Government

Supervisors Approve General Plan Update

The San Diego County Board of Supervisors voted 4-1 Wednesday to approve the General Plan Update, the first sweeping upgrade in 30 years of the County’s growth and development plans.
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The San Diego County Board of Supervisors voted 4-1 Wednesday to approve the General Plan Update, the first sweeping upgrade in 30 years of the County’s growth and development plans.

The Board also voted 3-2 to direct County staff to hold a Board workshop Nov. 9 to provide a comprehensive review of property specific requests submitted during the General Plan Update hearings.

General plans guide community development. Generally, they set the philosophy and policies that determine what gets built where.

The General Plan Update accomplishes that in part by shifting an estimated 20 percent of the development expected to occur in the future to western unincorporated communities with established infrastructure such as roads, fire protection and sewer services.

Benefits of the plan when compared to the previous plan include:

  • Accommodating a roughly 41 percent increase in population in unincorporated communities while still cutting projected growth in the old general plan by 15 percent.
  • Cutting potential greenhouse gas emissions by 550,000 metric tons a day by reducing new road construction by 780 lane miles and eliminating up to three million vehicle trips a day.
  • Reducing wildfire threats by locating more growth closer to existing fire stations.
  • Reducing potential direct effects of development on biological habitat.

The General Plan Update was developed with broad public input from developers, business owners, environmentalists, farmers, homeowners, landowners and renters.

General Plan Update Website

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