Zoning Code Simplification

Dear Friends:

I received an email with a new “zone simplification ordinance” today from Lucille Sanders. I’ve just spent hours pouring through it and I believe everyone needs to read it. This ordinance on its face says it is changing or deleting 24% of findings for CUP’s and Variances. They were easy enough to get around before but Planning is now looking for slam dunks. I got mired down in the first part and saw some changes but it wasn’t until I went to the last 10 pages that the real fun began. 83 changes are presented with section and title of code, Purpose, Current finding needed, Proposed finding, disposition and Reason.

The reason I think is simple, to make it easier for Planning to approve more projects, to make many more projects basically by-right. After two devastating audits by Laura Chick and one by Wendy of Planning’s Case Processing Unit I suppose this Ordinance was to be expected. Wendy in her Audit stated.

“Out of all of the audits I have done so far, this is among the most disappointing, because it appears that the City's Planning Department was unable to implement the previous audit's recommendations. The Department gave the reason that budget deficits and other Reorganizations have hampered their ability to make the necessary changes. While the Department has used some of their resources to update community plans and zoning regulations in order to increase projects that can be built by-right, which reduce case processing times, this is not acceptable four and a half years after the original audit came out.”

Some of the changes are a word here and a word there but others remove mitigation measures, monitoring, and environmental review as being redundant to CEQA, that the State has our back. That’s not how I read what is going on in Sacramento. It changes language that protects property adjacent or in the vicinity of a project to a vague “in the same Zone or surrounding neighborhood”. How big a zone or neighborhood area is, is not spelled out. If you live in a Hillside area you need to look at changes that will affect you. Both Hillside and the Flats will get new height and side yard variations. CUP’s for small restaurants wanting to serve alcohol have parking regulations deleted in some cases. Reclamation of surface mining lands is also mixed in, but I have no knowledge of what that means. Eldercare, Homeless shelters, corner commercial, mini-shopping centers and new density bonus findings for greater than what is allowed by-right and major development projects all get new findings or have their old ones deleted.

I am attaching a searchable PDF for your use and will follow up in the coming days with some specific findings. I would love to hear what you have found out.

Jim

James O'Sullivan
213.840.0246 - Cell