County supervisors completed a three-day special meeting Wednesday, directing County planners to come back in May with a plan re-evaluating requests made by 56 property owners who want the County to change how the new general plan affects their land.
Supervisors approved the “General Plan Update” Aug. 3, 2011, completing the County’s first comprehensive update of its general growth and development plans in 30 years.
However, the Board also voted at that time to hold a special meeting to consider requests raised by 137 property owners during the public hearing process.
On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, supervisors pored over maps, listened to property owners describe the changes they wanted, and heard Department of Planning and Land Use (DPLU) staff explain how the general plan affected those properties.
In the end, supervisors said DPLU should continue to evaluate whether changes could be made to the general plan to accommodate 56 of the property requests, some of which could also require land-use changes to surrounding properties.
Supervisors said they would not know if changes could be made until DPLU had the opportunity to work with the affected property owners and return with a plan.
DPLU Director Eric Gibson said the department would return to the Board May 2 with a plan that would include:
- Options for potential general plan changes.
- Estimates of what additional environmental study and/or public hearings those changes would require.
- Estimates of what those changes and studies would cost.
- Estimates of what potential “ripple” effects individual changes could mean to the general plan.
- An evaluation of the cumulative effect the collected changes could have on the general plan.
Gibson said DPLU would begin by notifying all affected property owners, the respective community planning advisory groups, and “aggressively” negotiating to come back to the Board with potential solutions by May 2.
