• Planning Commission Meeting June 2018

The June planning commission meeting came with no decisions that the average Wildomartini will ever notice. There were four items on the agenda... and the last item just sought input, and no decision was issued. 

The first three were known as "zone consistency" changes where land that is already being used according to the General Plan Land Use Map were being rezoned to match the GP.

But let's start at the top of the meeting with public comments. There were two. 
     •   Ken Mayes asked why are we still building, issuing permits, when the state has said we are in a severe drought condition. He also spoke about the general plan, and that he wants the city to update it with input from current residents. 
     •   Paul Hayes asked about Baxter Village and what's its status.
If you're unsure what, and or where, Baxter Village is, click the keyword at the bottom of the blog.

After the meeting I had a chance to talk to Paul, and he just was curious as to what the hold up has been with that project... and honestly, I'd like to know too.

This isn't a city/city council/planning commission/city staff issue, it's a developer issue. 

Anyone else remember how many years that Wildomar Square's developer(s) dragged their feet before that place got up and running?

This is on the developer(s) here, and why they would bother to go through all the pain of getting a large project approved, to then just sit on it, is baffling to me. But it's their money, and they can use it how they best see fit. We just don't have to be all hunky-dory about it.

The part of the project's limbo status that bothers me most is that they don't maintain the property to the standards that I'd like to see. 

First, the grove of eucalyptus trees need to be maintained so that it doesn't become another homeless encampment. There is already evidence that at least one person lives among the olive trees there.

There is nothing nice about those trees, unless you like easy access fire hazards with untrimmed brush that goes right down to ground level, giving ample hiding place for a future homeless hangout.

Also, it's an easy-to-reach dumping ground, and they need to put in serious barricades to keep people from being able to drive in there. About two weeks ago I saw that impediments were placed on the dirt road to keep people out, and about five days later the path was cleared. 

The red arrow points to an old tree stump that someone thought would make a impenetrable barrier... ummm, think again. It was easily moved and access to the property was 'restored' to what it was the week before.

This is the type of thing that we need code enforcement to be hounding the property owners about until they do some lasting work in this regard.

This photo was taken in early April. Let's award a gold star to whoever cleaned up this dumping ground, but it's just going to be whack-a-mole if they don't either fence the place or start building.

Back to the meat of the meeting. 

There were four items that were all somewhat similar. None of them have any bearing on our day to day lives so I'm not going to [over] elaborate here, but I will add the video of the entire meeting at the bottom of the blog (less the part where my camera malfunctioned during item 2.1 — that was rather vexing. lol).

They were somewhat similar because they all dealt with zoning consistency in one way or the other. Properties that are being used as they are allowed in the General Plan, but out of sync with the Zoning Map (such a headache).

Here are a couple of paragraphs from the agenda packet on the issue.

When the County of Riverside adopted its General Plan update in 2003, they planned to follow through with a consistency zoning program to rezone all the land in Wildomar that had changed as a result of the update. 

The County never completed the consistency zoning program, thus, when the City incorporated on July 1, 2008, the city inherited a large number of parcels with inconsistent zoning. Government Code Section 65860(c) states that in the event that a zoning designation becomes inconsistent with a general plan land use designation by reason of an amendment or update to the plan, the zoning map shall be amended within a reasonable time so that it is consistent with the general plan as amended. 

It now has been 14 years since the 2003 County General Plan was adopted. While the City has been unable financially to prepare its own consistency zoning program for the hundreds of parcels (350+) that are inconsistent, it is a positive benefit to the city when an Applicant proposes to change the zoning at their expense. 

Of the three items seeking zoning consistency changes —that you'd ever seen before— is on the east side of the freeway, on an unpaved road called Western Way. 

An illustration that was found in the agenda packet indicated the location.

It's a window manufacturing business that is visible on the north side of Baxter. It's really out of the way, and unless you were sightseeing, you could easily have looked right through it.

The arrow points to where the "notice of public hearing" sign was located on the property.

One neighbor spoke his objections to the rezoning, wanting to "keep it residential".

Here's the rub, that land is already being used for light industrial purposes, and has been since before we became a city. It's kind of hard to "keep it residential" when it hasn't been for years, and is actually on the GP as Light Industrial. 

Another zoning consistency item was dealing with a sliver of property behind the westside Starbucks area on an unpaved portion of Stable Lanes Road.

You'll see by the two maps of the same area, that the area is designated as commerical retail (red) on the GP, but still has the placeholder designation of R-R on the zoning map. 

There are no current plans in the works for this property.

Agenda Item #3.1
For as much as this won't actually affect anyone's lives (other than the property owners) this can bog down quickly in the various rules and regulations. 

Quick note, this was a GPIP. If you're not sure what that is, and want to know, click this link to read a past blog on the topic —it's about halfway down the page.

The current location of Wildomar Storage is L-shaped, and the request would be to include two other parcels to the south so they could upgrade and expand.

First let me include some of the language from the agenda packet:
The land use change (and concurrent zone change), if approved, would allow an existing/dilapidated mini-warehouse storage facility to be replaced with a new self storage facility meeting all code requirements.

The Planning Commission, as part of its comments to City Council, could also consider the following: 
• whether allowing the BP land use and M-SC zoning designations at this specific location is an appropriate and/or logical policy decision? 
• is redevelopment of the site to allow a new self-storage facility to replace an existing/dilapidated self-storage facility a good policy decision? 
• could this land use change result in a “de-facto” policy decision that would “open the door” for other legal non-conforming self-storage facilities in the commercial zones to redevelop?

If this was empty land, and someone wanted to put in a self storage yard, where it was neither zoned for it, nor part of the General Plan, this would be a slam dunk "NO".

However, there ALREADY is a self storage yard there, and they are looking to bring it into the 21st century; the owners have used the term "dilapidated" describing its current condition.

A view from Mission Trail courtesy of Google Maps (2016).

A legitimate concern that was noted by Planning Director Matt Bassi dealt with potential consequences of changing the General Plan. 

What if the GP gets amended, and the project doesn't go through? Would that then allow for a manufacturing business to locate there?

The way the rules are written (passed by the council in 2012), storage yards can't be put into commercial retail areas, they go into areas designated as light industrial with a CUP (Conditional Use Permit).

With that 2012 ordinance, it allowed such businesses to exist legally, but restricted them when it came to improving them beyond basic cosmetic upgrades... hence the need to ask for a General Plan Amendment (GPA) now.

Just a preliminary drawing to give a feel of how a rebuilt "Wildomar Storage" could look from Mission Trail. 

Without knowing the ins and outs of such minutiae, I'd think it would be a reasonable expectation that any GPA would be wholly contingent on the plans at hand, or it would simply revert back to its existing designation.

The problem is, that is far too reasonable, and easy to follow, for that to be how things get done on a governmental level. So I wouldn't be surprised if such a logical solution were to be greeted with titters and guffaws by those that do this for a living.

Again, no matter how this gets dealt with by the city council (where it will come before them in July) it's quite preliminary and years away from being anything the rest of us would see, even if "fast tracked".

If you live in district three, visit the website and take a look at my views.
If you have questions, please don't hesitate to ask them.

There was a thread that started with Kenny Mayes' public comment at the front of the meeting, that I touched on when addressing Wildomar Storage's GPIP agenda item, and responded to by Planning Director Matt Bassi.

It was about our General Plan, and it having last been updated in 2003 when we were county, and the map redone in 2007 (still before cityhood). 

In my comment I asked how much it would cost to redo the General Plan. 

I asked some direct questions, that really weren't part of the item at hand, but Director Bassi still did his best to answer them without any prep time; kudos to him.

The questions were:
1) How much would it cost for a whole new General Plan, and or complete zone consistency project?
2) As specifically as you can, please estimate how much time such an endeavor would take to complete... both in actual man hours and in weeks/months
3) Why would it cost that much?

Director Bassi's answers begin at the 2:10 mark of the video below. 

I had another two paragraphs on the backside of my notes that I didn't read at the time, but they'll work here.

I ask these questions because I know there isn't a large cash reserve in town, to the point that the city hasn't been able to swap out a $5,000 broken guardrail for more than three years. (my ballpark guess on how much the cost would be)

So a million dollar project, on something that isn't pressing, would seem absurd to have pushed to the front of the line, even if it would be nice to have.

Below is a video of the entire meeting as described above.

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A consensus means that everyone agrees to say collectively what no one believes individually.
– Abba Eban

If "consensus" were a bird, Wildomar Rap wouldn't throw it bread crumbs.  

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