Public Process for Sonoma County General Plan Update Off to a Bad Start (Fwd)

[Barry]

Date: Thu, 02 Mar 2006 09:36:34 -080
From: "Brenda S. Adelman"

Public Process for Sonoma County General Plan Update Off to a Bad Start

Hundreds of Sonoma County property owners were concerned about a
bright orange notice appearing in their mailboxes recently, notifying
them of General Plan changes that might affect their property. The
notice came from the Sonoma County Planning Department. Since it was
very unclear who was being affected, the first question people asked
themselves was, why did I receive this notice? Alarm bells were
ringing!%%So people did the logical thing; they tried to call the
contact number on the notice. The lucky ones who didn't get a busy
signal heard a voice message telling them that 36,000 notices were
sent out, and people could leave a message for a call back (At the
meeting, staff announced that 40,000 were mailed.). No one, to our
knowledge got return calls, but at least it was now clear that a
large number of people were affected, rather than a select few.

The first meeting of several listed on the orange notice was
scheduled for 6:00 PM on Tuesday, February 28th. You would think
that the staff might have figured that a crowd would show up to find
out more about what was going on, and not hold the meeting in a room
that would only accommodate about 100 people. As more and more people
filled the meeting room and then the outer room, and the lobby, and
even lined up out the door, there was an anxious feeling in the air.
Planning staff stood behind a table handing out information and
answering questions, and contrary to every other meeting they have
held, since there was no sign up sheet, no one knew who was
attending. Some of these people came from distant reaches of the
County and had traveled a long time in rush hour traffic to attend.
Many people were concerned about possible changes in zoning and set
back requirements. The notice wasn't clear that zoning was not being
considered and proposed changes were for new development only.

Because of the chaos, commencement of the meeting was delayed a bit.
There was some discussion of continuing the meeting to a more
convenient time and place. There was no agreement as to time, date
and place, but apparently staff told people in the hallways that a
second meeting would be held on March 15th at 1:00 PM. This was
announced on Channel 50 television as well. But when staff came back
in the hearing room and announced the time to those lucky enough to
have a seat, there were concerns expressed that working people could
not come to a daytime meeting. Eventually, after many people had
left, it was decided that a second meeting would be held at 4:00 PM
on March 15th, but the location was uncertain. It was decided that
notices would be posted on the website and the doors of the building,
but not mailed.

Staff also announced, after talking to people in the hall for over
ten minutes, that they determined that people had come to learn about
impacts to their individual properties and, when it was explained
that the purpose of this meeting did not include addressing issues
about specific properties, people left. Later, some attendees
alleged that that was not the only reason why many people attended;
rather many had come to learn about the General Plan and EIR and left
when they could neither get into the hearing room, nor hear what was
being said.

Well over half the people left and staff had no way of knowing who
would come back at the wrong time and possibly the wrong place.
Furthermore, if people wanted to learn about the EIR process, they
would be informed only two days before the end of the comment period.
The meeting began with a brief presentation from staff about the
General Plan process. Most were befuddled by the staff's
explanations, which were highly technical in nature. Yet, this was to
be the one and only meeting on the Environmental Impact Report,
which, after many years of preparation and delays, had been released
on January 17th, (The second meeting would be ONLY to take comments
from those who did not speak at the first meeting.)

Staff reiterated that they were generous in setting the time for
comments at 61 days rather than the usual 45. Actually, it took most
of us a week or more to obtain hard copies of both the General Plan
and the EIR. These thick and very complicated documents describe
proposed changes to County policies for the next 20 years. Speaker
after speaker pleaded for an extra 30 days to provide meaningful
comments. The Chair of the Planning Commission, Richard Fogg, chided
Commission Furch for requesting a discussion on the subject, and
instead dictated that there would be no discussion until after the
hearing is closed on the 15th in the evening. This would do us
little good however, since the comments are due by 4 PM on the 17th.
In gauging our time to provide comments, we would have to be nearly
finished by that point in time.

We are very concerned about the time schedule and the
interrelationship between the General Plan and the EIR, which is not
at all clear. The Commission intends to close comments on the very
complex EIR by March 17th, but continue to study and change the goals
and policies in the General Plan for several months to come, during
which further public comment would be allowed. Unfortunately
however, the EIR relies on the goals and policies of the General Plan
to mitigate the impacts. If the goals and policies are changed
significantly, the EIR will not match up and may need to be
recirculated anyway.

Furthermore, there are many very serious flaws in the EIR. There is
inaccurate, incomplete, and misleading background information in both
the EIR and the General Plan. The mitigations are mostly inadequate
to address the impacts. They have utilized old data that fails to
describe the current setting. One important example of missing data
is the Revised Urban Water Management Plan, which was due in
December, 2005, and now won't be ready until about June, 2006.
Instead, the EIR uses data from the outdated and incomplete year 2000
document.

So, many people will provide comments pointing out all the problems
to which the consultant will respond in writing, (many were pointed
out at Tuesday evening's meeting). A final EIR will be written and
then it will be up to the Commission and then the Board of
Supervisors to decide whether to certify the document (EIR). What a
waste of time to go through all this now, if the document is
significantly flawed and must be changed.

But Planning staff made a plea to move forward with the project,
because they don't want it held up any further. They have a schedule
to follow! It is clear from all their actions thus far that they
don't value what the public has to say, in spite of the many
sophisticated comments at the Hearing. While they remind us that
they have heard extensively from the public early on in the citizen's
committee process, and that is true, the public saw the EIR for the
first time in January of this year and has been given a very
inadequate amount of time to study and comment on it.

It is time to complain about the way the public is being treated. We
recommend calling your County Supervisor at 565-2241 and let your
thoughts be known about this process. They are, after all, the final
authority in this matter, and if they hear a large outcry from their
constituents, they will slow this process down and do a better job.
We need a General Plan that preserves and protects the incredible
resources of this County, and thus far, this plan falls far short of
protecting our precious resources for future generations.

PS: I is also a good idea to assume that comments will be due by
March 17th at 4 PM. You can call Sue Dahl at (707) 565-7380 for more
information.

Have a great time with this.

Brenda Adelman for Russian River Watershed Protection Committee

[JulieJess]

Public Process for Sonoma County General Plan Update Off to a Bad Start

Wow! It certainly was -- and IS -- off to a bad start!

But I want to say that I called and left a message, and Sue returned my call within a couple of hours. She answered my question as to how our property would be affected and was very friendly and knowledgeable.

Julie

[Teri Bigio]

Dear Barry and My Sonoma Friends,
Thanks for posting the info for Sonoma. Although I live in Marin and am not directly effected by this info, I too care about what's happening to Sonoma, and how the local govt officials are handling things. I appreciate the article and details, and hope that y'all have a favorable result from the outpouring of the citizens.

Warmly,
Teri Bigio