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March
15, 2004
John
Wilmot, Chair
Monterey County Planning Commission
240 Church Street
Salinas, CA 94901
RE:
The Economy, Jobs & Housing
Dear
Members of the Commission:
The
focus for your March 17th hearing on the General Plan Update is
the “Economy, Jobs & Housing.”
LandWatch
urges you to make changes to the current draft that will better
support the long term health of the County’s economy, that
will balance job and housing production, and that will produce more
affordable housing available to those who currently work in or reside
in Monterey County.
Our
specific recommendations will be forthcoming on or before your March
26th deadline.
We urge the Commission not to begin trying to “make changes”
in the draft document until you have completed your public hearing
and comment period, on March 26th, and have received the recommendations
of all persons interested in the General Plan Update who want to
comment. Everyone is working on a very “tight timeline”
to get comments to you, and members of the public, frankly, have
been upset to hear some Commissioners complain that the public comments
received in your hearings (where 3-minutes is the limit for comments)
are not “substantive.”
LandWatch—and
I believe others—assume that your March 26th deadline is meaningful,
and that the Commission and its members will not start “making
up their minds” and begin evaluating possible changes to the
current draft until after that March 26th deadline has passed, and
you’ve heard from everyone who chooses to comment. That is
the only way to treat the public fairly. The deadline was
set by the Commission. We and others plan to meet it, and we do
not appreciate complaints that we have not submitted “substantive”
comments prior to the deadline that you yourselves have established.
I
make this observation with particular reference to detailed comments
submitted by the self-styled “Refinement Group,” which
in fact is the “Business and Development Group.” The group
is improperly using the “Refinement Group” name (since
the Refinement Group established by the Board of Supervisors was
officially terminated by the Board some months ago). It has a membership
closely paralleling the 21st Century Solutions coalition that has
consistently opposed the draft General Plan Update. The so-called
“Refinement Group” has been working on its detailed comments
for months, and is making comments based on a former draft of the
GPU. Please let the public at least have the benefit of the timeline
you established, in commenting on the current draft of the General
Plan Update.
The Economy,
Jobs & Housing – Listen To The Experts
The
Economic Impact Analysis on the GPU, prepared by Applied Development
Economics, convincingly demonstrates that stopping rural subdivisions,
and focusing new growth into existing urban areas, will provide
the best fiscal and economic effects for Monterey County. In other
words, this study validates what the public has been telling you,
and what the Twelve Guiding Objectives mandate.
Specifically,
the Economic Impact Analysis says:
- Unincorporated
development exerts higher service costs on County government,
than does growth in the cities. Of the $11 million incremental
deficit created by the GPU growth, $10 million is associated with
unincorporated development, and only $1 million with city growth,
despite the much higher growth levels in the cities [Page ii;
Page 18].
- More
than 85 percent of workers need housing priced at $376,000 or
less [Page v].
- Residential
development should not outpace job development in each area [Page
vii].
- From
a policy perspective, the County may wish to avoid encouraging
substantial industrial development in the unincorporated area
in the Central Salinas Valley or South County [Page 7].
- Lower
growth scenarios show a smaller deficit, while the higher growth
scenarios increase the County’s fiscal deficit
[Page 9; Page 17].The study…identified the cost to the County,
per residence, for residents who live in the unincorporated County
but work in another county. This cost is estimated at $466 per
residence [per year], more than six times the cost per residence
for those who both live and work in the unincorporated County
[Page 18].
- The
unincorporated County’s role as a bedroom community, either
for workers employed in neighboring counties or for workers employed
in Monterey County, is very expensive and a constant net drain
on County resources [Page 20].
- Low
density residential developments generate costs that are much
greater than high or even medium density developments
[Page 20].
- Studies
documenting the fiscal benefits of compact development…have
addressed the issue in all parts of the country…and California
[Page 21].
- The
County should avoid significant amounts of low density development
in rural, poorly served areas…. [Page 22].
- Agricultural
land reductions potentially impact this cluster [the Agricultural
Services Cluster], and could erode its dominant position within
the Monterey County economy.
- Policies
that provide more flexibility regarding use … may improve
agricultural land value or farm income but in aggregate and over
time weaken overall agricultural viability by increasing
land values beyond the point supported by agricultural value [Pages
42-43; emphasis added].
- The
unincorporated areas around Rancho San Juan produce higher value
crops such as strawberries, which results in a much higher potential
impact per acre [for conversion of these agricultural uses to
urban uses] [ Page 46].
- The
extraordinary beauty of the communities along the coast draw very
high income individuals, some of which [sic] retire in the area.
It is also due in part to the demand for commuter housing from
workers in silicon Valley….The primary evidence of the [county’s]
economic transition is the rapid escalation of housing prices
throughout the County [Page 62].
- It
is critical that the public infrastructure not degrade
further as new development proceeds [Page 63; emphasis added].
- Residential
development should not outpace job development in each area [Page
63].
The Economy,
Jobs & Housing – Conclusion
To
improve our local economy, and to provide good jobs and good housing,
the GPU must:
- Slow
down growth
- Stop
low-density suburban development and focus growth in existing
urban areas
- Tie
new residential development to local job growth
- Disallow
development before needed infrastructure is available
- Require
a significant share of permanently affordable housing ($376,000
and below)
- Refuse
calls for the kind of “flexibility” that will undermine
our agricultural economy
- Disallow
Rancho San Juan
In
fact, this is what the Twelve Guiding Objectives also require. On
or before March 26th, LandWatch plans to submit detailed recommendations
on how you can change the current draft GPU to achieve these objectives.
However, we think the Commission gets the idea. Your first set of
recommendations to the Board of Supervisors much more closely tracked
what the Economic Impact Analysis calls for. We hope you’ll
“stay the course,” and make just the same kind of recommendations
this time around.
As
the Economic Impact Analysis shows, only this kind of leadership,
and these kinds of policies, will maintain and strengthen the local
economy, as well as protecting and preserving our quality of life.
[Return
to County Plan Update Issues and Actions]
posted
03.16.04
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