Planning Commission: Crispy or Extra Crispy
Staff editorial

A longtime city activist commented to the blog, “The council had a chance to clean house with the 2003 dismissal of Dan Joseph as city manager. Instead, they turned over the reins to staff members trained by and loyal to Dan – same personnel, same policies. The staffer who became city manager had side-stepped the council to spend more than $200,000 on Lower Curtis Park in a make-work contract benefiting Granich Construction. Activists took it to the grand jury, but the council had made the mistake of approving payments to Granich. The fiascos continue because the same city staffers are running the city.”

Nowhere are fiascos more blatant than the city’s combination of inaction and bumbling with affordable housing. Council members lacked the leadership to act, and the city staff only had to wait for the state to apply pressure. City council members have enriched their own campaign treasuries with developer cash, approving more housing in a built-out city but failing to satisfy affordable housing advocates.

The city recently lost in the lawsuit filed by the Public Law Center, an agency funded by developers of high-density welfare housing. As an ironic twist, city commissioners at the April 23 Planning Commission meeting asked the Public Law Center attorney’s advice on affordable housing.

In fairness to the commissioner who missed the April 23 meeting, he was evidently the only one who didn’t appear inept.

The meeting’s main event was a public hearing regarding General Plan and development code amendments and zone changes. The city staff recommended rezoning four parcels that could be developed as welfare housing. Two residents who attended the meeting commented to the blog.

One attendee emailed, “This Planning Commission is scary. No one on the commission seemed informed, prepared or capable of making a decision. When they don’t read the packet or know what’s going on, they rubberstamp whatever city employees want.”

Another said, “The outcome was obvious from the beginning. The commissioners were led by the city staff to favor rezoning. The commissioners are supposed to make decisions and direct the staff, but they constantly asked the staff what to do. Then they asked the lawyer who sued the city what she would like them to do. The chickens were asking the wolf how they should cook themselves – crispy or extra crispy.”

The lawyer who sued the city (on behalf of her welfare housing client) seems to prefer Site A, across the street from Palmia on east Los Alisos, as the next location for low-income housing. A Palmia resident spoke during the meeting in opposition to rezoning Site A, saying such a high-density project would devalue Palmia homes. A commissioner emphasized that Palmia has no access gate on Los Alisos – as if a six-foot perimeter wall is an invincible barrier. The Palmia resident, who serves as its HOA president, presented the opposite view of his predecessor, who said at a December 2003 Planning Commission meeting he didn’t object to another parcel adjacent to Palmia being rezoned for high-density residential with affordable units. The red carpet, once rolled out, is difficult to yank back.

The lawyer representing welfare housing said some of the other three parcels are less attractive because of environmental issues or other concerns. The Planning Commission ignored residents, heeding only the comments of non-residents who intend to profit from more welfare housing in Mission Viejo. The council majority will likely do the same as the Planning Commission, and Palmia will have plenty of new neighbors.