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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2009-01-08; Housing Commission; MinutesMinutes of: HOUSING COMMISSION Time of Meeting: 6:00 P.M. Date of Meeting: January 8, 2009 Place of Meeting: CITY COUNCIL CHAMBERS CALL TO ORDER Chairperson Smith called the Meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Commissioner Wrisley led with the Pledge of Allegiance. ROLL CALL Present: Commissioners: Emelda Bradwell Craig Kirk Bobbie Smith Hope Wrisley Absent: Doris Ritchie Staff Present: Housing and Redevelopment Director: Debbie Fountain Senior Planner: Scott Donnell APPROVAL OF MINUTES Minutes of December 11, 2008, were approved as written. VOTE: 2-0 AYES: Kirk and Smith NOES: None ABSTAIN: Bradwell and Wrisley (absent from meeting) ABSENT: Ritchie ITEM NOT ON AGENDA There were no items that were not on the agenda. NEW BUSINESS Debbie Fountain, Director of Housing and Redevelopment, presented the item on the agenda which is the 2005 to 2010 draft Housing Element. This is a request for a recommendation from the Housing Commission to the Planning Commission and City Council to adopt the update and the revisions to the General Plan Housing Element for the noted cycle. Scott Donnell, Senior Planner, is the project planner and will make the presentation. He is assisted by Veronica Tarn, our Housing Consultant. Mr. Donnell said this is the staff report on the 2005-2010 Housing Element. It covers this housing cycle, which is this five-year period mentioned here. First I would like to give a summary. We will have an introduction and start off with some basic project and meeting information. We will also discuss staffs recommendation, what your action is and what it means, as well as some parameters for public input for tonight's meeting. I will then turn the presentation over to Veronica Tarn, and she will provide you with the basics on the Housing Element; what its purpose is, what some state mandates are, and how Carlsbad, just like every other city and county in California, is affected by a host of new state housing laws that are reflected in our proposed Housing Element. Speaking of the proposed Housing Element, we will go over what the contents of that Element are and highlight some of the programs. Much of the effort staff has put in towards this Housing Element has been to find adequate sites in order to meet some growth projections the state has established. Those growth projections are known as RHNA or the Regional Housing Needs Assessment. While many of our HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 2 of 20 programs deal with RHNA, there are also other programs as well in the Housing Element; we will briefly touch on those too. Finally, the presentation will wrap up with a discussion about what the ramifications are to cities and counties that do not adopt a Housing Element. Last of all, we will look at the review schedule from when the Housing Commission finishes its review through when the Housing Element would be certified. As the Housing and Redevelopment Director mentioned, Veronica Tarn and I are available to answer any questions as well as Ms. Fountain. The draft version of the Housing Element that is recommended for approval is that with the date of December 2008. You received a copy earlier. That document is also available on the city's website on the Planning Homepage. That is important because there have been two earlier versions of this draft. The first was released in April 2007, the second one was released in June 2008, and then finally this third and hopefully the final draft which was just released last month. It is that final draft that reflects the approval or the desires of HCD as to what they would like to see in our Housing Element. HCD has sent the city a letter of compliance indicating the draft Housing Element that you have before does comply with state law. That letter as well as the Housing Element are both available on the city's website. Copies of this PowerPoint presentation, should you desire any information in it, has been provided to the Housing Commission. There are also copies of this presentation in the foyer in the back should any members of the audience like to have it. Some additional meeting information: The Housing Element is part of the City's General Plan. The General Plan is our blueprint for how we want to grow. Because it is part of the General Plan, approval of the Housing Element ultimately requires an amendment to the General Plan. It is an element of the General Plan. It is one of the mandated elements by the state, and any time one of those elements is changed an amendment is required. The purpose of tonight's meeting is to consider that amendment by receiving this staff presentation, by considering any public comments that are made tonight or in writing on the proposed update to the Housing Element, and then finally to consider making a recommendation on the Housing Element update. Our recommendation is approval of this Housing Element update, and that would be a recommendation of approval of a General Plan amendment to adopt the Housing Element update. Your recommendation will then be forwarded to the Planning Commission and City Council, and it is the City Council that makes the final decision on whether or not to approve the Housing Element. Your action is a recommendation only. It will not result in approval of the Housing Element, nor will it result in approval of any of the land changes or programs that are proposed in this document. It is the City Council that approves the Housing Element. Even with that said, the Housing Element, like the rest of the General Plan, is just a policy document. It does not implement any land use changes once it is approved. Instead, the bulk of the programs and all of the programs that call for land use changes will require a separate review and approval at later hearings that will take place after the Housing Element if it is adopted. Public comment, of course, is welcome tonight. This meeting was extensively noticed to encourage that public comment. We have developed a mailing list that includes organizations, individual housing advocates, business, as well as homeowner's associations. Should anybody desire to speak tonight, there is no need to fill out a speaker's slip. Also, there will be further public comment opportunities in addition to tonight's meeting. There will be the Planning Commission public hearing as well as the City Council public hearing. Both of those meetings will be noticed. Everybody that received a notice of tonight's meeting will also receive a notice of these future meetings before the Planning Commission and City Council. If anybody did not get a notice of tonight's meeting, there is a sign-up sheet in the foyer. They are welcome to put their name and mailing address or e-mail address and we can make sure notices are sent to them once they are ready for these upcoming meetings. The basics of Housing Element 101: Why we do it and what the state requires us to do will be presented by Veronica Tam, our Housing Element Consultant. Ms. Tam will give an overview of what the Housing Element is. It is a major achievement the city was able to get a compliance letter from the state. It is something that is very difficult to come by. Many communities, even in San Diego County, are still struggling in trying to get a compliance letter from the HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 3 of 20 state. The Housing Element recognizes that housing is an essential commodity for every single household and every single person in California. Every person is entitled to decent and adequate housing within the state of California, including those people who have special needs; elderly, disabled, homeless and large households. In many situations the state recognizes it is the local community's responsibility to actually address housing needs for all economic segments of the community because the market usually takes care of the upper income households. The Housing Element inherently implies the emphasis to providing housing for low and moderate income households. Further in the Housing Element law it emphasizes you have to provide housing for all income groups, including those who are low and moderate income. As Mr. Donnell mentioned before, the Housing Element is an integral component of the General Plan. It recognizes that the housing market is more volatile and therefore needs to be updated frequently. The General Plan is updated every ten to fifteen years or even longer, twenty years. It has a longer horizon. The housing market is so volatile that it needs to be updated more frequently. Previously, the law says every five years. There has been new legislation that it could actually be extended to eight years or it can be shortened to four years. We will explain that later when we get to the ramifications. The timeframe is usually between four to eight years that you can update the Housing Element. It applies to all jurisdictions, all 478 cities in the state and 57 counties in the state. Each jurisdiction has to meet this requirement. The Housing Element has to go through a very rigorous review by a state agency, the State Department of Housing and Community Development, is responsible for that review. This review is extremely stringent and onerous. That is why we have mentioned it is an achievement to get a compliance letter from the state. When we look at the Housing Element, the basic content of the Housing Element has several components. One, we must look at the current needs of the residents and also projected needs of the residents; what is needed in the community, what will be needed in the community, based on the demographics of the community and projected trends in terms of the demographics. We need to do fairly extensive needs assessment. Then we have to identify the constraints and opportunities within the community. When we talk about constraints, we are really talking about the market constraints, the environmental constraints, and the governmental constraints. Even though we have to recognize market constraints and environmental constraints, the state law recognizes you have very little control over those two elements. However, governmental constraints, things you do, your policies, your regulations, and your standards, those are the things you have control over. If your policies and regulations are found to be constraining to the Housing Element, you are obligated to mitigate or eliminate that constraint. That is something the Housing Element focuses on; the policies and regulations you have as a community in dealing with housing. In terms of opportunities, financial resources you have, incentives you offer, and most importantly, the land resources, the residential sites you have available to meet the housing needs of the community, and not only just now, but in the next few years. The Housing Element has to identify a strategy, which Mr. Donnell will cover later in the proposed programs and how you are going to deal with your housing needs. In looking at the Housing Element, the most critical component to getting a certification of compliance status from the state is something called the Regional Housing Needs Allocation. What that really entails is the State of California Department of Finance working in conjunction with the State Department of Housing and Community Development to project how much housing is needed in the state over the next five to ten years. Then they allocate to each jurisdiction within the state. Every single jurisdiction gets an allocation. The San Diego Association of Government is the regional body that is responsible for taking that allocation from the state, from San Diego County, and allocating to each individual jurisdiction within the county. To get that number that you must meet, you must be able to accommodate that housing need within your community. Your obligation is to make sure you have planned for the residential growth that can accommodate the need. If the market is such that the housing doesn't get built, it is okay because you are not in control of the market. However, you must be able to plan adequate sites in order to accommodate that growth should the market turn around and allow the housing to be constructed. That is the legal obligation of the Regional Housing Needs Allocation. Once given an allocation, the City of Carlsbad conducted a lot of meetings such as the Planning Commission and the Housing Commission in order to gather input. That process of developing the Housing Element is critical in reflecting in what we HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 4 of 20 have in the Housing Element that is consulting with a lot of different groups including staff and different agencies. There is also negotiating with the state in terms of what would be an acceptable Housing Element. The drafting of the Housing Element took quite a few months and then it was sent off to the state for their review. The state's review takes two months every time you submit a revision to the state or some kind of changes to the state. Throughout that process we have to negotiate policies, we have negotiated incentives in order to put it in the Housing Element. That negotiation took quite a bit of time. Ultimately the draft we had in December got an approval letter from the state. Once we got that letter on the draft Housing Element, we are moving forward right now with the adoption process. Once the Housing Element is adopted by the City Council, we have to send it back to the state for their review again because they want to make sure you actually did adopt the Housing Element they have reviewed and approved. If any changes we have done would constitute any substantial policy change, we need to restart that whole process again. The Housing Element is a very stringent review because Housing Element laws probably are the most extensive in California among all states in the nation. Housing in California is the most regulated aspect of planning compared to the rest of the country. There are many different laws that govern how the Housing Element should be written with other housing policies and programs that need to be included in the Housing Element. Recognizing there are so many different issues with local land use planning, there have been a lot of changes to the state law, particularly relating to housing land use planning. We wanted to quickly go over some of the key laws. The first one is SB520, Housing for Persons of Disabilities. We have to address the constraints in local policies relating to providing housing for persons with disabilities. Specifically, the state requires the adoption of a reasonable accommodation policy or ordinance in order to provide housing for persons with disabilities. AB2292 establishes minimum densities for housing developments. In the Housing Element if you use a certain density to estimate your capacity, you need to stick to that and making sure you have the capacity to accommodate your RHNA. It stems from the fact a lot of jurisdictions would raise the density to very high but continue to approve projects at very low densities. If you run into situations where you approve very low density projects on very high density sites, you are required by law to replenish your sites' inventory. Housing is the most difficult to achieve for extremely low income households, that is households making 30% of the county median income. That is primarily people working in the service industry or the hospitality industry; those are the people who are making minimum wages. Housing must be available for persons with extremely low income, and stemming from that particular piece of law, we have to deal with housing for persons with disabilities again recognizing that many disabled people do not make a high income. SB2 is something that was adopted just recently last year in September. It relates to housing for the homeless. We do not have to build emergency shelters, but we must allow that to occur by zoning. You must identify zones within your community that you would permit emergency shelters to be located should a non-profit request that. So you must be able to identify a zone. It also requires people to do single-room occupancy units. Another new law that was passed in 2005 was AB1233. That relates again with the regional housing needs allocation. If you do not identify adequate sites in this Housing Element for your RHNA, you will not get a certified Housing Element. It is also a penalty that RHNA doesn't just go away. The next time you update the Housing Element, you get a new RHNA for the new Housing Element cycle, but you will also get a penalty for not meeting the RHNA in this cycle. You will have to add on top of the new RHNA in the future cycle with whatever is not being met right now from a planning perspective; whether you have zoned adequate land for it or not. SB375 was passed in October 2008 that requires the alignment of Housing Element and regional transportation planning. It does have an incentive to some extent. That particular law allows jurisdictions and regional governments to do a regional forecast in terms of growth over an eight year period. If you have a certified Housing Element, the Housing Element planning period becomes an eight year Housing Element so you don't have to update every five years. HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 5 of 20 The one that is very difficult for a lot of communities is AB2348. It establishes some minimum densities in order to accommodate the RHNA. The state has automatically established thirty units to the acre as the density considered to be adequate to facilitate and encourage the development of housing for lower income households in metropolitan areas, which includes Carlsbad. Mr. Donnell said Ms. Tarn's presentation, her overview, and the discussion of the laws especially, including AB2348, are a good segue into talking about what our proposed Housing Element actually contains. Briefly we will talk about the first six sections of the Housing Element. The first section, the Introduction, is a lot of what Ms. Tarn just discussed in the way of the basics; why we do the Housing Element and what the state law mandates. It also provides discussion about previous public input that you as the Housing Commission have heard regarding the proposed Housing Element. For example, there is a write-up in Section 1 that discusses the comments received at your last meeting on this subject in April 2007. The Housing Needs Assessment is Section 2. That looks at census information, data regarding population, ethnicity, characteristics of households, overcrowded households, single family, female headed households, housing prices, homeless counts, census data, etc. A lot of the information in this section is outdated because it is based on the census. That will be updated next year and the years following once the 2010 census results are out. This Section 2 is what establishes what the housing needs are for Carlsbad. Section 3, Resources Available, analyzes what we have to offer in the way of land for future residential development. It also discusses things such as financial resources, the City's affordable housing trust fund and other monies that are available for example to assist developers with the building of affordable housing. Section 4, Constraints and Mitigating Opportunities, looks at different kinds of constraints, whether they are private sector constraints, governmental constraints or environmental constraints. Environmental constraints in Carlsbad include things like hillsides, habitat areas, areas that have to be set aside and preserved based on various state and federal mandates. Governmental constraints might include things like the City of Carlsbad's permitting process. Private sector constraints would include the cost of land, the cost the developers have to pay in order to build housing. That all influences the programs we have to have to assist developers when necessary to build housing that is affordable to families with very low and low incomes. Section 5 is a review of the 1999 Housing Element, the previous Housing Element which was adopted in the year 2000. When you read that section in conjunction with Appendix B, you can see the results of how effectively the city was able to implement the various programs and policies of that previous Housing Element. Finally, Section 6 is our Housing Plan. It contains the various programs, policies, objectives to address and help establish and provide housing based on the needs that have been identified for this housing cycle. After all of those sections, we have various appendices, many of those appendices constitute our detailed land inventory. For every program we have recommended that has been based on a certain type of area from which we hope to see some sort of unit yield, there is a detailed parcel by parcel inventory that explains what each parcel can yield in terms of numbers of units. That is important. As mentioned before, our previous Housing Element was adopted in 2000. Most of the Housing Element programs from that Housing Element have been carried forward. That is to say they are successful and still valid. For example, we have a program, 2.5 in the previous Housing Element, which encourages mixed-use development. You will see we do that in the Village Redevelopment Area and we will be encouraging it in other areas as well. It remains a valid program in Carlsbad. HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 6 of 20 Another program we kept was Program 3.68 to continue our inclusionary requirements. That has been a wonderful asset for the City in terms of producing housing that is affordable to very low and low income families. An example of a program that was deleted, and I believe there are probably about four or five programs that did not get carried forward to the new proposed Housing Element, was 4.1, A Housing Impact Fee. That was a fee that would have been placed on developers of non-residential construction. The money that would have been generated from that fee, for example, would go to assist in the construction of affordable housing. That impact fee has not been adopted. It is recommended to be deleted as a program. The majority of the programs that are new have been proposed to comply with state law. The state law that has gained our attention and effort has been AB2348 dealing with the regional housing needs assessment. This is a growth projection the State Department of Finance and Housing and Community Development develop. These numbers are then transmitted to the various councils of government, which in our case is SANDAG. It is the job of SANDAG to distribute these growth projections to the different cities and county here. This exact same process happens everywhere, whether you are in Shasta County, San Francisco, Sacramento, but we are just focusing on San Diego, but you can rest assured the process is similar elsewhere in California. That Regional Housing Needs Assessment gets translated into a 7 1/£ year number from January 2003 through June 2010. As you can see, Carlsbad's share of that growth projection is about 8,400 units. In other words, the state is saying, through SANDAG, the City of Carlsbad needs to show it has the land available and the programs provided to accommodate about 8,400 units. You can see those 8,400 units then get broken down by income group. Each one of us falls into one of these income groups. The Regional Housing Needs Assessment estimates we need to provide 40% of our housing to people who earn above moderate incomes. It also says 40% of our housing needs to be made affordable to very low and low incomes. As Ms. Tarn mentioned, the State Department of Housing and Community Development considers densities of 30 units or more per acre to be a de facto density that is acceptable or appropriate for very low and low income families. In Carlsbad we have been able to convince the state that densities appropriate for very low and low incomes households are at least 20 units per acre, which is below the state minimum. We also have some programs that are proposing densities of 28 units per acre. We must provide the land to meet the RHNA. We do not need to provide the units. The city is not obligated to build 8,376 units. We just simply have to show we have land at the appropriate densities to accommodate those 8,376 units in this program. To do that, we prepare an inventory. That inventory is very detailed. It breaks down all of the residential land in Carlsbad by parcel, indicating what its general plan designation is, indicating how many units can be realized from each parcel. That is in the back of the Housing Element. In terms of our progress in meeting the RHNA, if you recall I said the number begins in January 2003 and it is a great thing to be able to report that Carlsbad has built over 1,200 units since then, affordable to lower income families, as well as moderate income families. Despite all of the progress we have made since 2003, the city is still obligated to find land to accommodate 3,566 units that are considered affordable to lower and moderate income families. That means in Carlsbad we need to provide land at densities of 20 units per acre or more for lower income units and 12 units per acre for moderate income units. When you analyze the City's General Plan and Zoning Ordinance as they exist today, we can't meet the figure. This is a constraint. Obviously our policies and programs as they exist are inadequate. To meet RHNA, therefore, we have to devise programs to figure out how to accommodate these 3,500 units. When I mention the General Plan and the Zoning Ordinance maps, this PowerPoint slide shows a segment of the General Plan Land Use map. If you were to look at the entire city, you would see a map that regulates all types of land uses in Carlsbad. As an example, the City Council is located in the government designation. A lot of the area around here and around the high school is designated for residential. If you included the rest of the City of Carlsbad, all of these different residential land use designations, when they are added up, don't enable us to meet our RHNA. That is how we get into programs. HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 7 of 20 The inventory we did counted not only vacant land, but it also counted properties that are considered underutilized. Underutilized properties are those which maybe are a one-acre parcel with a single-family home that is actually designated for multifamily residential. There is a good opportunity that such a property might redevelop. In addition to counting vacant land towards meeting our RHNA, we can count properties such as that because they have a potential to redevelop with more units. Even if we count the vacant and the underutilized, we still fall short of meeting our RHNA, those 3,566 units. For the first time in its history, Carlsbad has, through its Housing Element, had to introduce programs that would increase minimum densities, identify sites for higher densities, and develop standards for mixed use. All of these programs are subject to more and substantial review before the Planning Commission and the City Council. The adoption of the Housing Element ultimately by Council will tell the City staff what the marching orders are to implement the programs. It will still require separate applications to come back before we actually do make land use changes. In addition to counting programs that are self-initiated or City-initiated, we are also relying on some private development proposals to help us meet our RHNA. Carlsbad, as a city, would be proposing some programs in the Housing Element to help meet our RHNA and these programs can be found in program 2.1, which is in Section 6 of your Housing Element. These are sites the City has identified to help us meet our RHNA. The first site is Quarry Creek. This is in the northern part of the city along the Oceanside border. This is a property that currently has General Plan land use designations of residential and open space. The proposal is to take that current residential land use designation and change it to allow a greater density. That property presently allows about 160 dwelling units. We are proposing to change the land use designations to allow 500 dwelling units. We have also looked at the Village Area in Carlsbad to increase the allowable minimum densities there. Presently they range anywhere from 15 to 35 units per acre. By increasing that minimum density from 15 units to a higher number, we can realize potentially a yield of 875 units. The Barrio Area, which is south of the Village, west of Interstate 5 and north of Tamarack, is another area we see that has the potential for density increases and also to allow mixed use. If we factor in those density increases, we think there is a yield of about 330 units. We also think some of the shopping centers in Carlsbad, such as Plaza Camino Real, are opportunities for mixed-use residential development. Also our Ponto area on the southern part of the city, you may recall a vision plan was adopted, and if that vision plan is implemented, it would enable perhaps 160 units. This program would put in place the land use designations that would enable developers to come in and build units at these increased densities or based on mixed-use standards. That same program, 2.1, also proposes additional changes. We have two General Plan density categories that are suitable for moderate income and lower income families. They have minimum densities and would be affected by new densities proposed in the Housing Element. The same holds true for the Village. We have also called out the mixed use in the Barrio Area. Just to highlight that Barrio Area, presently it allows residential densities of four or eight units per acre. The proposed density under the Housing Element would be 12 units per acre or 28 units per acre. These would be minimum densities. As I mentioned, we are also counting some private proposals by developers. These are projects that either were already approved or are now going through the process. The first is Bridges at Aviara, which has a 65 unit affordable housing project. This is a project that is in the Dove Library area, west of El Camino Real. La Costa Towne Square is a large residential commercial project in the La Costa area. That should yield about 135 units of high density housing that we can count as being appropriate for lower income families. Finally, Robertson Ranch is a project that was approved in 2005. It is developed today in terms of grading and pads have been created. That project will yield about 465 units at a minimum of 20 dwelling units per acre. That is the magic figure for us to be considered as having a density acceptable for lower income units. I want to assure the Housing Commission that just like all of the affordable housing projects that exist today in Carlsbad, whether it is Villa Loma or other projects, the programs we are recommending to change land use designations are on sites scattered throughout the city. Speaking of scattered sites, let's first take a look at Quarry Creek at the northern part of the city. We also have a shopping center that we think might be a suitable site for mixed use. That is the Smart and Final HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 8 of 20 Center along the east side of El Camino Real. Also, we have Plaza Camino Real, the Village Area, the Barrio Area, the shopping center at Tamarack and Interstate 5, and a little commercial area known as the country store along El Camino Real. Once again, these are sites potentially either for residential or mixed- use residential at high densities. Other sites include the Robertson Ranch area that I mentioned, the Ponto area down at the southern part of the city just south of Poinsettia, the Bridges at Aviara project in the vicinity of Dove Library, and a shopping center at the corner of La Costa and El Camino Real. We think this shopping center, where there is a Von's today, is a potential site for a shopping center with mixed-use development. Also we are counting the La Costa Town Square project along Rancho Santa Fe. We are not concentrating all affordable housing in any one location. It has taken quite a bit of time to develop sites that are located throughout Carlsbad. There has been an extensive effort done to try to find sites to meet our RHNA. When all is done and said, when you look at the sites we just discussed, when you take a look at the vacant land and the underutilized land we have, here is the result: We have that remaining RHNA figure of 3,566 units. When we take a look at all of our proposals, we end up with over 619 units more of lower income units than we need. But if you take a look at moderate income, we have almost 600 units fewer than what we need. Fortunately, the lower income makes up for the moderate income. We end up with a surplus of about 25 units. We are 25 units over our RHNA figure. While certainly the emphasis tonight has been on how we meet our RHNA, we have additional programs that tie in well with some of the laws that Veronica mentioned earlier. Program 3.4 requires the city to create 70 units of non-inclusionary affordable housing, and actually we have met that program through the construction of Cassia Heights on El Camino Real as well as the Roosevelt Gardens project that is in construction in the Village. Program 3.11 requires us to develop a reasonable accommodations policy for persons with disabilities. Case in point would be someone who needs to add a bedroom onto the first floor of their house because they are no longer able to climb the stairs. There would need to be a policy to accommodate that type of thing, or perhaps a garage that has to be widened or expanded to accommodate a special vehicle. We also need to amend our industrial zones to permit emergency shelters or homeless shelters. Finally, we have a program that requires us to adopt an ordinance to permit managed living units; these are single-room occupancy units like a studio where someone may live on a temporary or a permanent basis. Now Ms. Tarn will present on Housing Element ramifications, what will happen if the Housing Element is not adopted. Ms. Tam said previously the Housing Element law didn't have a lot of incentives. That is why in the 1990's Housing Element compliance was minimal. Probably about half of the jurisdictions in the state complied with the Housing Element law. Increasingly the state recognizes it is really important so they have continued to rework the Housing Element law and provide more incentives and also more penalties relating to Housing Element compliance. In the last round, Housing Element compliance was close to 80% compliance for all the jurisdictions in the state. One of the key reasons for getting a Housing Element that complies with state law certified by the state is the fact it is an integral component of your General Plan. If your Housing Element is out of compliance with state law, that renders your General Plan overall legally inadequate. In many situations, that can be risky. In the event of a lawsuit, which has happened to some other jurisdictions, if you have a Housing Element that does not comply with state law, the court can actually withhold the city's ability to issue building permits. That is not just housing permits. It can be commercial permits, and it can also relate to rehabilitation and improvement additions. This recently happened to the City of Folsom. Because its Housing Element was litigated by a nonprofit organization for not complying with state law, the court ordered the state to renegotiate a settlement agreement, rework the Housing Element, and withholds Folsom's ability to issue building permits on about 600 acres of land within the city until the lawsuit is settled. When a state agency has already stated in a letter that you do not comply with law, you, as a jurisdiction, have to prove otherwise to a court, which becomes very difficult because a state agency has already determined you do not comply. If you have the state letter saying you do comply, in the event of a lawsuit, HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 9 of 20 it would be the litigant's responsibility to prove that you do not. The burden would then be on them, and it is much more difficult. That is a protection for the city, depending on the risk of litigation you have. Most recently, the state has added incentives for Housing Element certification. In 2005 and 2006 there was Proposition 46 and 1C. Those were funded specifically created to provide housing in the state. Really Housing Element compliance, particularly for Proposition 1C, requires that you have the Housing Element compliance before ypu can be eligible to apply for such funding. That funding is not only limited to affordable housing development, it also provides funding for amenities and infrastructures in association with mixed-use development and association with urban development. In a few months you will see a $200,000,000 funding availability for urban parks because a lot of communities, in providing affordable housing, have limited ability on land to provide parks and recreation opportunities for the low income households. You will not be eligible for it if you do not have a Housing Element that complies with the state law. SANDAG is a leader in the state in tying regional transportation funds with Housing Element compliance. There are certain regional transportation funds that you will not be eligible to apply if you do not have a Housing Element compliance. Earlier I mentioned SB375; SB375 aligns regional transportation planning with Housing Element planning and extends the Housing Element planning period to eight years, which is to many communities an incentive because you don't have to update the Housing Element as frequently. If you do not have a Housing Element that complies with state law, you are not eligible for that. You will, in fact, actually be penalized to update your Housing Element every four years, even more frequently than we do currently. With SB375, if your land use policies are inadequate in meeting your regional housing needs allocation, in the event of a lawsuit, the court can take over the land use jurisdiction of the community and actually rezone the land for you. Those are the major ramifications of not having a Housing Element. To summarize the presentation, Mr. Donnell presented the review schedule. Once the Housing Commission makes a recommendation to the Planning Commission and the City Council, this is what will happen next. In early 2009, from now until about April, we will circulate the environmental document for public review and we will hold adoption hearings for the Housing Element at Planning Commission and the City Council. After the City Council takes its action, we will submit the Housing Element to the state for that final certification. They have as much time as 90 days to do that certification. Once that is obtained, we will hold the hearings to carry out the various programs that we have discussed, the land use changes, an ordinance to permit emergency shelters, that type of thing. Since all of this is supposed to take place within our Housing Element cycle, which ends June 30, 2010, we need to complete these programs. We have already started to work on the reasonable accommodations policy and another program regarding farm worker housing. There is a lot of work that has to be done in the next year and a half. Once again, our recommendation is that you recommend approval of this update to the Planning Commission and the City Council. Chairperson Smith said she would like to acknowledge the Housing Commission did receive letters and staff has extra copies if you would like them. Are there any questions? Commissioner Wrisley said we have certain elements that have been identified with each unit, proposed program 2.1, Quarry Creek, the Village, the Barrio, shopping centers and Ponto. If we do not accept all of those, then we will be out of it and we won't be able to comply with our numbers, is that correct? Mr. Donnell said that is correct. Each of those components that you mentioned is important. If any one of them is taken out, then we can't meet our RHNA. Commissioner Wrisley said as I understand it, if we accept those numbers, that doesn't mean we have to build those numbers. Mr. Donnell said that is correct. Commissioner Wrisley asked is there any way you can adjust these to come up with the same total. HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 10 of 20 Mr. Donnell asked if she means, as in finding other sites. Commissioner Wrisley said either find other sites or take some units out of one and add them to another. Mr. Donnell answered yes, is the quick answer. I don't think the state necessarily cares where the sites are as long as you meet your RHNA. That is what is important. To the city, on the other hand, the difficulty is finding if we take something away from here, how are we going to make up for it elsewhere. Commissioner Kirk asked in terms of the Quarry Creek site, given it is a fairly large number of units, I would take it to confirm this is a very critical site to the overall Housing Element. Mr. Donnell said yes. Commissioner Kirk said along that line, have you considered the opportunity to up zone or rezone other areas, and what is the possibility of achieving that? Mr. Donnell said at the April 2007 hearing before the Housing Commission there was quite a bit of public comment about Quarry Creek. In response to that, city staff did try to find alternative sites. At the same time, we realized one of the projects we were counting on at that time, we could no longer count. With the loss of Quarry Creek and the loss of that other project it would have totaled about 900 units that we would have to replace. We were able to replace a portion of that by identifying the Bridges at Aviara project, which has a 65 unit affordable component. We also made up for some of that loss by up zoning or increasing the density in the Village area. We also then counted the Barrio Area, which I believe in April 2007 we weren't considering. That made up for the shortfall of one of the projects. Nevertheless, without Quarry Creek we were still unable to meet our RHNA. We did also look at additional sites in the vicinity of College and El Camino Real. One involved a property owner who was not willing to consider a land use change. The other involved a site that was not ready for high density development. It did not meet the criteria. So there were efforts made to try to find replacements for Quarry Creek. I think the City would acknowledge that if there was a way to avoid a controversial site, then we would do it. The difficulty is there just isn't. It has been a tough road to hoe to try to find a replacement. Commissioner Kirk said in terms of the proposed sites, is there a prioritization in terms of which would be built first. Mr. Donnell said no, there is not a prioritization. We realize Quarry Creek is going to be the most difficult to effectuate the land use changes to reach the unit yield we think we need; the 500 units. That is because of the multitude of permits, actions that are necessary. Neither site is more important than the other; all involve programs that will be begun simultaneously. Some will finish sooner than others. Commissioner Bradwell wanted to know of the various groups represented in RHNA, which one, if any, is targeted for priority, and are there any recommendations? Mr. Donnell said I am not sure I understand your question. Commissioner Bradwell said for development. Mr. Donnell said the City has a RHNA need only for very low, low and moderate income families. We have already met the need for above moderate income. We don't need to rezone or redesignate any land for the typical single-family home. What we do need to redesignate land for is multifamily at 20 units per acre because that is what HCD says is the minimum density we need to provide. That is our priority and all of the programs try to do just that. Commissioner Kirk said I am sure we will be talking much more about Quarry Creek, and I would like to ask a couple of questions just to develop my understanding. I understand the City of Oceanside has HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 11 of 20 jurisdiction in some aspect over Quarry Creek. Can you explain how that might impact the Quarry Creek proposal? Mr. Donnell said the jurisdiction Oceanside has regards the reclamation. There was an agreement some years ago between our two cities. They have a mining ordinance, and at the time, I think this was in the 80's, the Quarry Creek site has an active mine. The City of Carlsbad, even though that portion of Quarry Creek is in our City, did not have a mining ordinance. They were given the lead agency status to take care of the reclamation, which is once that mine is closed down and it has been now for ten years, Oceanside would be responsible to restore that land, remove the mining scars, revegitate it, and put it in a state that is consistent with its General Plan designation, which is open space and low density residential. Commissioner Kirk asked will that still have to occur. Mr. Donnell said that would still have to occur. Another state mandate is mined properties in California need to be reclaimed. There is an environmental impact report that has been released and the public review on that has occurred. The public hearings to finalize the reclamation plan to adopt the EIR still need to occur. That is all done by the City of Oceanside. There are permits that will be required through Carlsbad to implement that reclamation work. That does need to occur. Whether it needs to occur before it can be considered suitable for development in HCD's eyes, I am not sure. It doesn't prevent the City, however, from implementing the land use designations that Program 2.1 proposes. Commissioner Kirk commented it might well impact the ability to implement. Mr. Donnell said it might well impact the ability to implement. There is a representative from McMillan here who might be able to provide more information on developing that site. Commissioner Wrisley asked if we have any kind of a timeline on how this is going to occur. Mr. Donnell asked if she means the reclamation. Commissioner Wrisley said, yes, the reclamation and getting that land ready for development. Is that going to be two years from now or twenty years from now? Mr. Donnell said I don't think it will be twenty years from now. I am sure two years from now is a more realistic minimum. There certainly is a lot of work to be done even just beyond the City; the reclamation plan approval, the permits from various agencies, the widening of the creek channel that goes through there, the restoration of the land, etc. I am sure a minimum of a couple of years is realistic to see that reclamation work to begin. Commissioner Wrisley commented it would just "begin." Mr. Donnell answered right. Commissioner Wrisley asked what about to completion? Mr. Donnell said that I don't know. Commissioner Kirk asked what percentage of the underutilized will contribute towards RHNA? Mr. Donnell said there is a table in the Housing Element in Section 3. For example, Table 3.9 on page 3- 21 mentions underutilized RMH land and underutilized RH land in the Beach Area Overlay. If we count those properties, they yield 162 units toward the RHNA. Percentage wise I am not sure what that would be. Commissioner Kirk said that is all right. It is fairly small. HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 12 of 20 Mr. Donnell said it is fairly small. The same holds true with RH designated land or high density land. The yield there is eight units. Ms. Tarn said the State's criteria for accepting underutilized sites is far more stringent than vacant sites. To get them to actually accept the units that we have provided required a lot of analysis and work and also convincing. We have to prove projects can be done on an underutilized land. The sites need to be big enough or they can be consolidated, which may require you to provide incentives to encourage the consolidation. It is very different in trying to get the State to accept the underutilized sites, whereas vacant land will usually be accepted. Mr. Donnell said Commissioner Kirk, to follow up on that, that is one thing about the Village, as you know driving through there, there aren't a lot of vacant properties so we had to convince the State that small sites in the Village, which is the typical 2/10ths of an acre or less, are being redeveloped. You will see a discussion in Section 3 about a list of projects that have developed on formerly developed sites where a couple of units or a commercial building have been removed. In other words, we had to demonstrate a track record that what we say will happen actually is happening. Commissioner Wrisley asked are infill sites considered underutilized. Mr. Donnell said they can be. Certainly anything that was vacant was counted. Although there was a minimum parcel size established outside the Village. I think that minimum parcel size was a quarter of an acre. HCD frowns upon very small parcels being considered because they say you just can't get the unit yield from them that would be considered to be affordable. It wouldn't be viable. Commissioner Kirk asked is there a desirable contribution of distribution in terms of affordable units within a geography. Is 500 in one area a large amount or an expected amount for a City of our size? Ms. Tarn said the difference is we are not saying the units are going to be affordable. We are zoning it at a density that should affordable housing projects be located in those areas, it is considered an adequate density. That is just your obligation. We are not saying that all 500 units will be affordable, low-income housing. We are just saying the density is feasible. Commissioner Kirk asked if we could say all 500 could be affordable, on the other hand, if we needed it. Ms. Tarn agreed. Commissioner Wrisley asked if we go under this assumption that we have these designated but they are not necessarily going to be built, is the State likely to come along and say we have to build them? Ms. Tarn said no, that is not the legal requirement of the State law. Chairperson Smith opened up to the public and invited interested parties to come and speak. My name is Mel Vernon, Chairman of the San Luis Rey Band of Mission Indians, and I live in Escondido, 1044 North Ivy. I have been following this process of Quarry Creek for quite a while. I have been down to SANDAG and met with Mr. Millich with McMillan and gotten to know a little bit more of the process. I was real excited back in April 2007 where the Planning Commission said no this can't happen. It goes back and forth, and we see it is a process. One I was listening to says it is a very punitive process if you don't step up to the plate for the State. The other part of this is that the State is sinking in itself. What was rational at one time in a certain economy doesn't make sense in an environment where everybody seems to be upside down in a world of hurt. Not to say with Brian and a lot of the people we have met aren't concerned about what their part is and also as a Native American, I am concerned about the value of what is concerned here also. It is interesting to follow this through. I have always said that no build would be wonderful. I am not sure that is possible, but if no one says it, then the possibilities are limited to a compromise that never really existed. I would like to thank you for the process we are going through. Carlsbad is a beautiful place, and it is putting growth that it needs to do to have its economy going HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 13 of 20 forward. Oceanside has its struggles with the Pavilion up there. They were looking to have some cultural elements as a part of their shopping center, and then we find out that Westfield wants to conquer the world and own all the shopping centers in it, which is from Australia. Just to share with you that following the process I hope to hear a lot more people than just myself that just got up here first. I will just start the rippling the process to participate this further. Thank you very much. My name is Don Christiansen, and I live at 3715 Longview Drive. First of all, I really take exception to calling this project Quarry Creek. Quarry Creek is the name of the shopping center development that laid asphalt to within a few feet of one of the tallest waterfalls in all of Southern California, next to a Native American sacred site, El Salto Waterfalls, and crowned with a giant Wal-Mart and Kohl's sign. That is Quarry Creek. This project is in the Buena Vista Creek Valley. It is not called the Quarry Creek Valley. Every meeting I come to, for whatever reason, it is consistently referred to as Quarry Creek. That is a marketing strategy. It is not correct so I would appreciate it in the future if all concerned could start addressing this project by something other than Quarry Creek because at this point in time, it is not Quarry Creek. Secondly, as far as where this housing will go within Carlsbad that has been mandated by the State of California, I appreciate a variety of different sites have been checked out. I am curious if any time and energy was put in along the Palomar Airport Road corridor. It is a major traffic corridor. There are lots of jobs there, which is my understanding are two of the key requirements of smart growth. Also, during the last down cycle there are see-through office buildings, and I would speculate a fair number of office buildings that are considered non-performing assets by those people who have gone in and built them that are just standing there and deteriorating. I would think a higher and better use for those buildings rather than just standing there and deteriorating would be to do something creative like turn them into smart growth housing. Then we wouldn't be having this ongoing controversy about desiring to place 500 units or making it possible to place 500 units in one of the few remaining open spaces that we have in North San Diego County. Please keep in mind, there was a lot of effort put in over the years to acquire the west end of the valley, 134 acres which is commonly called the Sherman Property or Sherman Acquisition. We have potential to build on that, to move east, and to acquire the rest of that valley. I see Dennis Huckabee is here tonight and some time ago I heard him use the phrase, "from waterfalls to waves." That really gets my attention if you can think back thousands of years when Native Americans lived here, I'm sure their life was between the waterfalls and the waves. To the best of my knowledge, we don't even have a trail to connect that unique natural resource, El Salto Waterfalls, with another unique natural resource, the Pacific Ocean. I think there is a lot more that could be done with this property than just building more units. I encourage you to please consider taking the Buena Vista Creek site off the list and perhaps having another go around at trying to identify other sites where we might be able to come up with the needed units. Another location I am especially interested in is in the Westfield Plaza Mall. It is my understanding the City owns all of that parking lot area, and I don't think I've ever seen that parking lot fully utilized with the possible exception of a staging area for major events. Right across the river on the north, which is currently in Oceanside, is ten acres of vacant space. Perhaps someone with some vision and with some capital to put it all together could acquire that ten acres, move the .... Chairperson Smith asked him to please complete his point. Mr. Christiansen asked if the existing transit center over on the other side of Buena Vista Creek could be moved and increase the proposed density of units at the Westfield Shopping Center. Chairperson Smith reminded the audience to limit their comments to five minutes. My name is Dennis Huckabee, and I live in Oceanside. I am the president of Buena Vista Audubon Society. Buena Vista Audubon Society consists of about 1,350 members, almost all of them from here in Carlsbad, Oceanside, Vista and Encinitas. We operate a nature center on the shore of Buena Vista Lagoon where we bring in over 3,500 school children from Carlsbad, also from Oceanside, to do nature studies out of our nature center. We are quite constrained because we don't have too many places alongside the lagoon to take them and show them nature. Yet now with the acquisition of the Sherman Property, we have 134 acres just upstream from the lagoon which is now being developed as the Buena Vista Valley Ecological Reserve. There are plans underway to restore Buena Vista Lagoon to make it a functioning wetland. It is rather in peril at the moment. We have the potential, particularly if the land to the HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 14 of 20 east of the Buena Vista Valley Ecological Reserve is allowed to be open space, is allowed to show future generations what the cultural and ecological open space values are. I am sure I am preaching to the choir here because I think all of you are aware of what a unique, irreplaceable place that is. We have the potential to educate our children about nature; like it was said before, from the waterfalls to the waves. It is an absolutely irreplaceable opportunity to maintain open space. I am no planner, and I appreciate the bind that Carlsbad is in and the need to provide affordable housing, but there has to be a better place than the Buena Vista Valley. There has to be a way of redoing the numbers, investigating more thoroughly the opportunity to provide housing in the Westfield Mall area, anywhere else but the Buena Vista Creek Valley. My name is Anne Burns and I live at 2855 Carlsbad Blvd, #N209. I recently came to Carlsbad from Tucson, Arizona. I want to say first, when it's gone, it's gone. When our natural habitats are developed, they are gone. I saw a lot of that happening in Tucson, Arizona, where I lived. It was breaking my heart. I think that Carlsbad is such a beautiful place and maybe doesn't realize that this is one corridor that goes from native historical site to the Pacific Ocean with a lot of natural area on the way to the ocean. I understand it is the only corridor left in San Diego County that goes all the way to the ocean. It seems to me this is a wakeup call that we don't allow things to happen the way they have happened in other communities where these natural resources that are irreplaceable are gone and there is no way to reverse that. I used to teach Spanish and Buena Vista means "good view." Wouldn't it be wonderful to have that from the El Salto Falls all the way to the ocean so there could be walking trails, hiking trails, maybe even horseback trails, and a lot of natural vegetation that could even be replenished along that area. I don't know what else to say except that I don't want to see something happen here that I was seeing happening in my home state where all this vegetation you would not believe, beautiful desert vegetation and they come and bulldoze it down. They dig up the saguaros and supposedly to replace them someplace else, but many times will not take. This is a different environment, but the principal is the same. Let me conclude with saying, when it is gone, it is gone. My name is Shelly Hays Carron and I reside in the Buena Vista Creek Valley in the Marone adobe. I have lived there for 40 years as an adult and as a child. I have seen dramatic changes. This Housing Element, as proposed, I believe is flawed as far as the time use because of the remediation of these biopiles. There was a meeting in the quarry by Hansen's, which now doesn't own the quarry anymore. They sold their holdings to Heidelberg Cement out of Germany. On the 8th of November there were different consultants there. I was speaking with the consultants from Brown and Caldwell. I learned this type of remediation is a pilot. It has never been done in San Diego. There is no data on the success of this, this type of remediation.. This is benzene from a diesel spill in the quarry that was left undetected for years, and they excavated the soil out. However, right across the highway is Costa Serena Community and eyewitnesses of that community have actually, when these biopiles were being established, seen trucks coming from outside of the quarry and depositing on these concrete slabs. That brings a lot into question as to what is being remediated from another source. We know about benzene. We know that benzene causes leukemia, and if this kind of remediation has never been done in the County of San Diego and there are no results that show success, the other success they were able to tell me was in Orange County on an industrial site for an industrial use. We are proposing housing here. Remediated soil, under their criteria, can be designated in one, two and three. One being clean and can be used in any place. Two being used for roadbed five feet above ground water and three feet above the road surface and that it has to be removed. The reason why this toxic soil is being remediated on site is for financial reasons, not to truck it off to see if they can remediate it. Benzene, when it is reduced by aeration, clumps and it adheres to whatever it is connected to in the soil. I am not an expert, but this is what I was told from their experts. This brings a lot of question to my mind. If Oceanside is the lead agency and you are going to be responsible for how this soil is used, I think you are putting the cart before the horse if all these things aren't brought into compliance before you are submitting a site for a Housing Element. I think that is questionable. I think RHNA or the state agency would be really interested to know about the remediation of this soil and whether this site really is prepared. As it was spoken earlier, there are a lot of hoops this has to go through and we are talking about a water shed. We are talking about artesian wells that have been there for thousands of years that are being affected by this benzene spill. This was a cross gradient plume that was migrating toward the creek, and they had to drill wells where they had to oxygenate the water so they could cure this. I pump water from a well. I use well water that has been my family's tradition, and my well even had to be tested downstream to find out. Now, you as the City of Carlsbad, HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8,2009 PAGE 15 of 20 have an active recycling going on there of crushed asphalt and concrete. There are no berms to protect when it rains, whatever drains out of those crushed asphalt piles to protect that from going into the creek. When we were in the creek for that November 8th meeting, there was standing water, and oil had risen to the top surface in the reclamation area. So that is another place to question whether this site even is ready. This site is only zoned for a 160 homes, but yet you are proposing 500. It is up to Carlsbad; it is not up to SANDAG; it's not up to Oceanside, it is up to Carlsbad to make these decisions. That whole area over there on the hillsides where these slopes have been mined up further where I am across, when it rains heavy, those hillsides slide and there is a liquefaction that takes place. I am bringing up those things of great concern. Commissioner Wrisley asked if she had brought these things up with the Oceanside City Council since they are the lead agency in doing this reclamation. Ms. Carron said we bring it up with everybody, and we are willing to go to Sacramento if we have to. I am Ann Hallock and I live on Tamarack in Carlsbad. You have already before you Preserve Calavera's position paper, and I will elaborate on it in my comments. In 2002, the citizens of Carlsbad approved Measure C, indicating their desire for more open space. In fact, 82% of the citizens of Carlsbad have listed as their number one priority open space. The so-called Quarry Creek land with its unique, sacred El Salto Waterfall and the adjacent 134 Buena Vista Creek ecological reserve would be the enviable jewel in any city's crown. Carlsbad has that opportunity to have it as its jewel. In addition to the natural resources of the El Salto Falls and the Buena Vista Creek, the site is an extraordinary microcosm of early California history. The Native American site was recorded by the El Portal expedition in 1769. Then they had the Rancho Hedionda and Shelly^ home is the adobe of that rancho, and then the early city of Carlsbad fledgling town had as its water source the artesian springs and pond in that area. Also, it used this fertile soil for their first orchards. This is a tiny area, but it is the core of our city's history. Of all of Carlsbad's open space, none is so richly endowed in natural, cultural and historical resources. This land's extraordinary overriding conditions demand its maximal preservation for generations to come. This is what you can do. Tonight there is no urgent need to recommend approval of the proposed 500 unit, 30 acre, low income housing project, so called Quarry Creek. In fact, the developer's plans, as of this morning, are not available to the public. They will be disclosed later this month. So we do not know what is actually being planned as of now. Toxic waste has yet to be cleaned up, and completed land reclamation is years away. No units will be built before 2010, and the filing year of this draft will have been met at that point. As the facts become available, this site's actual suitability can be determined. Changes may occur in the next cycle and in state law. With the current economic downturn, projects that are projected to continue for several years, jobs are being lost and low-income families are moving away out of Carlsbad. Thus the number of mandated affordable housing units may in fact decrease. The current housing downturn has left a glut of homes on the market with little justification for adding new homes. In fact, Carlsbad is currently second in all North County coastal cities in the amount of houses available on the market. This condition will most likely continue for years. Moreover, alternative sites for the proposed 500 low-housing income units need to be creatively explored and found using existing built space, not further open space. We can, as has been suggested, use parking lots, built above them, the spaces are still there for the parking and we get the use of the air space. We have parking lots all over, including the library, including here, along near the train depot. We are going to also need to look at the stalled housing developments because they could be revisited and their allotted density for the housing units could be increased. I would like to ask that you not approve this. That you, therefore, grant us more time to explore this further. To create a committee of those who are actively interested, including preservationist so we may get it right because we don't have another opportunity. Thank you Madam Chair and Members of the Commission, my name is Brian Millich with the Corky McMillan Company at 2750 Hybrid Street, San Diego, 92106. I am here to answer questions you may have regarding the Quarry Creek project. Even though the meeting tonight is about your Housing Element, the focus seems to be on Quarry Creek, which is our project. Before I ask if you have questions, I wanted to clarify a few points and make just a couple of very brief comments. While I don't disagree with what a number of the speakers have said, Quarry Creek is a unique site and it has some remarkable environmental resources. I think it is important, if you haven't been out to the site and maybe you aren't HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 16 of 20 familiar with some of the specifics of the site, that you do familiarize yourself with that. It is important to understand that Quarry Creek very recently was identified by the San Diego Association of Governments as a smart growth site. With that designation comes a desire to see areas like Quarry Creek develop at a slightly higher density than maybe some other areas in order to appropriately accommodate housing in areas that are best suited to accommodate housing. You are probably familiar with the fact that Quarry Creek is located directly adjacent to a large shopping center, it is a highly urbanized area, it is directly adjacent to public transportation to the 78 freeway, it is not a pristine site. Over 50 acres of the 150 acre site has already been significantly and heavily impacted by a mining operation so it is not a pristine site, yet it does have some very unique environmental resources on it. In addition, the Habitat Management Plan, which probably is the City's overriding environmental document, was adopted in 2004 and designates well over half of Quarry Creek for development. That document was not only adopted by the City but it was endorsed and adopted by the resource agencies, US Fish and Wildlife Service and California Fish and Game. It has always been contemplated that Quarry Creek would develop. I think the question is not really before you, it will be before the Planning Commission and the City Council, is what type of development and what is the appropriate balance between conservation and development. As one of the speakers said, those plans aren't out yet, but we are busily working on a master plan for Quarry Creek and actually hope to submit that master plan next month to the City of Carlsbad because we do understand that at least the ability to have the General Plan designate the appropriate densities on Quarry Creek is important for that to be done in a relatively short period of time. We are working closely with your staff and we are working with the City of Oceanside staff. We had a meeting this week with the US Fish and Wildlife Service and Fish and Game to get their input on what type of development and what type of conservation should occur on Quarry Creek. We also met with Mel Vernon and the San Luis Rey Band of Indians this week and we have met with them on three or four other occasions. We will continue to meet with the community. I have made offers and have met with a number of the speakers tonight, and we will continue to do that throughout the process. It is absolutely premature for anybody to make a decision as to what type of development and exactly how many units should be placed on Quarry Creek. We will work with your staff and the public to help make those decisions and ultimately the City Council to make the determination. It is not inappropriate to identify that Quarry Creek is an appropriate site for residential development, and it is an appropriate site, I believe and it appears your staff does as well as does SAN DAG and other organizations, that it is an appropriate site for a little bit higher density of development because of its location and because of its unique attributes. We will preserve the falls. We will not only preserve, but we will enhance Buena Vista Creek. We will preserve well over half of the open space, and we will return much of the impacted area to open space. I will make commitments tonight that there will be the appropriate balance between conservation and development on that site. Quarry Creek is the ideal site for a sustainable project. It is the poster project for a sustainable development. It has all the attributes of a highly impacted site. As it has been mentioned, it did have an oil plume on it. For a number of reasons, it is a perfect project for sustainability, and we will make sure that project is ultimately adopted and approved. I would be more than happy to answer any questions that you have about that process or the reclamation process. Commissioner Wrisley asked when you do go to build here, will you be building on the areas that have already been disturbed and not be building on areas that are still pristine at this point? Mr. Millich said the site itself is 157 acres approximately in the City of Carlsbad. There is a small little four acre piece in the City of Oceanside. About 50 of those acres, so about a third of the site has been impacted by the mine. We will be looking to develop on that 50 acres. Some of the 50 acres will most likely be returned to naturalized areas, and there are some areas that haven't been impacted yet but are identified for development, and that don't have sensitive resources on them that we are also looking to develop. Right now our plan is to develop roughly half of the site and preserve half of the site. Those are roughly our plans. We are finalizing that master plan. The answer to your question is: In addition to returning some of the areas that have already been impacted and developed by the mining operation, we will be developing some areas that have yet to be impacted by some type of development. It has been impacted by agriculture but not by development. Chairperson Smith asked Mr. Millich if he has met with the concerned citizens or the residents. HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 17 of 20 Mr. Millich said we have actually started an outreach program. We have met with Imagine Carlsbad as a large group on two occasions and with the smaller groups on two or three occasions. We have met with Preserve Calavera. We have had meetings at the Carlsbad Chamber of Commerce where we have invited twenty or thirty people Also the Native American groups, the Buena Vista Lagoon Foundation, the Buena Vista Audubon Society, and we actually have a meeting that we are planning later this month with those same groups. We have met with the resource agencies, also with the San Luis Key Band of Mission Indians, and we will continue to offer to have those meetings. We are trying to get as much input as early in the process, the planning process, as we possibly can so that we can reach a consensus project that meets, if not all, at least most of everybody's goals and objectives. One other minor point, but I think it is an important point, if you think about 500 units on a 150 acres, that actually is a very low density project. What we will be doing though is clustering those units so that we can preserve significant amounts of open space. We are talking a project that is not even four units to the acre, which is well below the densities that have been discussed tonight. When you factor in though the smaller parcels that they will be situated on, they actually do meet the HCD requirements for densities. In total it is a pretty large site with actually very few units. Right now we can build about 280 units on that site under current zoning in General Plan designations. But the City, appropriately I believe, is asking for slightly more units but clustering those units in the appropriate locations. Commissioner Wrisley asked if those would be three-story units. Mr. Millich said most likely they would be. There will probably be some two-story units. We are going to provide a range of density as you move further to the west which is closer to the Sherman Property that was recently acquired by the State of California. It will probably be lower density in those areas and a little bit higher density when you get right next to the shopping center where that is appropriate to have a higher density. Up against the freeway, I think those are areas that are appropriate for higher density. Commissioner Wrisley asked if these would be the low income and very low income. Mr. Millich said they would be a combination. The City has its affordable requirement, which requires low income housing. We will certainly meet that. Then we will be building market rate housing, whether it is market rate in terms of apartments or for-sale units, but by definition because of the densities, they qualify under the categories that the State has established for the site. Commissioner Kirk asked Mr. Millich to tell the Commissioners about his concerns regarding the reclamation of the property. Mr. Millich asked, "Our concerns?" Commissioner Kirk said the concern regarding the reclamation of the property that Shelly Hays brought up. Mr. Millich said McMillan is not doing the reclamation. That is actually being done by Hanson Aggregates, the owner of the property. We are doing the master plan, which takes it from the point that they complete the reclamation work and we then take it from that point and complete the project. Commissioner Kirk said then you would no doubt have a risk mitigation. Mr. Millich said Hanson is in the process as we speak, you saw the biopiles as they call them, of working with an environmental mediation firm that is under a permit under the County Health Department to remove the petroleum plume that is on the site. The reports we have received by Hanson is in fact that process is not only under way, but it has been extremely successful and they are expecting that the site will be fully remediated, that the soils will be returned to a non-hazardous condition, probably within the next six months or so. I am not by any means an expert on that process. Our company was not involved in that, but we are very comfortable that Hanson is going through the appropriate steps to fully remediate the site. The information that was presented tonight is news to me, but I am not at all concerned. They HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 18 of 20 have their experts out there, and they are under a permit under the County Health Department and they are being heavily regulated to make sure the site is fully remediated. Commissioner Kirk asked Mr. Donnell what agency would approve that. Mr. Donnell asked if he meant the reclamation plan. Commissioner Kirk said yes, who do you go to for review of the soil analysis. Mr. Donnell said the County Department of Health I believe. Commissioner Kirk said okay. A couple of more questions as well. Once you have your plan in place for the 500, if we determine that we don't need that density, what is the likelihood of the plan being modified? Mr. Donnell said one thing to keep in mind is the next housing cycle after this current cycle completes in 2010, which will once again impose some kind of growth forecast on Carlsbad and more than likely the majority of those units we'll need to provide will be in the very low, low and moderate income categories. There will always be a need, therefore, to meet those number of units so I think a site like Quarry Creek, even if it weren't redesignated in this cycle, would be looked at again in the next cycle. Commissioner Kirk said another question regarding the Housing Element: Can this plan be amended before the completion of the cycle? Mr. Donnell asked, the Housing Element itself? Commissioner Kirk yes. Mr. Donnell said yes it could depending on what the amendment is. It may need to go back to the State for review. Commissioner Bradwell said other than Quarry Creek, are there any proposed sites that could be considered for development that would accommodate the number of units? Mr. Donnell said there are other sites in Carlsbad that could accommodate that number of units. The first sites that come to mind are in the Sunny Creek area, east of El Camino Real, the Mondano and Cato properties, these are properties that are currently being farmed. They meet the criteria in terms of acreage. They are as large if not larger than Quarry Creek. However, due to environmental constraints, topography, habitat and their distance from major roads, commercial centers, employment areas, they would not qualify per our General Plan as being suitable for high density development. Commissioner Wrisley questioned Sunny Creek and the Mondano property would not be near a major road? Mr. Donnell said correct. The infrastructure does not exist to those properties today such as a major circulation element roadway that provides access to them. Chairperson Smith interrupted and asked if there were any more questions for Mr. Millich. Commissioner Kirk has one final question. When do you expect to have your plan completed? Mr. Millich said if we had our way, it would be a lot sooner possibly than is possible. We are ready probably in February to submit our master plan. That will go through some level of staff review initially, and then an environmental impact report will be prepared. I would say those two processes will take roughly nine months to a year to get to the point where people start to become more comfortable with the document. I think we can comfortably meet the June 2010 requirement to have the General Plan and hopefully the Master Plan approved, which I think are the key points to meet the Housing Element HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 19 of 20 requirements. Since the site is already impacted by the quarry operation, a large portion of it will be graded by the time we get through that process so hopefully not too long after that, maybe some time in 2011 we hope to be out there getting the site ready for whatever development ultimately is approved on the project. Chairperson Smith closed the public comment. Commissioner Kirk said regarding Mr. Christiansen who mentioned Palomar Airport Road and I know we have talked about looking at other options, but I think it is important to certainly explore every opportunity while we have this time. Can you talk a little bit about Palomar Airport Road and the opportunity there in which you looked at. Mr. Donnell said sure, Mr. Christiansen brings up very good points, he is right, it is a major transportation corridor and there is a lot of employment in that area; several large business parks, industrial buildings, office buildings, etc. There is also some vacant land still in those areas, especially east of Melrose along Palomar Airport Road, there are a couple of business parks there that have not fully developed. One constraint though that causes that area to be developed with industrial parks is the airport. The parks are under the approaches for airplanes, and because of that, it is very difficult to locate residential there. In fact, most of that area has been planned the way you see it due to the limitations imposed by the airport. In addition to that, and this is certainly more minor to the restrictions imposed by the airport, because that area has developed industrially, most of the properties, by their CC&R's prevent any type of residential use. Certainly things like that could change, but the airport is the paramount reason why that wasn't considered for residential construction. Commissioner Kirk asked could an area such as that be designated within the Housing Element as a potential area even though we might not know whether it is a viable development area? Mr. Donnell said he thinks it would be fairly simple to do an analysis based on our comprehensive land use plan for the airport, which dictates which uses may be located in proximity to it. It would be an easy process to eliminate those properties which don't qualify, and I think you would probably find that the areas that are residential, which are near the airport, are those that would qualify. Anything that hasn't been designated for residential is due to the airport. One other item I forgot to mention, because of the proximity of industrial businesses that are there, there might be certain hazards associated with chemicals, wastes, whatever that they use, that would make it difficult to locate residential close to an industrial use. Commissioner Wrisley said she remembers several years ago they tried to put farm worker housing in an industrial building. I remember they were going to do it, but I don't remember why it never came to fruition. Mr. Donnell said you are right. That plays well into a proposed program we have right now, which doesn't say farm worker housing, but which does say emergency shelters should be located in industrial zones. I am not quite sure if an emergency shelter for homeless individuals qualifies as residential, but just assuming it does, we have looked at the properties, which in Carlsbad are those that are industrially designated, and they have these CC&R's which prohibited residential uses. That eliminates probably 90% of the properties in the industrial areas. We also have to factor in the concern about hazards as well as the airport approaches. When all is done and said there is maybe about 15 acres of vacant land that could accommodate an emergency shelter, not residential but an emergency shelter. It was the same difficulty we had with trying to find farm worker housing. There were just so few sites where it could be done. Chairperson Smith thanked Mr. Donnell and Ms. Tarn for their input. I did go by and look at the Quarry Creek site. I would also like to thank the audience for coming and for your input. I wish I could wave my hands and say this is over, but it is not like that. We will not make a decision tonight. We have to take things into consideration. HOUSING COMMISSION MINUTES JANUARY 8, 2009 PAGE 20 of 20 Commissioner Kirk made a motion that we continue this meeting and give us an opportunity to have some further analysis discussions in this area, because this is extremely important to Carlsbad and I want to make sure we are absolutely as educated as we need to be to make the appropriate decision. Commissioner Bradwell seconded that motion. Chairperson Smith said it has been moved and seconded we continue this meeting to a later time. Ms. Fountain said it will be continued until the next available Housing Commission Meeting which is February 12, 2009. DIRECTOR'S REPORT Ms. Fountain does not have any further reports. For the next meeting staff will be present if you have any more questions we need to answer or if after your thinking, you have some additional information you need, you can let us know so we can have it available to you. ADJOURNMENT By proper motion, the meeting of January 8, 2009, was adjourned at 7:55 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Deborah Fountain Housing and Redevelopment Director PATRICIA CRESCENTI Minutes Clerk MINUTES ARE ALSO TAPED AND KEPT ON FILE UNTIL THE WRITTEN MINUTES ARE APPROVED.