Published in the August 2008 West County Gazette
Letter to the Editor - Response From Carol Mitchell (Appreciating and agreeing with the article)
Letter to the Editor - Response from Councilmember Larry Robinson (Repeating his original speech without responding to my article's points)
Letter to the Editor - My Response to Councilmember Robinson
For more information
* Original Article - In the West County Gazette, July 2008, page 1
* A Better NEAP webpage - which includes other citizen comments and official City documents.
Dear Vesta,
Many thanks for Patricia Dines' excellent article outlining problems with Sebastopol's Northeast Plan.
This is a Machiaavellian scheme that pretends to be green when it is really a shopping mall with high-end condos on top plunked down in the middle of a flood zone. There is no viable public transport in Sebastopol. This plan will actually create a lot bigger carbon footprint and cause people to drive more.
Members of the council who back the plan claim "a moral obligation" to keep the plan as is. This implies that people with substantiated criticisms of the plan are somehow "immoral."
I agree with Patricia, it is better to build up out of the flood plain and on a scale more to the character of our small rural town.
The next city council meeting is Aug 5th at the Community Center Annex (Old teen center)
Thank you, Carol Mitchel Sebastopol 829-8332
[WCG editor's introduction before this letter, as printed in the paper]
In response to Patricia Dines article on Sebastopol's North East Area Plan, Sebastopol Council member Larry Robinson submitted the following. Patricia Dines - in turn - responds to Larry. I'm placing these two "letters" together so you can follow along. There's a lot of information for everyone here.
And if you think this is just about Sebastopol and for Sebastopol residents and businesses only - think again. Every individual who visits and shops in Sebastopol is impacted by this community's development - not only as we travel through and use the services of this city, but also by the impact one change has upon another.
Our lives and communities are like dominoes lined up against each other. None of us are alone and are impacted by each other in many, many ways. The "last word" on this subject is still a long way away. -
[PD NOTE, just for this website]: Though the Council's final decision on this particular topic is very near, within the next few weeks, potentially changing the design of this area and town long into the future.
Sebastopol's NEAP
By Larry Robinson
Throughout the process of developing Sebastopol's Northeast Area Plan and throughout my ten years on this Council, my overriding concern and intention has been to help Sebastopol and Sonoma County move closer to true sustainability. This goal has informed every decision I have made and every initiative I have proposed. I would never support any Council action that I believed would jeopardize our quality of life or that of those who will come after us.
As a community, as a culture and as a species we are in a time of unprecedented change. I believe that the next twenty years will show whether we are going to continue on the path to social and ecosystem collapse or evolve to a new level of relationship with each other and with the Earth - one of partnership rather than attempted dominance. The choices we make today will either broaden or narrow our future opportunities to adapt to a world that promises to be increasingly challenging.
It may be that the only things we can reliably predict about the future are greater instability, more people and fewer resources to go around. But anyone who is certain about the exact shape of the future either hasn't lived long enough to know better or hasn't been paying much attention. In the coming years we will be facing changes and challenges none of us are, or can be, prepared for. We will need to be flexible, resilient and resourceful. But most of all we will need each other. I fervently hope that on the other side of our current disagreement about the Northeast Plan, we can learn to talk to each other, to listen to each other and to trust each other.
We know that we need to transition to a post-carbon economy; to conserve precious resources like water and agricultural land. In all likelihood we will be living much more locally in twenty years than we are today. We particularly need to make our land use decisions with this in mind.
I understand the hope that Sebastopol can be an island of sustainability in a sea of unsustainability. We see our world on the edge of system-wide failure because of our consumption patterns and our continual disregard for the web of life that supports and holds us all. We feel more and more crowded by cars, buildings and othe people. But we don't live in isolation; we are part of a complex web and we are inextricably linked to everything and* everyone else. As never before it is incumbent upon us to live up to our ideal of thinking globally and acting locally.
We need to remember that what we are deliberating is a plan to guide development over the next 20 to 25 years; it is not a development proposal. The proposed plan would not prohibit any current uses nor expand any areas designated for development.
Despite assertions to the contrary, the plan would not allow development on any wetlands. This is not a pristine area; it has been developed for many years, in some cases for over a century. Under our current General Plan, development is already allowed there, including up to 500 residential units, as compared to the 300 unit limit the plan proposes. The original intention of creating a specific plan for this area has been to make sure that the development that does occur there is done in a coherent way, benefitting our entire community, rather than piecemeal, as it would without a plan.
It is important to note that the land in the plan area is privately owned and that the City cannot mandate specific uses such as a new library, a business incubator, photovoltaic arrays or a year-round market. These are all excellent ideas and would add greatly to our quality of life. The City unfortunately doesn't have the money to buy any of the land. However, with the warrant process for increased building height, we have the potential to negotiate such community benefits.
I am saddened by the misinformation being disseminated about this process. But I am most saddened by the animosity and mistrust that is dividing our community. After years of conflict between the environmental community and the business community, I had hoped that we could come together to support a vision of the future that leads to the healing of the planet and to a sound local economy. I still believe that the Northeast Area Specific Plan, with certain modifications, will accomplish this.
Climate change is a very real and imminent threat and it is indisputable that much of it is driven by human actions. In California, 40% of greenhouse gas emissions are from automobiles and trucks. In Sonoma County it is 60%. Reducing the number of vehicle miles traveled is our most important challenge and the single most effective way to do that is with high density mixed-use urban infill. Density is what makes transit feasible, giving us the option of getting out of our cars.
If current rrends continue, over the next 25 years the world will add 3 billion people; California will be adding 9 million new residents; the Bay Area will add 2 million; Sebastopol will add another 3000. They will have to live somewhere. If we don't allow and encourage infill on existing urban footprints, development will occur on the land we will need for food production, recreation and wildlife habitat.
When we adopted our Urban Growth Boundary 12 years ago, the bargain we made was that in exchange for halting sprawl we would allow infill. This is also what our General Plan calls for. It is time for us to keep our promise. It is past time for us to think and plan regionally and systemically.
Among other comments we have heard that the planning process was unfair, that the current draft of the plan was driven by either the consultants or by developers. The truth is that the planning process was initiated by the City Council five years ago in recognition of the fact that this area is going to be developed eventually. We agreed that it would be better to have the development be coordinated and planned in a way that offers the greatest benefit and the least negative impact to our community and the surrounding ecosystem.
Without a plan, property owners would have far greater latitude in how they develop their properties. Current zoning allows for up to 500 units of housing instead of the 300 proposed in the plan. Individual parcels could be built on fill as we see now on Morris Street. There would be no new street grid, no public spaces or other amenities.
We have done everything we know how to be inclusive and to let our residents and neighbors know about and be involved in the process. Over the course of 17 public workshops, several hundred of us shared our visions, hopes, dreams and concerns. At each juncture, the consultants we had engaged to facilitate the process, DCE, took the evolving consensus and brought back to us a more and more focused product.
What we are considering now is a compromise among these various visions. It doesn't reflect everyone's wishes, but it does accurately reflect the vision of the overwhelming majority of those who participated in the visioning workshops. This is a plan that was developed by the people of Sebastopol; it has been fair, inclusive and exhaustive, if not exhausting. It is a plan that will restore Sebastopol's former reputation for environmental stewardship and creative thinking.
We have a unique opportunity to create a vibrant, walkable, human scale extension of downtown that is not dominated by automobiles; an area that will enhance our quality of life while doing our part to minimize human impact on the natural world. We can show that Sebastopol can truly think globally and act locally.
Dear Councilmember Robinson -
Thank you for your thoughts about Sebastopol's proposed Northeast Area Plan (NEAP). I share and appreciate your desire to encourage this town's sustainability, quality of life, and economic vitality.
That's why I, and so many others, have taken the time to try to constructively and collaboratively address what we see as this plan's shortfalls in those three areas. As I discussed in my original article, I feel that the plan's viability is undermined by the gap between its hopes and its specifics in this particular location.
I was disappointed that you responded to my article by submitting the speech I had critiqued, with its general vision statements, disproven claims, and dismissal of those who've dared to disagree. For me, this approach is what has so painfully polarized our town around this plan, discouraging those who seek only informed democratic discussion.
How different it would be if you instead received and engaged with our fact-based concerns and suggestions. The people have the right to choose their future; and our combined perspectives, analysis, and wisdom could help create a much-improved plan for our town. In my article, I asked if the Council would finally hear the people's voices. Why is it so hard for that to happen?
Before the City embarks on an approach requiring many millions of dollars up-front (which are returned only if the plan works) and changing this town so notably, I think it's reasonable for the people to assess the viability of the claims and decide if they want to take on the costs, risks, and identified downsides.
My article highlighted serious conflicts I've found within this plan, because of its specific location and design. For instance, it depends on many new shoppers while predicting significant traffic congestion that will block their flow. The costs of building in an earthquake liquefaction and flood zone will create expensive housing and stores, but the business types identified by the plan as viable here are decidedly low-rent. The plan's costs and mismatches will likely worsen in peak oil scenarios.
We can still have mixed use's ecological benefits, without these downsides, by building organically in higher areas of town, with more modest development in this area. As you say, the future is quite uncertain, with serious changes looming. Thus, it seems wisest to choose approaches that are flexible to emerging conditions, instead of committing so many resources up-front to one questionable approach.
My article also addressed claims made about this plan. For instance, it's the consultant himself who said that the plan would increase the allowed development in this area. And, if the plan is really happening over 20-25 years, why do we need to remove the General Plan's growth controls? Also, many question if this will actually lessen GHGs, given traffic jams' added pollution, or create a better transit system, given our spread-out rural area.
Overall, we keep wondering - isn't it possible for Sebastopol to be sustainable without rapidly and at high-cost becoming a crowded hectic high-rise city? Some of us define sustainability and livability quite differently.
In terms of this plan's public process, I think it says it all that the overwhelming majority of citizens speaking at the recent public hearing stated serious concerns about the plan, including both environmental and business people. Only a handful of insiders spoke for the plan, and even they often added provisos. If this had truly been the people's plan, the majority of citizens would've affirmed that their visions and values were expressed in its specifics. Instead, many of us felt throughout the process that the design had been decided beforehand, and only concurring voices were heard.
I know that it's hard to hear disagreement, as it is to speak it. But I think it's worse to see only our hopes and not face realities, while we still have time to adjust our direction.
My goal in sharing my concerns is to support informed democratic decision-making about our shared future. The Council's decisions impact far beyond the town's limits. I sincerely hope that the Council remembers that its role is representing the people's wishes, not forcing a plan on us that we don't want. I also hope that our conversation can focus on the citizens' priority issues and integrating our wisdom and choices into the plan, instead of going into periphery issues we haven't emphasized (such as wetlands status). The outcome could be a better, more-successful plan that the people might actually choose.
Folks wanting more information can see <www.healthyworld.org/ABetterNEAP.html>. This has my original article, other citizens' concerns, critiques of New Urbanism (upon which this plan seems to be based), the City's Plan documents, and information about participating. The next Council meeting is Tues. Aug. 19.
In service, Patricia Dines, Environmental Writer
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Page last updated 08/19/08
www.healthyworld.org/ResponseToNEAPArticle.html