Fierce Debate Brewing In Goleta Planning Fray

Santa Barbara Newsroom
By Tom Schultz
April 5, 2007

Of all the big issues to hit City Hall since Goleta formed in 2002, the battle over a key planning framework seems to always be boiling on the front burner.

A majority of longtime council members approved the city's first general plan for traffic, noise, housing and other concerns in October, a month before voters removed most of those folks from office.

Now a new council majority is in charge, and it's setting the stage to dramatically amend a wide range of policies that barely began — yet critically impact — the community.

The fundamental question at hand is an easy one. What, if anything, in the plan will stay or go?

But that’s where the simplicity ends.

While its supporters largely see the general plan as a tool for preserving Goleta as is, critics say internal inconsistencies, rigid language and unworkable policies are key problems that threaten economic vitality and new home construction for middle class workers across the city.

Business leaders and affordable housing advocates supportive of a new direction are offering changes to the plan in testimony and writing.

On the other side, slow-growth advocates increasingly guard against wholesale revisions.

MEETING THIS MONTH

This comes as both camps gear up for an April 16 meeting, one aimed at framing and initiating a series of new public hearings expected to exacerbate debate in the coming months.

Hovering in the background are a series of lawsuits launched last fall against the city by landowners and business interests, alleging the past council violated state laws designed to ensure the environmental quality and an appropriate review of the plan. Talk of settling these disputes still percolates among involved parties.

Already, city staff members have offered a slate of proposed changes that could alter environmental standards and make new development easier to accomplish, or bring new commercial centers to the area.

“We have had more than 100 days and an opportunity to test the general plan against the 40 or some odd current planning projects that are currently in our quiver,” Steve Chase, Goleta planning director, said recently. “We have been looking at those projects and how they line up."

In some cases, the plan may impede success, he said. “That has influenced our thinking."

Changing the plan “should be a really positive thing,” Councilman Eric Onnen said. “Not to say there won’t be conflict."

“Obviously there are those who believe that the general plan is perfect as it stands -- a relative, in my opinion, minority -- but they are very vocal,” he said.

Bacara Resort & Spa, Sandpiper Golf Course and the would-be developers of Bishop Ranch were among parties opposed to the general plan as written by the last council. All have begun lobbying for future changes that could make development on those respective properties easier.

HOUSING A BIG FACTOR

Among the dissatisfied is Jennifer McGovern, coordinator of the Goleta Housing Leadership Council. The organization advocates for the construction of workforce housing, and has championed efforts to rework one general plan section in particular, an element rejected last month for a third time by state regulators. "I think what's been initiated by the new council is very productive."

In a March 19 letter to City Hall, the state Department of Housing and Community Development rejected for a third time the plan’s important housing element, stating it "continues to require significant revisions to comply with state housing law.”

“For example,” according to the agency, “the element still does not adequately demonstrate the projected residential densities and buildout capacities on the identified sites (for new housing) can be realistically achieved.”

While not stating so specifically, that passage was widely interpreted as targeting the plan’s so-called “inclusionary” housing policy requiring that 55 percent of all units in new projects along sections of the Hollister Avenue corridor be affordable.

McGovern and builders say that level of inclusion defies market forces, rendering project proposals financially infeasible. Based on campaign promises, it appears as though the new council majority, which includes Onnen, aims to decrease the level to around 25 percent.

“You have to have a housing element that’s workable,” McGovern said. “Not one designed by the former council to make sure development didn’t happen.”

Councilwoman Jonny Wallis, the last holdover from the old majority, paints a different picture.

“The council obviously wants to make some changes,” she said. “Some of those changes are getting considered because of lawsuits. There’s nothing wrong with considering what is brought to us by way of lawsuits. A general plan is, of course, a flexible document.”

Still, “We should consider what we want for the city of Goleta in the long term,” she said, citing controlled growth among her goals.

Wallis appears ready to hold the line at 55 percent. It’s a tool, she said, to ensure Goleta gets the workforce housing it needs.

“It’s important to remember that not all of Goleta is covered by the 55 percent,” she said. “I will look to see if the council is sensitive to the whole of Goleta and residents, or favoring big land users.”

“The (original general plan) process that got us here involved, I don’t know, a hundred meetings with hundreds of comments,” Wallis said. “I don’t want those to be lost. . . It would be a shame to lose that.”

Councilman Roger Aceves said it’s a good time for fine tuning, with the city also restructuring its Design Review Board and creating a strategic plan.

“I want people to know that nothing has been decided,” he said. “It’s going to take months to properly vet public comment and allow staff to do their work.”

WORDS WITH WEIGHT

By law, a city or county can only amend its general plan once a quarter, or four times annually. In Goleta, the council may consider a raft of changes all at once, or perhaps groups of them in a series of decisions.

On March 5, Chase unveiled an extensive matrix of proposed changes – part of a five-step process that by law must occur before any final decisions.

Among those, the council could allow all types of commercial development including large regional commercial centers in areas determined appropriate.

Another suggested change would replace the word “shall” with “should” in more than a dozen passages to provide general rather than absolute policy direction.

For example, a line stating that “approvals of all new development shall require adherence to high environmental standards and the preservation and protection of environmental resources” would change under the proposal.

It’s this same sort of change that could give Bishop Ranch a cracked door to future project hearings. Currently, the general plan states that land zoned for agriculture shall not be converted to other uses. Located between Los Carneros and Glen Annie roads, the fallow farm property spans more than 250 acres.

To Onnen, incorporating non-binding language makes government more responsive to community input and direction, by restricting any council’s ability to act unilaterally against a proposal.

When a council acts like that, he said, "then the only recourse is legal. It should be a public process.”

Other stakeholders see a chipping away at protections designed to keep Goleta neighborhoods flanked by open space.

“I would like to see the City Council reconsider” its direction, resident Bill Shelor said. “A sea change of this magnitude should be thoroughly and thoughtfully vetted. Certainly there are situations where flexibility is desirable similarly there are situations where the policy should be rigid.”

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