Citywide Urban Design Guidelines Negative Declaration-Comments Due 8/25/2010
Attached and below is brief info on a negative declaration to citywide urban guidelines. Public comment is due by 25 August.
I (Lucille Saunders) spoke with Michelle Sorkin, city planner on the urban design guidelines, to arrange an appointment (thursday, 10 am, room 621, was set) to review the ENTIRE CASE FILE. Ms. Sorkin advised me
she is "still drafting" the guidelines and will have them completed "hopefully by start of next month."
This is a citywide amendment to the General Plan AND THE GUIDELINES ARE NOT COMPLETED. The only thing available is the (also attached) neg dec "checklist" file.
I and other question how public comment could be in by 25 august to address guidelines not yet written.
Sorkin will be available at the appointment to answer questions, but not even guide drafts will not be available then.
She states as with the housing element, after the completed guidelines there will be "opportunity for public input at the hearings." Well we all recall the housing element hearings where the final report was written before the community meetings were held.
Cindy Cleghorn, of Sunland Tujunga NC and PlanCheck, will accompany me at the appointment thursday. all are welcome and invited to come.
Please send questions, comments, asides, and circulate to help stop these "cart before the horse" patterns. Not to be confused with planning.
Thanks, Lucille
How can you respond to something that doesn't exist, is this normal...seems like one thing to ask for input and the publish a draft and get feedback and another to say that was your only shot before a proposal is presented to commission where you get a minute or two to speak....crazy
ReplyDeleteronkayela.com
From Dick Platkin --
ReplyDeleteI have quickly looked over the three sets of design guidelines and have several reactions.
First, the Framework already has a design chapter, Chapter 5, which is quite good. If these three sets of design guidelines are to augment and update the Framework as appendices, then why is there is no effort to connect these new guidelines with the existing, adopted guidelines? There are obviously many points of connection, yet at no point is there any effort to amend the existing document's design section.
Second, I cannot think of any situations since 1995 where the Framework's Chapter 5 was ever used or invoked to modify a project's design or to make a legal findings. So, why should the Framework now be implicitly updated, if it design role has been continually ignored?
Third, just as the original design chapter was flushed down the memory hole, I would expect the same for these three new appendices. They can't be used for most buildings because they are built by right and only require LADBS-issued building permits. In those cases all the LADBS plan checkers do is review projects for compliance with the LAMC's Building Code and the Zoning Code.
Plus, the appendices can't be used for Specific Plan and CDO projects because these regulations already have their own Design Guidelines, and there is no legal or administrative procedure to supersede those with these three design documents.
Furthermore, they can't be used for Plan Amendments and Zone Changes because those only relate to use, not the structure built on the desired use.
So, even if the three sets of design guidelines were better linked to the existing General Plan Framework, I can't think of many discretionary actions where a Zoning Administrator or Planner would be able to use these design guidelines to modify a proposed project.
Fourth, the problems of the Framework are not addressed by new Design Guidelines. The Framework is the heart of the city's General Plan, yet its horizon year of 2010 is nearly over, with no known efforts to update it or even resume monitoring the General Plan after a hiatus over 10 years. Instead a few Community Plans are being updated to elaborate an outdated planning document. Design Guidelines are totally oblique and peripheral to what is truly needed, and, in effect, are little more than a distraction from serious planning work which Los Angeles desperately needs.
Fifth, we need to remember that design review, even if well done, can never substitute for good planning and good zoning. Though good design obviously is desirable, for the most part it is a distraction to avoid attention of the major planning and zoning issues facing a community. Instead, activists get caught up in secondary questions about window treatments, step backs, and colors.