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| Developed through a network of eight working neighborhood teams, Market Creek Plaza has become about building community, building skills, building assets, and building ownership while residents rebuild their neighborhoods.
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Planning the Future of Our Community
Momentum is building for a Ukiah Valley community planning and visioning process. People have begun to educate themselves in the tangle of issues involved. Diverse stakeholders are seeking ways to participate. Local governments are looking seriously at doing more regional planning with community involvement. If done well, this process will tap into the rich veins of knowledge, experience, and commitment running through our community. Few question the need for new and effective structures for community participation, building bridges between interest groups, and balanced decision-making.
Clearly, there is no simple formula for moving forward. However, given recent signs, it looks doable but only if we enact a joint planning process that is truly regional. The community is now challenging the City of Ukiah, Mendocino County, and Municipal Service Agencies to collaborate with a degree of unanimity never before seen in this County. Our institutions must rise to the occasion.
To help facilitate this complex process, area residents have formed the Ukiah Valley Smart Growth Coalition, www.ukiahsmartgrowth.org, an all-volunteer effort committed to helping the community envision its land use future and partner with government in good planning and smart design for our home place. In that interest our members are working in a variety of ways to bring to our community a healthy dialogue about the growth issues facing us.
So far these have included: 1) planning forums and films on community planning; 2) gathering together interest groups, such as local builders, planners, and architects to discuss growth issues and help forge solutions; 3) interfacing with city and county planners to help move the valley planning forward in a positive manner; 4) holding weekly discussion meetings and study groups.
One area of intense study by our members has been our most important regional planning tool as we go forward: the Ukiah Valley Area Plan (UVAP) and its associated Environmental Impact Report (EIR). The UVAP is intended to direct growth for the next twenty years. An adequate UVAP EIR would provide much of the information we need to make sound planning decisions.
Some of the most troubling inadequacies of the current UVAP EIR are rooted in a lack of information. Managing growth cannot be done intelligently and satisfactorily without determining the carrying capacity of the Ukiah Valley. To begin with, this means conducting the necessary studies to determine how much water is available and who has rights to it. Sound planning also hinges on determining the present and future capacities of the Ukiah and Calpella Sanitation Districts, and of completing a circulation plan. The UVAP EIR recommends improvements to water, sanitation, and circulation. In each case, the County should undertake a study to determine the feasibility and timeline of all planned improvements. Likewise, it should do a fiscal analysis, identifying who pays for the improvements and where that money will come from.
These are not, of course, simple issues. Gathering accurate information about water, for example, may require the endorsement of LAFCO and a Water Agency Municipal Review Process, and determining who has rights to the water may require working with the State Water Resources Board. The question of sanitation capacity cannot be answered without fully resolving the issue of discharging waste into the Russian River. Nonetheless, it is urgent that the County commit itself to this process. We need to complete these studies in a timely fashion; without them, work on the UVAP cannot go forward. The County should commit the money needed to complete the studies, and monitor compliance with its timeline.
The current UVAP recommends numerous zoning changes. These changes should be put firmly on hold. We need to identify the number of developable residential units and the number of parcels and total acreage of residential, agriculture, and industrial lands available for future development in the entire Valley. Any zoning change considerations must be made in the context of the carrying capacity of the valley, of smart growth options, and of community priorities. Historic growth rates should be the measure of future housing needs.
Until the UVAP process is complete, the County should not process any General Plan amendments or use permit applications that may undercut this planning process. Future development in the Ukiah Valley should start where the actual infrastructure exists and build out from those centers. We commend Supervisor Wattenburger for recognizing that all significant development must halt until we¹ve completed these planning processes.
As we go forward with the process of revising the UVAP, we recognize that many of the policies it contains are very good, many need strengthening, and some that were removed need to be reinserted. These policies provide a starting point for a revised UVAP. In addition, we should ensure they meet State requirements for housing and planning and can be implemented. The policy language should be strengthened so that ³Shall do² replaces ³Should do.²
The most difficult "nut to crack" during this "taking stock" period is the affordable housing issue. The County has legal mandates, and the need is acute. The current approach, however, is not necessarily in concert with Smart Growth principles of economically diversified neighborhoods with commercial components and which maintain the integrity of current communities. We want to hold out the possibility the County can both meet its legal obligations and respond to the real need in our community for affordable housing, while sticking to smart growth principles of development.
Finally, the City and County must coordinate with each other in a whole new way. They must plan together for valley growth and reach revenue sharing agreements. These agreements and the joint City-County planning they make possible are integral components in any effective long-term regional planning process.
This may seem a daunting undertaking, but we take heart from the large turnout at community forums, from the spirit of open-mindedness and apparent willingness for collaboration evident in meetings we¹ve had with various stakeholders, from the growing commitment on the part of elected officials to enact a community planning process. The enthusiasm and talents of our friends and neighbors is inspiring.
The common goal of enacting an inclusive, regional planning process is an incredible opportunity to work with each other in new ways. It will challenge us to step outside of what¹s comfortable. It will ask us to work alongside people we haven¹t worked with before. It will ask groups who have historically seen each other as enemies to find common ground. What binds us across political lines is our love of this valley and the rich quality of life we have here. If we want to preserve that, we all need to be pulling in the same direction.
Anne Oliver
Antonio Andrade
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Want
to join our efforts? Email: smartgrowthuk@yahoo.com
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