The Arroyo Grande City Council’s study session on an ordinance about a local safe parking program site met with a polite warning against being too hasty.
“What is that proposed plan that would come before you?” asked Janna Nichols, executive director of the 5 Cities Homeless Coalition, at the March 14 meeting. “I caution between jumping too far ahead versus what you need to do to put the legs in place.”
City Council’s deliberation of the proposed draft ordinance initially had the prime objective of defining in its municipal code what a safe parking site looked like, especially because this type of land use is new to Arroyo Grande. Setting a definition is something Nichols advocated for, both to the City Council and to New Times, in the face of San Luis Obispo County phasing out its unsuccessful safe parking site on Oklahoma Avenue.
According to previous New Times reporting, a uniform understanding of specific support services for the homeless has helped Nichols find some success in Grover Beach’s Cabins for Change program.
Instead, during the March 14 meeting council members wondered about the complex future threads that could come with a potential safe parking site—ranging from the presence of security guards to confusion about the appeals process.
“I understand it’s frustrating dealing with government,” Mayor Caren Ray Russom said at the meeting. “We move slow and it’s like molasses.”
Inspired by talks to alleviate rising homelessness in 2020 with faith-based leaders from St. John’s Lutheran Church and a subsequent temporary site set up at the church’s parking lot, Arroyo Grande staff drafted the safe parking ordinance hoping that the council would one day include it in the city plan. Public correspondence detailed that another safe parking site once existed in the city.
“More than 10 years ago … St. Barnabas [Episcopal Church] worked with the city and started a safe parking program on our site at 301 Trinity Ave.,” wrote church rector Rob Keim. “I am told that the program lasted less than a month since the client registration process was too onerous, and the overnight monitoring was more than we could staff.”
Community Development Director Brian Pedrotti previously told New Times that churches had pushed back a few years ago asking for a more streamlined permitting process. Faith leaders wanted to swap out the city-recommended conditional use permit for a more discretionary land use permit that would be exempt from public hearings, Pedrotti said. But sidestepping hearings became a point of focus at the March 14 meeting.
All council members questioned the “unique appeals process.” According to the draft, a safe parking site applicant or property owners within 300 feet of the proposed site can appeal Pedrotti’s decision within 14 days of mailers sent to residents living near an approved site. The appeal would appear on the City Council’s consent agenda. It will only be pulled out for public hearing if the council doesn’t agree with Pedrotti’s appeal findings.
“Normal appeals get their hearing no matter what,” Councilmember Jim Guthrie said. “In this case, the council can choose not to hear it.”
A successful safe parking site application will set its host back by $756 to pay for staff time. Planning Manager Andrew Perez told council members that even though staff hasn’t thought that far ahead, they anticipate a similar fee for appealing a site, too. Guthrie countered that limiting public input through hearings at the council’s discretion isn’t fair because of the attached fee.
“It’s likely that their appeal will be denied. It just seems to me that if they’re paying, they’re going to get their day in court, for lack of a better term,” Guthrie said.
With Russom calling the new appeals process a “deal-breaker” for her, the City Council agreed that officials also need to create a common definition for safe parking sites and who it serves, with a focus on what “safe” entails. The proposed ordinance will also limit RVs and recreational campers from using approved sites to avoid long-term stays.
City staff will refine the ordinance with the council’s recommendations, and the new draft will be presented to the Planning Commission at a later date, after which the council will review it for adoption. Δ
This article appears in Spring Arts Annual 2023.