Prophesy or plunder?

As Atascadero and Arroyo Grande redo their general plans, residents wonder if their concerns will be heard

BY ANNE QUINN

It doesn’t take a crystal ball see that SLO County’s future will bring more people, more traffic, and higher density land use. What isn’t clear is how local governments are going to deal with it all.

Both Atascadero and Arroyo Grande are rewriting their General Plans. And that’s brought SLO County residents into the mix, ready to fight to have their say and make it stick. One of the main concerns is that both plans specify increased residential density with little or no additional zoning for industry. More cars, more commuters, more congestion. No, it doesn’t take a crystal ball.

Arroyo Grande, a city of 1,600 residents, has created a general plan for the next 20 years to accommodate a population increase of 4,000 residents.

Atascadero, currently at 26,411, is looking at a 20-year build-out population of 34,972–an estimated gain of 8,192 residents.Consultants have been hired by both cities to organize the public input process for the general plans, allowing much of the technical work to be handed off to experts to relieve overworked city staffs. But critics to this process, such as Atascadero resident John McGoff, think using consultants short circuits democracy.

"This council majority has permitted consultants to be placed between the public and the accountable body, the city council," he said, adding that consultants are not subject to financial disclosure or conflict of interest statutes. Their deliberations are also not subject to the Brown Act provisions of record keeping or legal notification.

In May of 2000, consultants Crawford, Multari, Clark and Mohr conducted eight neighborhood meetings about the Atascadero General Plan. The city’s records of public input consists of a box containing tapes of eight neighborhood meetings, but no written transcripts. There are comment forms and folded flip charts where lengthy public comment is summarized–sometimes too much.

"When the issues suggested were written down, the viewpoint of the person was not included," writes Dorothy McNeil on a comment form following an Atascadero neighborhood meeting. "For example, at my second meeting, a woman brought up the [Atascadero] State Hospital and emphasized that she wanted the SVPs [sexually violent predators] out of there permanently and the issue was written down as SVPs/Hospital expansion. The council would never know what she meant."

While many residents complimented consultants Crawford, Multari, Clark and Mohr for making meetings fun and generating discussions, others questioned the validity of the process.

Cindy Doll gave this feedback: "I think this community input process is too ‘touchy feely’ for an objective planning process. Where is the concrete information with which a logical discussion can take place? Where are the numbers, the statistics about housing and the needs in the area?"

This "touchy-feely" process produced a list of Atascadero residents’ priorities. At all eight meetings the top vote-getters were "Rural atmosphere; natural beauty (oaks, creeks, hills); and large lots with elbow room."

Yet the resulting three option plans didn’t reflect these priorities and were rejected by the public. They have since come back with a revised plan.

In Arroyo Grande, a similar process took place in 1998, led by consultants from a Southern California, Envicom Corporation. What most residents loved about living in Arroyo Grande was being surrounded by fertile agricultural fields.

Later, Arroyo Grande citizens who had attended the General Plan workshops were shocked to see a controversial business park and residential development of almost 300 acres known as Arroyo Linda Plan included as a decided land use in the proposed General Plan. This occurred in the fall of 1998, a time when many residents were feeling a growing distrust of their city council.

Minutes from a city council meeting in October 1998 relate the citizens’ belief that the Arroyo Linda Plan should be subjected to the City’s General Plan, not the other way around. Citizen reaction was strong and consistent: The General Plan should be completed without being prejudiced by the annexation or rezoning requirements of the Arroyo Linda Plan.

Two years earlier, Arroyo Grande residents watched their city council override a unanimous "no" vote by the Planning Commission and approve a controversial Wal-Mart.

A month later, in November of 1998, citizen displeasure decisively settled the matter with a landslide vote replacing Mayor Pete Dougall with Mayor Mike Lady, who won by a 2-1 margin.

One of Mike Lady’s first decisions was to form a citizen-based long range planning committee. That committee in turn created a detailed general plan survey.

Since the city couldn’t afford to pay to process the survey, committee member Colleen Martin organized residents, councilmen, even camp fire girls to input data at night and on weekends when city staff computers were available.

"We got a 40 percent response rate. That’s incredible," Martin said. "Today, our survey serves as a written instrument, something people can reflect back on. It’s the best thing we ever did."

Plans were changed to reflect the survey and, according to Community Director Kerry McCants, things seemed to be moving along. By January, 2000, maps were released to the public. Three public workshops on the plan were held by the City Council that spring.

"I anticipated that we would have this thing complete in August or September 2000," said McCants. But then the process died. McCants said that "due to other commitments the Envicom consultants stopped working on the project."

Eventually the city fired Envicom, and hired a local consultant, Rob Strong, to complete the project in-house. Strong was a former community development director for the City of SLO, who started his own firm, Strong Planning Services.

"The general plan survey was the directing tool," Strong said. Four years and $350,000 later, Arroyo Grande has a draft plan with a completed environmental impact report. Its review period ends July 5.

The residents of Atascadero found themselves in the same position as those of Arroyo Grande when the first general plan maps were posted in the Lake Pavilion and at City Hall.

Rather than reflect the citizen’s preference for "elbow room" via large lots, preservation of natural beauty, and rural atmosphere, these maps showed increased density almost uniformly. Responding to an almost universally negative reaction, the Atascadero Planning Department huddled with Crawford, Multari, Clark and Mohr consultants and produced a "refined alternative" map, which is being debated now.

This new map leaves the heavily wooded west side of Atascadero alone, except for the possible future annexation of Eagle Ranch–county land to the west which will come out of the Williamson Act in 2009. The Williamson Act eases escalating property tax assessments so that agricultural land owners can afford to keep their lands in agriculture.

If Eagle Ranch converts from agriculture, it has 400 lots that have already been designated as original Atascadero colony lots, meaning it can be converted into residential development with little means for opposition.

Essentially, Atascadero’s "refined alternative" suggests that most areas be upzoned to a higher density for development than outlined in Atascadero’s current general plan. This density is concentrated in the northern, southern, and central areas of the city. It revives the controversial shopping mall Dove Creek at Atascadero’s south end, altering it to include housing.

The new plan specifies 258 less acres will be designated for single family homes, 32 more acres will have low density single family homes and 41 more medium density single family units.

The greatest change over the previous general plan is an allowance for 60 additional acres accommodating 367 additional units of high density multi-family housing.

Both Atascadero and Arroyo Grande are making significant efforts to relieve SLO County’s affordable housing needs by increasing zoning for multi-family units. The challenge is how to do this and keep what makes these communities special to the people already living there.

In Atascadero, much of this multi-family housing is slated for Morro Road, otherwise known as Highway 41 West. Traffic can be bumper-to- bumper on Morro Road at rush hour now, a relatively new experience for residents used to "elbow room."

Ted Monmonier identified himself as a developer when he asked the Atascadero Planning Commission to reconsider placing heavier density in neighborhoods next to Morro Road.

"Even though I have developed office complexes there, I believe what is proposed is probably too much for Morro Road which already has a traffic problem. Navajo Road and Santa Inez, [which border Morro Road] already have high density housing.

"Children in that neighborhood cut through my property. They have nowhere to play. The property next to the library would make an ideal park. Instead, new development that would plug up that neighborhood is indicated," he said.

Similarly, Arroyo Grande’s general plan calls for higher density in its new developments.

"There isn’t much land left over for low density single housing. In the future the community is going to have to become more compact," explains Strong. "More than half of the 4,000 additional residents will live in multi-family housing."

Mixed-use developments combining commercial and residential uses, particularly in its Village area, will accomplish this, Strong said.

Some Arroyo Grande areas once shown on the draft plan for development were changed to open space designations in the final plan, according to Strong.

In Atascadero, areas formerly zoned for parks are now zoned for housing. The new general plan shows a loss of 177.6 acres of land originally zoned for recreation. This is despite the city’s effort to establish a long term lease with Atascadero State Hospital to expand Paloma Park by 40 acres. Paloma park is on State Hospital property that was annexed into the City’s borders in 1999.

One area representing a loss of recreational land is east of the town’s new Home Depot shopping center. It was changed from a vacation RV park to a permanent mobile home park. The property is near the river and borders the Atascadero Mutual Water Company property.

"I am concerned about that change in designation and wonder how the water company feels about mobile homes so near the Salinas River," said Henry Engen, a former Atascadero Community Development Director who wrote the original general plan that is now being updated.

An area designated as open space on the proposed plan is the same site where a high density housing project known as the Mackey project was debated in 1999. Because the land was so near the Union Pacific Railway right-of-way, the high density housing proposal was dubbed "shacks by the tracks " by opponents.

That project never received approval, or confirmation that there would be any water available for it. Councilman Ken Lerno had to resign when it was discovered that he had voted despite a clear conflict of interest. The project was abandoned. Now, its being offered to the community as open space.

"The Mackey property is nothing," resident Joan O’Keefe said. "It couldn’t be built on anyway."

Much as the cities say they want public input, getting information on general plans is not easy for residents.

Kathleen Wendell, a resident of Printz road in Arroyo Grande wasn’t sent a notice when the Arroyo Grande City Council reviewed whether or not to change the zoning on her road from rural residential to a higher density. She found out from a neighbor. Envicom had used a two-year-old property assessment list when they sent out notices. The Wendells had only lived on Printz Road for a year.

To analyze a general plan, be prepared to spend money. The cost of a copy of the Arroyo Grande general plan is $18, although copies can be reviewed at the library.

In Atascadero, residents can buy a set of refined alternative maps for $10.

Community watchdogs in Atascadero don’t just want to look at colored maps. They want to know which developers have asked for land-use plan amendments, because that information details changes that could be made to the general plan that will be difficult to reverse.

At first that information wasn’t easily available, fueling suspicions that it was being hidden from the public. Engen said he had to go down to City Hall twice, and was turned down at first by planning permit coordinator Pat Hicks.

Hicks said that she had information on the land-use amendments on her desktop, but information as to who requested the land use amendments wasn’t part of the file. After numerous requests and complaints, a stack of land use amendment summaries, as well as a list of the developers requesting them sits on the Planning Department countertop.

Similarly, the latest fight in Arroyo Grande was over finding a way to preserve the general plan now that the community is satisfied.

"Plans are not constitutions. They are designed to be flexible documents subject to change," points out Arroyo Grande resident Otis Page.

Flexibility can become abused, however, and too often the will of the people as recorded in the plans is overridden the whims of a council which can easily grant amendments.

Since Arroyo Grande residents had spent so much time and effort developing their plan, they sought a way to protect it. Martin, Page, Mike Titus, and others hoped to have an initiative passed that would make changes in the general plan only possible by a "super majority" or a vote where more than three councilmembers approve. Others suggested using a vote by the people.

Arroyo Grande Chamber of Commerce Director Heather Jensen called this initiative "son of SOAR" and immediately faxed "an alert" to chamber members. Opponents say she only targeted chamber members who would sympathize with her position, and that others were left out. Jensen denies this, saying she only faxed members whose "fax numbers we have."

Supporters say characterizing the initiative as SOAR is unfair because it is different in many respects, not the least of which is time frame. If passed, SOAR would have been in effect for 30 years. General plans don’t last that long. At the very least there ought to be an election to determine if the people were interested in establishing an initiative at all, others argued.

But on June 12, Mayor Lady tabled the initiative, saying that the community needs to concentrate on getting the general plan finished.

After all, it’s been four years, and has cost $350,000 so far.

Atascadero planning commissioners and council are still reviewing the draft plan. They have the maps, they have documents, they have hours of public comment from two recent meetings filled with standing room only crowds.

What they don’t have is a crystal ball to show them how all this will help, or hinder, the town’s future. And without that, all they can do is hope and work for the best. Æ

Anne Quinn sees a bright future.