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HomeMy WebLinkAbout12/7/2021 Item PC, Schmidt Delgado, Adriana From:Richard Schmidt <slobuild@yahoo.com> Sent:Tuesday, November To:Advisory Bodies Subject:Planning Commission Agenda Correspondence: SB9 Attachments:Council SB9 urgency needed.docx This message is from an External Source. Use caution when deciding to open attachments, click links, or respond. Dear Planning Commissioners, I am very concerned the city is doing so little to prepare for and prevent the worst impacts of SB9. I am writing to the commission to urge you to urge the city council to enact an emergency ordinance, to take effect prior to Jan. 1, to offset as much of the harm from SB9 as possible. Without such an ordinance the city's neighborhoods will be burdened forever with the whims of whatever developers want within the law's rather broad confines. Such a posture does not serve the best interests of the people of San Luis Obispo. I also want to express my misgivings about staff's memo to the council and your commission in which they allege there's nothing to worry about because nobody much will use SB9. This propaganda is straight from the much-criticized faulty analysis of the Terner Center, and is an interplanetary view from some other planet. You may be assured that Sen. Scott Weiner and other anti-single-family legislators who fought years to get this legislation passed would not agree with staff's point of view!!! And you shouldn't be fooled by it either. My concerns with SB9 are expressed in the attached letter I sent to the city council. Thank you, and please do ask the council to do emergency legislation on this matter. Richard Schmidt 1 Re: Looming SB9 deadline – It’s time to pass an urgency ordinance Dear City Council, I wrote before on SB9, and am dismayed by the city’s response, a copy of which I received indirectly via a third party. As a licensed architect, a planner, and an 8-year veteran of the city’s planning commission I am shocked our city has done nothing to prepare for the onslaught of SB9 coming on Jan. 1. I am further shocked staff has no intention of dealing with SB9 in a timely way and is telling the council it should wait till some time after August 2022 to start drafting an ordinance to mitigate SB9’s impacts, thus giving mischief-making developers a full year to wreak whatever “by right” havoc they choose to inflict upon our family neighborhoods. And I am distressed by the pollyannaish memo staff sent to council, basically patting you on your collective head with the assurance having no ordinance won’t be all that bad, just don’t worry, leave it to us. And that staff, by their own admission, is relying on analysis from the Terner Center, analysis which has been widely criticized for inaccuracy, bias and pro-developer spin. I think as the people’s representatives it’s time the council engaged directly with this “abolition of single family zoning” mandate from the state and told staff to write an urgency ordinance for adoption prior to Jan. 1. If such an ordinance is not perfect, it can be fixed on the same timeline staff proposes for its first effort at an ordinance – i.e., in summer/fall 2022. The city otherwise leaves its neighborhoods totally to the mercy of clever developers. And you better believe they’re a lot more clever than the naïve staff memo suggests. An emergency/urgency ordinance is the path being chosen by other progressive pro-active cities, and that’s because this is the best interim step to deal with the planning chaos that looms as developers can otherwise ignore city standards and zoning niceties. REMEMBER THAT FACT: SB9 NULLIFIES CITY STANDARDS ABSENT AN IMPLEMENTING ORDINANCE. I’ve followed press accounts of Santa Barbara’s draft ordinance, and what’s fascinating to me is that city is working in many ways to maintain neighborhood quality of life standards as it implements SB9. For example, in contrast with what our own city has done of late, I’m impressed they are requiring an enhanced riparian setback (35 feet) on SB9 subdivided lots. This is important both hydrologically and 1 ecologically, and so in contrast to our own city’s recent indifference to our established riparian 1 Mentioning hydrology and ecology requires this digression. The rationale for and history of our creek setbacks are likely unknown to present staff and council. The 1973 flood was devastating; it washed out creek banks and undermined buildings and other structures throughout the city. It was clear after the flood the city had been negligent of public safety in allowing construction right up to – and in some cases beyond – tops of creek banks. Public safety required, in the mind of the conservative pro-development city engineer, Dave “the pave” Romero, a significant setback and he recommended a minimum of 20 feet. The Waterways Planning Board was established to oversee creek and flood planning, and to act as an interim creekside project review board. I was appointed to that board and served through its 7-year existence. We put on boots and walked every foot of our city’s waterways, acquainting ourselves with on-the-spot conditions from a creek’s- protections and the frequency with which it approves exceptions, even in cases involving raw land where there’s no excuse for exceptions. Santa Barbara is trying to set a good example, and I’d suggest the council obtain a copy of their draft ordinance and use it for inspiration. There are many obvious plain vanilla planning issues that must be addressed now or the city loses control over them. For example: • Lots must be split only along street frontage, not by creating a labyrinth of flag lots, which are really sucky planning that destroys neighbors’ back yard privacy. • Lot widths. The city has many antiquated lots of 50 foot width, or less. If these are split, you’ll have 25 foot lots, which have been essentially outlawed elsewhere nearby (Cambria, Los Osos). Surely SLO doesn’t want to reopen that can of worms and spoil our established neighborhoods. These are just two examples of the sorts of plain vanilla things over which you’ll lack control without an ordinance. Please, write and adopt an emergency/urgency ordinance for early implementation of SB9. I know December is a busy month, but please set aside time to deal with this urgent matter, and direct staff to do the same. Richard Schmidt eye view and establishing the nature of problems that needed near-term fixing, or prevention through future-oriented policy. We formulated the setback policies that were eventually codified by ordinance in the 1990s after a city attorney became nervous about their only being “policy.” There was no argument among board members about a minimum 20- foot safety setback, but the two young board members, environmentalist city council member Keith Gurnee and myself, argued the setback should also be conceptualized as an ecological habitat-protection measure. The council agreed, and that is how the dual purpose setbacks became established. Looking back today, I must say we were forward looking and prescient, and our pioneering work’s value stands. But today the setbacks are being eroded by decision makers and staff with no understanding we live in a floody mess of a place and whose environmental assumptions are muddled by failure to understand the difference between ecology and recreation, thus undercutting the conservation purpose of setbacks and not appreciating their public safety necessity.