honeycutt stated that there will not be any low income housing
in this tract, and yet we have a lot of elderly people and younger people,
people on limited income in this community, and this is what she is concerned
with. It is her opinion that this has to be addressed in this program. Plan-
ning Director Castro advised that, in his opinion, the project has addressed
itself to a diversified market of 5 or 6 different price ranges, and one of
the things they tried to achieve in the re- design of the project is a diversi-
fied market. As far as low income housing, this is something that has been
discussed at staff level and there are other programs that can produce the type
of housing that Mrs. Honeycutt is referring to.
Mrs, Honeycutt stated another thing she was concerned with was the phasing.
She referred to the City of Rialto wherein this City had like 4,600 lots that
the Planning Commission had 0.K'd, for''development and within 'a six month period
3,000 applicants came in to build. So, when we are talking of all these massive
developments we have to look down the coast;Santa Barbara is saying "no building ",
consequently, this area now is the hot spot to build. When we are talking about
letting the developer do his own phasing, we can eventually end up like the City
of Rialto by having to do planning after the horse is out of the barn.
Mrs. Honeycutt further inquired who the developers are of this tract? Mr.
Dave Riner, Shell Beach, stated with reference to the ownership of the property,
it is a joint venture project between Rancho Grande Properties, a California
Corporation, of which Mr, Ron Bennett is a partner, and Ottse, Inc., another
California Corporation of which he is the Secretary - Treasurer. Mr. Landsman
inquired if Mr, Al Browne has any connection whatsoever with this project. Mr.
Riner advised that if the people would check the County records it would show
that the property was acquired in August of 1977, As of that time Mr. Browne
was paid for his property totally and has nothing whatsoever to do with the
property,
Mrs. Langworthy stated she was concerned about placing R -1 right up next
to 21 acre zoning, and it is even worse within the development itself because
they are putting R -1 right next to 5 acre zoning. She stated that furthermore
there is some more City property which extends through to Printz Road, and she
would not like to see a reason for having R -1 logically extended; in other
words she would like to see the top tier of R -1 lots cut down to 1/3 of an acre
lots or something like that,
Mrs. Jackson pointed out such a development as this would mean a larger
Police Department; going from a volunteer Fire Department to a full paid Fire
Department; more police cars, etc., and the whole thing is going to cost us a
lot more money., She felt that until the developer can come up with the actual
facts and figures of finance that they are absolutely going to pay for them-
selves and not cost the people that are living here, then she s'definitely against
it because she doesn't want to have to pay for something that she cannot afford.
Paul Haddox, 587 Valley Road, stated that is the problem we have with any
building here; a home will not pay the taxes to provide the services that all of
the people living in the homes need.
Ella Honeycutt stated the Commission should consider the cummulative effects
of putting three large tracts of 2,000 homes and she did not believe there would
be a fair share of housing for young married people, divorced people, and the
elderly. In answer to Planning Director Castro's question as to her definition
of low income, Mrs. Honeycutt stated she is, referring to people on Social Security
who have paid their way all of their life and all of a sudden they are living in
a trailer park on Grand Avenue and the park is going to be closed out; where are
these people going to move? We need housing for them; not in just one section of
Arroyo Grande, but all over. We need housing for young kids getting out of High
School,
Planner Sullivan stated that currently, as mandated by State Law, the Area
Council is preparing a Fair Share Allocation Plan to update the City's housing
plan. This fair share allocation will assign a number of dwelling units for the
low and moderate income families in each of the communities.
Mr, McCann referred to Page 6, Paragraph 6 of the EIR, under "Summary and
Conclusions" stating "School financing plan should be applied uniformally district -
wide and credit be given for the project's contribution of the site," He stated
it seems to him that the contractor is going to contribute the site and then get
some kind of rebate back for their proportionate share of the Lucia Mar School
449
Arroyo Grande Planning Commission - 1/11/78 Page 8
District, and let the other districts come up with some other monies for the c
other sites.
Planning Director Castro stated that this relates back to the suggestions
offerred in the EIR with regard to the Sur Charge, which was a consideration
being given by the former Planning Directors of the three cities; Pismo, Grover
and Arroyo Grande, Dr. Hoagland, etc. He stated he had attended the last meet-
ing where the conclusion was made that the application of a Sur Charge for a
limited period of time would not be the solution to the school problems, and
that what is needed was, in fact, that maybe a bond would be the only solution
as far as the high school is concerned, and whether or not there needed to be
modifications in the legislation in terms of how the school monies are to be
appropriated.
Mr. McCann commented that if this particular 5.4 acre parcel is just made
available to the School District and is not donated, then because of the prob-
lem that is going to be created within the School District, making a parcel
available is absolutely doing nothing to alleviate our problem and, in his
opinion, that is nothing as far as the mitigating measure to the School District
problems, and he feels we should look more along the lines of contributing the
school site and even building the school.
Mr. McCann referred to Page 16, Paragraph c., "Unit Absorption" stating
"The project's phasing has not been determined, but it is assumed that it would
be incremental and that units would be constructed as they could be absorbed
based on the projected annual need of between at least 100 and 520 units depend
ing on what portion of the regional market could be captured ". He pointed out
that even though the City of Arroyo Grande is going to have a housing need of
100 units per year, and approximately 520 for the area, it is possible to build
this particular project at a much exhilarated rate and he felt we should be
very careful how we go about putting some controls on as far as phasing is con-
cerned, and he thinks the best way to control the phasing of a particular pro-
ject like this is a limited type of rezoning,
Mr, Bill McCann commented that this project does have an important dis-
continuity all the way around the R -1 area up on the bench land. It is dis-
continuance with its own 5 acre zoning over next to Noyes; it is discontinuance
with the probably 1. to lk acre per unit densities that Oak Park Acres will have,
and it is discontinuance with the rural residential area which opens out on to
Printz Road. He stated he believes there should be at least an outer tier there
of lower density. Finally, the overall project looks pretty good and would be
a lovely project for Santa Barbara, but it is just not clear to him that the City
of Arroyo Grande, with 9,874 people, is ready for a project for which there has
been no mention of phasing; which would add all by itself more than 25% to the
present population of the City, and it seems that we have got to come up with
some alternative way to handle the development in the hills.
There being no further discussion, Chairman Gerrish continued the public
hearing to the regular meeting of January 17, 1978
There being no further business before the Commission, Ch an Gerrish
adjourned the meeting at 10:05 P.M.
ATTEST:
1
Chairman