CONO Report One

REPORT ONE:

Long Beach neighborhood group releases transcripts of the controversial 8/17 Planning Commission meeting on high density

The Council of Neighborhood Organizations  (CONO),  the city-wide coalition of neighborhood organizations, released the first two reports on the transcripts of the  controversial August 17th Long Beach Planning Commission meeting on the Land Use Element (LUE) place-type maps. 

All the reports will only cover the staff comments of  the over five hour long meeting that included hours of public testimony from neighborhood leaders representing neighborhoods across Long Beach. 

The first two reports were released last week to the CONO member neighborhoods and have caused a stir across the city on social media platforms.  

CONO has called a meeting for next week for its members devoted entirely to the LUE  issue and the upcoming four new outreach public meetings.  

The LUE issue and its high density maps that envision high density "urban" (apartments and condos) for 20,000 new residents has galvanized  citizens across the city in opposition to the proposed high density especially in conjunction with new and proposed state laws that could trump local zoning and "super size"  new developments far beyond local zoning. Those state laws can strip away local parking and setback criteria. 

A social media driven protest of Assemblyman Patrick O'Donnell's upcoming Community Meetings were abandoned last week after O"Donnell publicly announced his opposition to one of the most controversial new state laws encroaching on local control: SB 35.

Below is CONO Report One on the Long Beach Department of Development Services (LBDS) staff statements to the Planning Commission.  LBDS Director Amy Bodek's comments to the Planning Commissioners on her plans to ignore the commissioners are planned for Report Four.

Released Report Two can be accessed at this link:

CONO REPORT TWO 

Council of Neighborhood Organizations (CONO)

Community Report on the transcripts of the Long Beach Department of Development  Services staff's public testimony to the Long Beach Planning Commission on August 17, 2017

CONO Report One: Initial Staff report on background of Item 5

At the August 17, 2017 Long Beach Planning Commission meeting,  staff from the Long Beach Department of Development Services (LBDS) under the direction of the department's Director Amy Bodek made two presentations to the Planning Commission, answered questions from the commissioners and reacted to the Planning Commissioners motions for more public outreach following extensive public testimony from neighborhood organization leaders and residents from across Long Beach.

This is Report One on the transcripts of those  LBDS staff reports and interactions taken from the public video and audio on the City of Long Beach website:

http://longbeach.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=12&clip_id=9297

In Report One  CONO transcribes portions of the audio of the online video concerning the 1st report the LBSD Staff  made to the Planning Commission for:

Agenda Item 5  17-051PL Recommendation to recommend that the City Council approve the selected alternative for the Place Type and Height Map, superseding the existing adopted Land Use Element and Scenic Routes Element. (Citywide) (Application No. 1701-01)

CONO's Report One quotes are transcribed from the Planning Commission Video link  above ( go to Agenda 5section and click on Agenda 5).  The report includes  video Time Stamps as indicated by the (TS) followed by the nearest time down to the second of the quote taken from the city provided video.

CONO Report One

(TS) 2:11:58 - General Plan info

"Just a reminder the General Plan is a required document the city must prepare and update regularly. It establishes  our long-term vision for the city. This update to the Land Use Element and Urban Design Element is long overdue"

(TS) 2:12:00 -Park Needs Info

(TS) 2:12:08 - 2:12:21

"We are unlikely to build large new parks"

"better use of open space"

plan will lead to "acquiring space for more parks"

(TS) 2:12:40 -Pollution

"Through this plan we are hoping to reduce the need for people to drive  and improve some of our air pollution quality issues in the city"

(TS) 2:14:08- Population growth

"Population continues to grow. That means that we will need to provide additional housing opportunities."

(TS) 2:14:20

"We cannot meet our current and future housing needs without making a change in our general plan".

(TS) 2:14:13

Staff presentation shows table by age detailing that Long Beach has a young population-unable to see table in video.

(TS) 2:14:20

"Long Beach's young population is going to be open to smaller units, more urban units and the product type that is contemplated in our Land Use Element"

(TS) 2:14:50 Families vs no children

"While most households in our city are families, many are not, and only 31% of households are families with children" 

(TS) 2:14:55

"So this mix of household types  demonstrates that we need all types of  housing options in the city. And that is what we are trying to provide with this plan"

(TS) 2:15:15 Community Outreach

"We have done a lot of community outreach with this plan. And as hard as we have tried, we know our outreach has been imperfect"

(TS) 2:15:18 -  2:15:33

"We know that some people in the city are not as active in the public hearing process and we ask you to consider those who are in most need of housing options, but cannot or did not participate in the public outreach process due to language barriers, financial or other resources."

(TS) 2:16:01 City requirement and Housing unit goal

Staff shows slide requirements under state law.

"The city is required to provide opportunities for housing production. This plan will provide the capacity that is needed to meet our housing goals. Not a production goal necessarily, but our current goal is 783 units per year." 

*CONO Note- under the stated staff goal above- If you do the math the "vision 2040" plan equals 2040-2018 = 22 years    22 x 783 = 17,226 units.

(TS) 2:16:20  Lack of Housing Supply

"Lack of housing supply in our city has consequences for our residents in terms over crowding and high costs. Forty-seven percent of renters in Long Beach are considered cost burdened"

(TS) 2:17:00 - 2:17:30 LUE fixes long commutes & environment with high paying jobs

" Lack of high paying quality jobs in the city is a major crisis with implications for greenhouse gasses and commuting patterns for residents.  The average commute in 2014 was 29.6 minutes which is 5% longer than the average commute in the state, but 2% shorter than Los Angeles commuters. Among California's largest cities the residents of Long Beach have the 4th longest commute behind Los Angeles, Oakland and San Francisco.

"And we feel the best thing you can do for commuting and for the environment is to provide local jobs here in long beach and that is what this plan is intending to do."

(TS) 2:17:35 Community Outreach and surveys

"As a reminder we have been working on this plan since 2006. The city has held over 100 public meetings and events on the Land Use Element and Urban Design Element throughout this process."

(TS) 2:17:52

"We collected feedback throughout these meetings and written feedback on-line through several surveys through three different languages.  You may recall from our study session in June, that staff conducted additional focus outreach in the spring of 2017 including 12 pop-up events, additional meetings and focus groups.  Overall feedback from these events was positive. We did have a lot of concerns expressed. We did some targeted focus groups in the Wrigley Area with people who were concerned with the plan and attendees expressed concerns about safety, parking, and around the retention of the historical character of the Wrigley area."

(TS) 2:18:27 Visual Preference Survey- "almost" 300 responses

"We did conduct a visual performance survey and it yielded almost  300 responses. Survey respondents prioritized protecting the environment, encouraging jobs, and the ability to walk to businesses to meet daily needs was the top concerns for their community.   Staff believes,  that the goals of the community are advanced by these two plans and the proposed elements  work together to expand and rectify housing supply directly related to housing cost issues by survey respondents."

(TS) 2:18: 58 Statements on proposed "text" changes

"We are also proposing additional text changes in the policy and implication sections in order to reflect feedback directly related to housing cost issues identified by survey respondents.  We are also proposing additional text changes in the policy and implementation sections in order to reflect feedback at recent outreach events. "