The message below was sent by e-mail to the full City Council, the Planning Commissioners, and to City Manager Karen Diemer and to Arcata Community Development Director David Loya. May 5, 2024, 8:49 a.m.
The “May 14, 2024” draft of the General Plan can be seen here.
Sunday, May 5, 2024
- What ever happened with the conversation with Tribal elders about possibly having Wiyot name or names for Gateway areas? Or perhaps this is an on-going topic, but just has not been discussed openly. My preference is to see a Wiyot name for what is called the Barrel district. To honor the California Barrel Company seems odd to me (in existence from 1902 or 1906 to 1952), given the heritage of the Tribes.
Over the past two years, there have been several dozen ideas and notions that have “fallen through the cracks.” If there are results from discussions with the Tribes on this, incorporating the name or names now rather than changing a name later seems to me to be the more appropriate level of honoring the heritage.
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This General Plan 2045 draft is dated May 14, 2024. This is based on the date the Planning Commission takes up a formal recommendation to the Council. There have been (so far) two “May 14, 2024” drafts: The May 1st “May 14, 2024” draft and the May 3rd “May 14, 2024” draft. They should be differentiated in the document, but they are not.
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This May 14 draft has “tracked changes” marked by a vertical line in the right margin and the use of underlined-red text. These would be changes from the “12/13/2023” version. (There is no date written on that document. Actual PDF date is 12/21/2023.)
It would have been considerate if we were given a list of the changes, with their page numbers, but that was not done. (I may supply this.)
Question for David Loya: Are these underlined red text passages supposed to be ALL of the changes?
Important: Not all the changes from the 12/13/2024 version are properly marked in this “May 14, 2024” version. That is, there are changes to the document that are not marked as changes. For someone who is looking at this new version to see what has changed, this is bad. - There are changes in this General Plan document that were not brought to or discussed by the Planning Commission.
Aren’t potential changes supposed to be discussed at a meeting before being introduced into a document?Was AQ-6, the EV Charging Infrastructure Ordinance implementation measure discussed at a meeting? (page 4-38)
When was “Tenement housing shall be allowed in zoning districts where applicable” discussed? (General Plan page 2-15.)
[Updated 5/12/2024. The two examples that were given here actually were discussed — under a different wording. I had written that “tenement housing” had not been discussed by the Planning Commission, but I think perhaps it was … I just don’t know when.]This Planning Commission conversation perhaps had a policy that would not have been labeled “tenement” but rather as a shared bath or shared kitchen arrangement.
Note: The word “tenement” is not given a definition in this document. To use this word in the General Plan, it must be defined.
In the context that it is used in LU-2B (page 2-14) of the General Plan, tenement apartments are ones that have shared bathrooms — perhaps 10 apartments per floor and two common bathrooms per floor. Individual bathrooms for a studio unit can be expensive. This arrangement can create a more economic and efficient style of housing. Kitchen facilities can also be shared.
In legal terms, a tenement can be any multi-occupancy residential rental building. Typically a tenement has just a few apartments on each floor, sharing a staircase and hallway. The standard definition of a tenement has it be not distinguished it from an apartment. In the view of most readers, however, a tenement refers to low-quality lower-income housing.
- Table LU-1, “Land-Use Plan Categories and Acreages,” which shows the acres for each type of land use designation (e.g. Agriculture – Exclusive, Residential – High Density, Residential – Medium Density, Residential – Low Density, etc.) appears to have some figures that are not correct. This is on page 42. This table was incorrectly referred to as “the Land Use summary table” in a City e-mail.
- Important: “The Land Use Updates” map on page 37 shows zoning changes that are contrary to what the Planning Commission approved.
This is a strange situation. The Planning Commission worked on this. This map does not include at least one of the Planning Commission’s recommendations for the zoning changes. Instead, this map substituted a different zoning.
This map shows the entire Craftsman Mall opportunity zone as Residential High Density. The Commission’s recommendation was to “decouple” the north from the south areas, and to zone the south area as Residential Medium. All Commissioners wanted this Craftman’s Mall Opportunity Zone to be split. The vote was 4 to 2 on having the south part be Residential Medium, supported by Davies, Figueroa, Lehman, and Yodowitz. The two “senior” Commissioners, with more experience with how the zoning works in practice, polled for having that area in the southern part (along Eye Street, near Larson Park) being kept as Residential Low. One reason for keeping it R-L along Eye Street has to do with limited vehicle travel available on the narrower-than-typical lanes of Grant and Jay Streets.Note: The map is labelled “Figure X” — its correct title is LU-a.
- As a reminder to the Councilmembers and Commissioners, and as a bit of history to the newer Commissioners:
At the June 27, 2023, Planning Commission meeting, Community Development Director David Loya said (this is a quote):
“And what we’ve done here at the staff level, as we had mentioned in the staff report, is that, based on conversations that you’ve had previously, we’ve inserted what we expect you’re going to say, as a Commission — that you concur with staff on this issue, for example.”
[Note: David Loya spoke “…as we had mentioned in the staff report” but in reality this was not mentioned in the staff report.]
The concern is that what Director Loya has done here with the General Plan is part of that pattern. It seems that he has inserted language that he “expects” the Commission to agree with.
- The Table of Contents (page 10) shows “Gateway Area Plan – Bound in separate document.” In the “12/13/2023” General Plan 2045 draft document, the Gateway Area Plan was indeed a separate document. This May 14, 2024, document includes the Gateway Area Plan.
Why the Gateway Area Plan was included in this single document, rather than being kept separate as has previously been the case, is not known. As we all know, there are two Councilmembers who are prohibited by California Fair Political Practice rulings from discussing or voting on the full General Plan. They can discuss and vote on the General Plan without the Gateway Area Plan. At such time as when the Planning Commission approves this current single document, that document will not be able to be forwarded to the City Council.
It seems to be a decision that only adds complexity to an already complex situation. In my view, this single document should be re-issued as two documents. Why would it be made into a single document now, prior to it going to the City Council? - Among my aims is to reduce the City’s potential liability in the event of future lawsuits. If the General Plan says that Arcata “shall” do something that is impossible for to accomplish, this leaves the City vulnerable. In this General Plan document, such instances do exist.
- The list of names in the Acknowledgements (pages 3-7) contains six misspelled names, including the names of one current Councilmember, two current Planning Commissioners, and one former Councilmember. (At least six misspellings — there could be more.) I appreciate the inclusion, at my suggestion, of the recent former Commissioners whose work was instrumental in the creation of the General Plan 2045 updates. In my view, recent former Committee members who were present at least since January 1, 2022, should also be included. Walt Geist, on the Economic Development Committee is one example, as he certainly contributed to this General Plan.
In addition, in my view the public would be better served if “Alexandra Stillman” would be spelled out in full.
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As a minor example of the editing that is missing: The description of the Craftsman Mall Opportunity Zone (page 34) does not acknowledge the existence of the Craftsman Mall dorm project that is being built right now. It says ” … the Craftsman’s Mall property, which has the highest immediate potential for redevelopment…” This description has not changed in at least 1-1/2 years, even though the site is no longer a “potential” for development. It is being developed.
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As examples of very small items, the word “Barrel” is misspelled as “Barrell” in five locations. U.S. Highway 101 is called State Route 101 (or as a plural) in ten instances. (There is no such road as “State Route 101.)
- Added 5/12/2024
About 86 or so policies that were developed for the Gateway Area Plan were transferred over the General Plan, with the intent that these policies be in place City-wide. Some need to be re-worded, as the policy still refers to just the Gateway area. Examples are D-8n and what is labeled D-8m (it should be D-8o) on General Plan page 5-17.
The system for including letters from the public is broken, again.
— Fred Weis