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HomeMy WebLinkAboutcc min 1993/07/22 MINUTES OF JOINT CHULA VISTA CITY COUNCIL SAN DIEGO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS MEETING Thursday, July 22, 1993 County Administration Center 3:14 p.m. Board Chamber, Room 310 CALL TO ORDER 1. ROLL CALL: PRESENT: Councilmembers: Fox, Hotton, Moore, Rindone, and Mayor Nader Supervisors: Jacob, Slater, and Chair Bilbray ABSENT: Supervisors: MacDonald and Williams ALSO PRESENT: Staff George Krempl, Deputy City Manager; D. Richard Rudolf, Assistant City Attorney; and Beverly A. Authelet, City Clerk 2. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: 3. ORAL COMMUNICATIONS: There were none. 4. CONTINUED PUBLIC HEARING - OTAY RANCH Anthony Lettied, Otay Ranch General Manager, went over the materials which had been handed out. Supervisor Jacob stated that Michael Evans, the County Habitat Planner, was present. One of the questions she had raised yesterday, after the presentation by the Endangered Habitat League, was "How does the Otay Ranch Project fit into the larger planning effort?" Her goal was to make sure that the Council/Board make the land use decisions so the Federal government won't come in and override what we do. Michael Evans, the County's Habitat Planning Coordinator, stated he had not studied the map, but he believed it had some elements which were consistent with habitat mapping and planning which they have been doing. Yesterday, the Supervisors referred the matter to the Fish and Wildlife Service to get a very specific formal response. Staffof the Habitat Planning Section would like to meet directly with the Service to understand what their concerns were and then report back to the Council/Board. Supervisor Jacob requested that the Council/Board hold off on the EIR decision, even a tentative action, to allow Mr. Evans time to meet with Fish and Wildlife and the Otay Ranch project staff. Kim Kilkenny, Baldwin Company, requested that the applicant be invited and be able to participate in the meeting with Fish and Wildlife. Supervisor Jacob stated that Valle de Oro brought up the issue of traffic; there were some differences of opinion. She wanted to know if there was a representative present from Valle de Oro to respond to the staffs response to her question about the traffic counts. MINUTES July 22, 1993 Page 2 Jack Phillips, Chairman of the Valle de Oro Planning Group, stated that under question was whether or not the EIR provided sufficient, accurate information to understand the effects of increasing the intensity of the County General Plan. He presented a graphic from the draft EIR depicting the 'no project alternative~ and made comments regarding traffic projection in the South Bay model. He highlighted three roads to show how inadequate the final EIR was regarding traffic. The first one was Bancroft Drive and stated that staff projected 2100 ADTs for 'no project" and 2600 ADTs for the New Town Plan. Bancroft Drive currently had 17,000 ADTs on it. The projection using a real model would place it at 26,000 ADTs. There was no way that Bancroft Drive would ever have 2600 or 2100 ADTs. Next street was Troy Street which connected Bancroft to SR-125 in the future alignment. Staff showed 4300 and 3500 ADTs. There were currently 10,000 ADTs existing traffic volume on Troy. Same thing was true for Broadway. He felt something was drastically wrong with the analysis techniques or with the South Bay traffic model. Project experts who produced this data did so in response to specific EIR comments about these segments. Cultruns was also using the South Bay model in their development of the alternative report for SR-125 south. They found that the South Bay model was not capable of accurately predicting impacts in the northern and eastern neighboring communities. For the SR-125 south project. Cultruns engineers were using the more valid data which shows that the impacts from the General Plan increase, on top of the normal buildout, would create severe traffic congestion in the neighboring unincorporated communities. Dan Marurn, Senior Transportation Planner with JHK and Associates, who was responsible for the traffic analysis on the project and development of the Technical Report for the EIR, stated that the major regional facilities surrounding the Otay Ranch Project were 1-805 to the west, SR-54 to the north, SR-94 to the north and east. During discussions with the Transportation Subcommittee, they set up a transportation model which was a variation of the transportation model which had been developed for the Chula Vista General Plan. The land use information that went into the model south of SR-54 and south and east of SR-94 was buildout land use data which came directly from the Chula Vista General Plan. Within the Otay Ranch Project, they substituted each alternative which they analyzed in detail at buildout. The buildout information south of SR-54 all the way to the Border was the fifty-year type of land use assumption that they were able to collect from the City of Chula Vista, City of San Diego, and County of San Diego, For all other areas of the regional model north of SR-54 and north and east of SR-94, they used SANDAG's Series VII Growth Projections. The growth projections from Series VII in the fringe areas were very low. When SR-54 Corridor Study came along, the SANDAG modelling group and the Caltrans engineers on the project decided to focus on the area which was their project area, adjacent to the SR-54 corridor, just as they focused on the Otay Ranch project and its 23,000 acres. They decided that the model surrounding the SR-54 Corridor Project, especially on the north side, was not accurate. Thus, they alesegregated the zone structures. As a result of that effort by SANDAG, the level of traffic activity in those community plan areas was drastically different than the traffic activity that they forecasted on those streets when they were focusing on the Otay Ranch Project some five to twelve miles to the south. At the time they used SANDAG's model, they did not go into the Valle de Oru area, the Spring Valley area, and the Jamul Delzura area to confirm if the coding of the network was accurate in terms of the capacity in their community plans, nor did they update their land use for the buildout of their community plan. They relied on the information in the Series VII Regional Model. When they responded to comments on the Draft EIR, they found that those segments which they had found as showing up as Service Level 'F~ were not accurately coded, and thus, the volumes that were shown, even though they were low volumes, were actually causing those facilities to exceed their modeled capacity. In the new work being done on the SR-54 Corridor project, the volumes on all of the roads were significantly higher. The primary reason for that was that the land use assumptions that went into the model on the fringe area in these comm~mity plan areas. It was the actual buildout of their community plans. The three streets referenced by Mr. Phillips: Bancroft, Troy, and Broadway, were streets that were heavily impacted by the updating of the local land use in the model which changes the trip generation out of the local zones onto those local streets. Supervisor Jacob wanted all the figures analyzed and come back on August 25th. She also stated she was concerned about Millar Ranch Road. We need to know what the potential was with the given buildout for Millar Ranch Road and what it means to the surrounding area. MINUTES July 22, 1993 Page 3 PRESENTATION ON ISSUE AREA "B": OTAY VALLEY PARCEL Mr. Lettieri stated that the presentation would be divided into three parts: Slides would be shown to familiarize the Council/Board with the Otay Valley Parcel in general; Fred Arbuckle, from the Baldwin Company, would show slides on the village concept; and lastly, the Council/Board would go through the eight issue areas. Supervisor Bilbray stated the major issue in the approval of this plan was the ability to make sure that what was agreed upon ends up being locked in so that in the next fifty years someone doesn't come in and change it without having the global perspective that the Council/Board was trying to develop. Along with credibility of the plan, was going to be the ability to enforce the plan over its implementation period. Mayor Nader agreed with him as it related to open space, habitat preservation, and certain amenities. However, when talking about a plan to be built over this period of time, he had no idea what new technologies, social influences, etc. may come to pass. There does have to be some realistic ability to be flexible on issues such as housing design to take in account changing life styles and land use patterns that take into account changing transportation technology, etc. Supervisor Bilbray stated he worried about the term flexibility. It has been the new modern catch word for land speculation in the development industry basically to subvert a comprehensive plan. He felt this was why it was so important to be as visionary as possible. Councilman Fox agreed that a critical part of the plan was to make it difficult to make exceptions. One of the problems in Southern California over the decades has been the ability to make exceptions to plans which were supposedly laid in concrete. Councilman Rindone asked Mr. Arbunkel if there were any plans within the village concept for "ma and pa" typ~ commercial development? Mr. Arbuckle responded that there was going to be different levels of development within each of the villages in terms of the commercial component. Some villages will be smaller and some will have more. As an example, it takes aboutS,000homes to supportoneoftoday's modern grocery stores. One ofthe largest villages only has 2500 homes. There will be a grocery store in one village, but there will be a need for local services from "ma and pa' type operations in the next village. Each village will have a different combination and composition of uses. Supervisor Jacob felt it important to clarify that we were dealing with a General Plan amendment. We were not dealing with the types of houses or architectural style. It was important as we go through the hearings that we keep that in mind. Mr. Lettied stated that the procedure for considering the issues was to present the staff report, give time for the applicant to make a presentation, comments from the public, then the Council/Board would deliberate on the issue. The following issues were presented: ® Issue 1: Should Village No. 3 develop residentialIv or industrially? Mr. Arbuckle, from the Baldwin Company, stated that the applicant supports the concept of Village 3 with industrial on the western portion and with residential on the east. The reason being was that further to the east was Wolfe Canyon and single family homes. Village 4 has low density single family homes. They felt this was an opportunity to introduce a higher end component within the western pereel because it views down into Wolfe Canyon. Mayor Nader asked how do we reconcile the surplus industrial land with what has been heard in the business community of a shortage of land available for manufacturing and industrial uses? MINUTES July 22, 1993 Page 4 Mr. L~iter state~l that one of the things looked at was the extension of the existing industrial area to the east. We think it was a logical expansion area and made sense to have a mass of industrial land within that area. This was connected to the Otay Mesa area. Supervisor Bilbray stated that one of his concerns was that the decision we make does affect the surrounding housing. He felt the lower density residential will help with the marketing of the rest of the residential. His quition was that if the City of San Diego retained the industrial area and it was going to be administered tl~'ough the County, would they have the same concern about it being industrial or was it strictly on the land use issue. He was looking at how much we were getting involved with the revenue issue. Supervisor Slater felt that we should retain Village 3 as a village. She was saying that because its in support of the concept of having higher end housing but keeping in mind that we do have to be careful with what happens to the industrial zone. COUNTY MOTION: MSC (Slater/Jacob) to retain Village 3 as residential and then look at de. annexation from the City of San Diego and reannexation to the City of Chula Vista the other industrial parcels. Motion carried 3-0-2 (MacDonald and Willjams absent). CITY MOTION: MSC (Fox/Horton) to retain Village 3 as residential and then look at deannexation the other industrial parcels from the City of San Diego and reannexation to the City of Chula Vista. Councilman Moore stated he had concerns unless it was contingent upon the deannexation and reorganization being completed. \ Mayor Nader suggested that we take the City Planning Commission recommendation but put a "P" modifier over/) it so as to retain design control in case people were concerned about the quality of what the estate homes in Village 4 were going to have to look at. Mr. Arbuckle stated the service revenue plan provides for this community to pay its own way. This being non residential, the community will still pay its way. Each year we need to look back and update the service revenue plan to be sure that they were paying their own way. They felt that they satisfied the concerns regarding jobs, housing, and the number of jobs being created even with the residential component. Supervisor Bilbray stated that if the fiscalization of land use was the determining factor, then we were going to have problems with the plan. He felt the issue to be concerned about was will we be setting the pace from the beginnin~ of this Village affecting the next Village, etc. We must go beyond the ~scalization of land use. Councilman Moore stated we were looking at 23,000 acres with a very small spot for industrial. He didn't care which City it was in. He felt there was a lack of industrial. Councilman Rindone stated there has been a lot of time put into planning this project, while it was planned comprehensively, it would be processed piecemeal. The whole thrust of the project was to look at a balanced project. The industrial component was not as sufficient as it needs to be. If there was one place to provide increased area for industry, it would be this area because of the transition from what was adjacent. He was prepared to support Mr. Moore's position. Mr. Arbuckle stated they share concerns about jobs. They felt that within the eastern urban center, there was going to be 4 to 6 million square feet of office. Of that 1.8 million would be a regional mall; the rest would be business, mid-rise 15 story buildings where you get attorneys, government services, and high quality job opportunities. The industrial area was not the only place to create jobs. ,,~ MINUTES July 22, 1993 Page 5 CITY AMENDMENT TO MOTION: MS (Fox/Horton) to accept the County Planning Commission's recommendation contingent upon the deannexation of the southern proposed industrial area from City of San Diego and that would become industrial. CITY AMENDMENT TO MOTION: M (Moore) that the approval he contingent upon equal industrial acreage within the project area other than the City of San Diego. (Amendment agreeable to both the mover and seconder of the original motion). Motion carried unanimously 5-0. Supervisor Jacob stated there was a difference of opinion between the two agencies, so how can we move ahead? At some point in time, we were going to have to come to some resolution to reach an agreement. She asked the applicant if the action taken by the City Council was acceptable to them'?. Greg Smith, from the Baldwin Company, stated he agreed more with the County's position. He hoped as we go though this process, this will become a semantical difference as we go through LAFCO and it will be resolved. Issue 2. How many roads should cross the river valley to Otav Mesa? COUNTY MOTION: MS (Slater/Jacob) to approve the County/City staff recommendation No. 4. Mr. Lettied stated the only reason this was listed as an issue was the Otay Ranch Citizen's Governing Committee had requested deletion of Alia Road because of the environmental effects. But the Commissions and staffs agree that Alta Road should be a "safety value" and shown as a righi-of-way protection. Supervisor Bilbray called for those interested in addressing the Council/Board on Alta Road to come forward: Pat Gerrodette, Chair of Land Use Committee for Sierra Club, urged that there be only two road crossings in order to minimize the impact on the resources in the river valley. Barbara Gilman, 733 Second Avenue, Chula Vista, 91910, representing the Citizens Advisory Board, stated their position was to have three crossings and to delete Alta Road completely. Pan of the reason was for environmental reasons, but they also had a strong feeling that the regional park proposed should be divided up as little as possible. They felt the City of San Diego should redesign their land use because we should not need that road. Bill Tibbets, California Department of Fish and Game, concurred with the Service that two roads were appropriate. Especially with some modifications to not completely fracture corridors and continuous habitats between those wad crossings. Supervisor Jacob asked what the traffic and circulation impacts would be if we went to two roads. Mr. Letteiri responded that the major impacts were on the surface roads through this area. It would cause these roads to go to eight lanes. The freeway, which was one of the four, would go to Level of Service "F." That was with the assumption that 6,000 acres of industrial develops. Councilman Fox asked for a clarification of the fragmentation caused to the future Otay Regional Park because of Alia Road. MINUTES July 22, 1993 Page 6 Mr. Lettieri responded that the future of the Regional Park extends from the Bay to the Lakes area. The concern expressed was that with the three crossings that could impact the viability of the Park. VOTE ON COUNTY MOTION: Carried 3-0-2 (MacDonald and Williams absent) CITY MOTION: MS (Fox/Nader) to approve the City's Governing Committee recommendation to delete Alia Road. Councilman Moore stated that when the City of San Diego was talking about the traffic which would be generated from Sun Diego's industrial development, they went from 130 trips per acre to 100 trips per acre and there was still questions as to whether they went too low. With the 100 trips per acre (San Diego has approximately 4,000 acres of industrial), the three major highways which included 8R-125 would be at ten lanes at Service Level 'F.' He sta~:l you have to have another crossing. He felt the worst thing you could do was to do away with the potential of Alta Road. Mayor Nader stated this was an issue which the Citizen's Advisory Group had studied thoroughly and had come up with a recommendation to try to pressure the City of San Diego to change its approach in order to protect the environment and the viability of the proposed Regional Park rather than build a fourth river crossing. That seems to be a reasonable recommendation. SUBSTITUTE MOTION: MS (Moore/Rindone) to approve the County Planning Commission's recommendation to have three crossings with the reservation for Alta Road fight-of-way. Motion failed 2-3 (Fox, Horton, Nader voting no). VOTE ON ORIGINAL MOTION: Approved 3-2 (Moore and Rindone voting no). · Issue 3: Should transit core densities be increased from 14.5 du/acm? William Anderson, President for Citizens Coordinate for Century Three, 1549 El Prado, San Diego, 92103, addressed their position regarding the density in the Villages. He encouraged the Council/Board to consider increasing the density allowed in the village cores up to twenty five to support transit. He felt more density should be in the transit cores, then there would be less pressure for development in the open space areas. Nico Calavita, Associate Professor of City Planning, San Diego State University, stated he had testified before the Planning Commission for a higher density from 18 to 25 units to the acre. He felt it was a great waste to have a plan which was regional in scope which involved mass transit and not have densities at that level. Mr. Lettieri, in presenting the staff report, stated there were a number of issues associated with increasing density. What happens when you increase the density from 16 to 25 du/acre in the core itself. For example, if you look at the Otay Valley parcel, you were increasing the number of units without a concurrent decrease in the rest of the residential. You were increasing the number of units up to 2700 on the five villages which serve the light rail system; that equates to a potential of approximately 20-25,000 trips outside the project. Staff would have some concerns about that. However, the incremental increase from 16 to 18 du/acre, based on the initial analysis by JHK, was that it was a negligible increase. Staff would have to determine and elarif3~ with the EIR consultant whether this was addressed in the EIR. If the tentative action was to go with any number whether it was 16, 18, or 25, staff would come back to make a recommendation on the EIR. Mayor Nader asked why staff recommended 16 du/acre since there was no significant difference between 16 and 187 MINUTES July 22, 1993 Page 7 Mr. Lettieri responded that staff originally recommended 14.5. They were currently recommending 16 because that was what was reviewed at the time and they were trying to get the minimum number of units to meet the transit oriented development. MTDB recommended 18-25 du/acre on a net basis. He stated that we were at a net basis. If you look at taking out streets and all of the facilities, we were almost at 20 du/acre. The transit oriented guidelines state that a net density of 18-25 du/acres was recommended in the kind of villages such as the Otay Ranch. Supervisor Bilbray asked what it would do to the EIR if we give densities here and took it out on the single family units? Wouldn't this reduce the projected trip miles by automobiles? Mr. Lettieri answered that it would reduce the net impact on automobile traffic because you have a lower generation factor on multiple family. Mayor Nader asked Planning Commissioner Martin what the Planning Commission's view was on the density. Tom Martin, City Planning Commissioner, replied that their thought was that 16 du/acre was a much easier figure to work with. He did not remember exactly why 16 over 18 since they had discussed a number of issues. Councilman Fox suggested that the County consider a motion that would support the applicant's position which was 18, but asked staff to look at "up to 25" and come back with that analysis. Mayor Nader felt Supervisor Bilbray's comment to go with the original lowest density recommendation as a base but to provide that, if in fact, the transit was actually developed, it could go higher. The rationale for the higher density was the mass transit system. COUNTY MOTION: MSC (Jacob/Slater) to refer this to staff to come back with a report on the maximum number of dwelling units that could be allowed under the current environmental documents. Motion earfled 3-0-1 (MacDonald and Williams absent). CITY MOTION: MSUC (Fox/Horton) to approve the County recommendation (to refer this to staff and come back with a report on the maximum number of dwelling units that could be allowed under the current environmental documents). · Issue 4: Should development on the Otav Valley parcel be tied to transit funding assistance? COUNTY: MS (Slater/Jacob) to adopt the County Planning Commission recommendations. Patricia Gerrodette felt that Cross Roads had made an excellent suggestion in tying further development to the mass transit. Greg Smith, from the Baldwin Company, stated if you don't have the riders, they won't operate the line. Councilman Moore stated in order to make the light rail successful and get the ridership, you have to go through a city or have a major employment group going in and out of a city. You will not get it because you will not get the ridership. You have to go in, out, or through the city. The ideal thing was to go through it. In this ease, it was going to be a very costly line to get from SR-54 to Telegraph Canyon and then to go into two or three villages and stop. COUNTY VOTE ON MOTION: approved 3-0-2 (MacDonald and Williams absent). MINUTES July 22, 1993 Page 8 CITY: MSC (Rindone/Fox) to adopt the County Harming Commission recommendations. Motion carried 4--1 (Moore no). Mayor Nader suggested that the Council/Board consider extending the remaining hearings an hour to 7:00 p.m. Supervisor Bilbray stated that they will try to extend the time. They will all look at their schedules and will be a goal after their budget hearings. Mayor Nader adjoumed the meeting at 5:55 p.m. The next joint hearing will be held on Monday, July 26, 1993 in the Chula Vista Council Chambers. Respectfully submitted, Beverly A. huthelet, CMC City Clerk