This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Health & Fitness

Planning Commission Adopts Controversial Permit Process Despite Lack of Community Support

The conditional use permit process was adopted for the Ashland Cherryland Business District Specific Plan despite lack of community support to appease developer with all the right connections.

 

Representatives of the Ashland Cherryland Network attended the March 19th Planning Commission meeting regarding the proposed amendment to the Ashland Cherryland Business District (ACBD) Specific Plan.

The background on the proposed amendment and our reasons for resisting this proposal can be found here.

Find out what's happening in Castro Valleywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

We re-iterated our response to the Environmental Checklist which indicated that this Conditional Use Permit (CUP) would have little or no environmental impact.

We made the following points:

Find out what's happening in Castro Valleywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

(1) The Environmental Checklist assessed the impact of potential projects based on current conditions, and found there would be little or no impact on current conditions.

It is not sufficient to confirm that potential projects may or may not change current conditions, when the purpose of the plan we’re talking about is to transform those conditions. The question is whether the change ensures the outcome intended in the ACBD as a whole.

(2) The proposed policy work-around goes against State Law AB32, which mandates greenhouse gas reductions by 2020. The parking restrictions in the transit access zone in the ACBD has the specific objective of reducing auto transportation, the number one source of greenhouse gasses in Alameda County.

(3) The primary action item of the Alameda County Planning Department in the draft Climate Action Plan is to encourage alternative forms of transportation, specifically via the development of Transit Access Corridors, such as the ACBD; and to do so with particular attention and care for at-risk communities, such as Ashland and Cherryland. The conditions and findings in the proposed CUP Process are inconsistent with this commitment.

(4)  Simply because the County has not yet adopted its draft Climate Action Plan, does not mean it is exempt from taking action on a State mandate (AB32) that was passed six years ago. It does not mean the County can delay any action, and implement antiquated, pollution-based design for another 3 years. (Ironically, the Climate Action Plan has been stalled since June 2011, because the County has not yet completed its Environmental Review of that Plan, which it promised to begin in Fall of 2011. Find updates from the County on the CAP here.)

(5) If the County insists on moving forward, the findings and conditions must produce a business that is a partner in transforming the community into a transit-access, greenhouse-gas-reducing corridor, in accordance with the County’s own priority action items for achieving the State mandate. This CUP does not.

We also pointed out that this action is reflective of the inequities in our governance boards, and in how policies are implemented in the unincorporated area, to the disadvantage of Ashland and Cherryland.

We presented to the Board that:

(1)  We met with several planners and experts in planning who informed us that this action goes against the direction of all best practices for transit-oriented planning today, yet none of them could get permission from their supervisors to testify on this subject;

(2)  A letter was submitted to the Chair of the Planning Commission by Cory LaVigne, Director of Service Development and Planning for AC Transit, supporting our concern that this action undermines the need to increase transit in our area in November of 2011. Read it here. In January of 2012, a subsequent letter was sent to Supervisor Nate Miley from his friend Mary King, Interim General Manager of AC Transit. Her letter provided courtesy copy to the Developer Sherwood and Company and Executive Director of the Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center (TVHC). Read it here.

In conclusion, we expressed to the Commission that it is inequitable to demand that our at-risk, low-income, heavily-undocumented community fight, business by business, for what the Transit Access District promised in the ACBD Specific Plan. Officials representing us can be elected without our vote. Policies contained in the ACBD ensure our quality of life, despite our lack of political influence.

Other comments on this issue were made by the Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center, encouraging the Planning Commission to move rapidly to approve the CUP. The construction of the TVHC Health Center on East 14th is the reason the County is moving wrecklessly forward with an unraveling of the Ashland Cherryland Business District Specific Plan.

Planning Department Director Albert Lopez was given the opportunity to address anything we had said. The issues we presented were not addressed. They reviewed the process of public participation in the CUP process.

Upon completion of public comment, Commissioner Imhoff made double-sure that Public Comment was closed, and then the Planning Commissioners, none of which reside in Ashland or Cherryland, gave their points of view.

Since the Public Comment portion of the meeting had been closed (and confirmed closed again before proceeding), we were not able to address the ill logic of the Planning Commission at the time, so we have taken the opportunity below. The official transcript and recording has yet to be posted on the Alameda County website. A list of Commissioners, and their appointing Board of Supervisors representative can be found here.

Commissioner Jacob

Commissioner Jacob reflected that all the criticism of the proposal assumes there will be a negative effect on the environment. 

Our primary point is not that there will be a negative effect on the environment. Our criticism is that the policy in place is a proven method and a best practice for creating a transit access district, which is a key action item the County states it will undertake to meet the mandate of AB32. If this policy is being ignored, the conditions and findings of the CUP must ensure an improvement and transformation in the environment, which is mandated by AB32, and is the objective of the Ashland Cherryland Business District Specific Plan. The proposed findings and conditions do not.

Commissioner Jacobs provided the example that, for instance when going to TVHC, people may be driving from farther away now, but with a more convenient location, they won’t have to drive as far. So that will result in an improvement on greenhouse gas levels — since people are not driving as far.

This statement is evidence that Commissioner Jacob is unclear of the intention of a Transit Access District, which is a walkable, bikeable district with significant public transit access that discourages automobile transportation entirely. He also seems to be unaware that the transit access district is meant to provide both jobs and services to the residents of the state-mandated low-income housing developments he and his Commission zoned into Ashland and Cherryland. With our business district conveniently located between two BART stations within seven minutes of each other, a solid transit access corridor will enable many residents to walk, bike, or take public transit to work and services, eliminating the need for cars.

It also evidences he is oblivious to aggressive State-mandated greenhouse gas reduction goals, or the County's own action items for reducing them.

Finally, he remains completely unconscious of the demographics of Ashland Cherryland, and the fact that a significant and growing number of our residents do not own cars, cannot afford cars, and/or cannot legally drive, no matter the distance.

Commissioner Ready

Commissioner Ready’s statements reflected her concern that, given her personal experience with a life-threatening illness, she knows that people who are very sick cannot take the bus to a health center.

She indicated she would like to know the details of the Health Center.

When making policy determinations, Commissioners are not supposed to rely on their personal experience. They are supposed to draw from the facts at hand and make a determination based on those facts and the needs of the community.

Even so, it’s clear that Commissioner Ready is confused that this CUP does not apply to TVHC specifically, it applies to any business coming into our corridor. With the current findings, a McDonald’s drive-thru with trees in the parking lot could be approved.

Even if it were relevant to her determination, the TVHC does not provide treatment for life-threatening illness. They provide general and family medicine check-ups and dentistry. They are not equipped to provide the types of treatments that Commissioner Ready was engaged in.

Commissioner Ratto

Commissioner Ratto expressed “sympathy” with the community because he knows it’s difficult to fight business by business, but “that’s how it is.” 

Commissioner Ratto was not present at the prior hearings on this matter, and we did not see him at the Unincorporated Services Meeting held on the topic.

It is well-known and acknowledged in the County that the unincorporated areas, and in particular Ashland and Cherryland have been dumping grounds for predatory developers, and that County agencies are challenged to coordinate among themselves for effective results and efficient use of significant tax dollars directed to improve the lives of our residents.

The purpose of the ACBD is to institute a consistent set of policies to achieve a vision — a transit access district. The entire plan was written specifically so that at-risk communities that do not have political clout are not left behind, and are not a health or environmental threat to their neighbors. Currently Ashland Cherryland is an uncontrollable drain on the County’s Public Health resources and represents an increasing threat to the achievement of the State's 2020 greenhouse gas goals.

Commissioner Ratto also stated that people can look at the same information and draw different conclusions, that this is human nature.

The Environmental Checklist is not a matter of looking at information and drawing different conclusions. This reflects the views of many of the Commissioners, which is that the projects might not negatively impact greenhouse gas reduction goals, so therefore the CUP is acceptable. In our view, the burden is on the County to prove that the findings and conditions in place will positively impact green house gas reduction goals, in the same way that the policy the CUP oversteps is a proven method of designing for greenhouse gas reduction and transit access. A possible lack of impact is not the same as a confirmed positive impact.

These are not matters of drawing different conclusions, this is a matter of the County not providing sufficient evidence, and not meeting the burden of proof.

Although he didn't realize it, the Commissioner may as well have slapped community in the face. His statement is essentially: different people draw different conclusions, and since I'm the one up on the stand, and you're the ones in the chairs, my conclusion counts, and yours doesn't. It is our view that the Planning Commissioners of Alameda County should be looking to the populations living within the community for how to vote on the issues that affect us, not the Planning Department and predatory developers. This comment indicates Commissioner Ratto is only looking at his own opinions, and not the facts, State Laws, or his obligation as a public representative to do what is correct for our community.

Given no further comment on the part of the Planning Commissioners, the CUP process was approved. It seemed to us that all Commissioners voted yes, with the exception of Commissioner Ready who remained silent for both the YES and NO vote call.

Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center was given opportunity to make comment after the vote. Throughout our work on the issue, TVHC presented strong resistance to each of our recommendations for a more rigorous CUP process. They used their opportunity to make further comment to say that they were looking forward to meeting with the community regarding their CUP. We had asked to meet with them several times throughout the hearing process, and our invitations were ignored.

Commissioner Imhoff requested to speak privately with Bill Lambert after the meeting, who was also in attendance but did not testify. Bill Lambert, an employee of the County, is the original presenter of this proposal, and Business Development Director for the Alameda County Redevelopment Agency, which will soon be disbanded.

Our understanding is that issue will be on the agenda for the Board of Supervisors in April.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?