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Home My WebLink About05-23-2018 - Item #2 - Lopes1 Tonikian, Victoria From:James Lopes < Sent:Sunday, May 20, 2018 2:47 PM To:Allan Cooper; Corey, Tyler; Advisory Bodies; CityClerk Subject:San Luis Ranch Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Report Attachments:905_19_18...lettertopc_cooper.pdf Planning Commission City of San Luis Obispo RE: San Luis Ranch Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Report Dear Chairperson Stevenson and Commissioners: I concur and support, and I hope that you will also, Mr. Cooper's brilliant letter of May 19, 2018. Allowances for variations or lapses in phasing would increase environmental impacts over the current inadequately mitigated project. Since the project is already approved without full mitigations, it appears that such variations will exceed the levels of impacts already described in the project Final EIR. I agree with Mr. Cooper that these exceedances will threaten or negate the stated benefits in the Overriding Considerations, by providing only a partial residential area, little or no affordable housing, and/or little or no commercial development. The analysis by Mr. Cooper indicates that the request should be denied. Thank you. James Lopes On 5/19/2018 3:37 PM, Allan Cooper wrote: Dear Tyler - Would you kindly forward the letter attached below to the Planning Commission before their May 23, 2018 meeting? Thanks! - Allan Meeting Date: 05-23-2018 Received: 05-21-2018 Item Number: 2 To: SLO Planning Commission and Tyler Corey Re: San Luis Ranch Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Report From: Allan Cooper, San Luis Obispo Date: May 19, 2018 Honorable Chair Stevenson and Commissioners - I concurred with the ﬁndings in the San Luis Ranch Development EIR which states that air quality, cultural resources (historic resources and cumulative historic resources), land use/ policy consistency (General Plan policy consistency), noise (construction noise), and transportation (existing and near-term intersection operations, existing and near-term lane capacities, existing and near-term segment operations, cumulative intersection operations, cumulative lane capacities, and cumulative segment operations) created by this project will be signiﬁcant and unavoidable. This project at the time of buildout will also place unavoidable adverse impacts on the City’s current sewer, water, school, law enforcement and ﬁre protection capacities. Of course all of these signiﬁcant and unavoidable impacts were accepted by Council on July 18, 2017 due to the following "over-riding considerations”: Findings of Fact and Statement of Overriding Considerations For the reasons speciﬁed below, the City ﬁnds that the following considerations outweigh the proposed project’s unavoidable environmental risks: 1.Provision of new Residential and Commercial Uses 2.Provision of a Variety of Housing Types for all Income Levels 3.Open Space and Agricultural Protection 4.Provision of Park and Recreational Facilities 5.Well-Planned Neighborhood Would Reduce Per-Capita Vehicle Trips 6.Provision of New Jobs 7.Transient Occupancy Tax 8.National Flood Insurance Program and the Community Rating System Rating Improvement 9.Implementation of the General Plan What I ﬁnd unsettling here is the following: The project applicant now proposes to adjust the phasing plan description such that each of the project phases could overlap, be out of sequence, or be concurrent, depending on market conditions and to adjust project conditions and/or mitigation measures to implement such adjusted phasing plan. Does this therefore mean that the commercial development (including the hotel) provided in Phases 4,5, and 6 may never be provided? Could this therefore invalidate overriding considerations 1, 5, 6, and 7? Without commercial nearby this would cease to be a “well-planned neighborhood”, without commercial this would no longer provide permanent jobs and without a hotel there would be no transient occupancy tax revenue. Currently Phase 1 is low-moderate density residential, Phase 2 is Medium Density Residential and Phase 3 is High Density Residential. Never getting to phase 2 or 3 would suggest that there would be little so-called “affordable” housing which would invalidate overriding considerations 2 and 9. Invalidating 6 of the 9 overriding considerations would suggest that this project alternative would become inferior to the other project alternatives. Finally, revising the mitigation measure monitoring program such that construction of the Prado Road Overpass & Northbound Ramp is not a requirement prior to occupancy of Phase 2 or any other project Phase would further exacerbate transportation (existing and near-term intersection operations, existing and near-term lane capacities, existing and near-term segment operations, cumulative intersection operations, cumulative lane capacities, and cumulative segment operations) created by this project. Thank you!