Slow-Growthers Turn Up the Heat : Tough New Initiative in Works After Council Vote on Builder Exemptions

Angered by the number of exemptions granted in two key San Diego growth-control ordinances, a group of environmentalists and slow-growth advocates has decided to sponsor a citizens’ initiative aimed at imposing even stricter controls over where and how many residential units developers can build in the city.

Linda Martin, co-chairman of Citizens for Limited Growth, said members of the group voted Monday night to go forward with the initiative because they are dismayed over how many exemptions San Diego City Council members allowed last week in final deliberations over the controversial Interim Development Ordinance (IDO), as well as a companion law designed to keep development off hillsides, wetlands and flood plains.

Martin said Tuesday that an “overwhelming” number of the 20 group members who attended the meeting voted to study how to raise campaign funds and how to draft the initiative, which may be ready for a spot on the May, 1988, ballot.

“We decided that we had to go ahead and do our own thing,” Martin said, adding that the exemptions granted to developers are a “complete slap in the face” to slow-growth activists.

Gotch Pledges Help

Councilman Mike Gotch said Tuesday that he endorsed the group’s decision to put an initiative on the ballot, and he pledged to “provide their effort whatever personal and technical assistance I can after I leave office.”

“I do believe they need to go forward with the citizens’ action,” said Gotch, who will step down in December. “The council gave away the store.”

But a spokesman for the Building Industry Assn. said Tuesday he expected the citizens group to mount the initiative campaign all along, despite the outcome over the recent growth-control ordinances.

“Quite honestly, that group was going to go to the ballot with an initiative no matter what we ended up with,” said Mike Reynolds, president of the BIA and owner of the M. W. Reynolds Inc. construction firm.

“They have a cause, and they have a need that they need to fulfill,” Reynolds said. “If they’re not working to do that, they have nothing better in life to do.”

Renewed discussion about a growth-limitation initiative, akin to the successful 1985 Proposition A, came in the wake of a marathon City Council meeting on Friday to put finishing touches on two temporary measures aimed at controlling development--the IDO and a companion measure called the Resource Protection Overlay Zone, which is designed to prevent construction on environmentally sensitive lands.

To slow the city’s burgeoning growth rate, the IDO dictates that developers can build no more than 8,000 residential units a year, a pace that is about half that of last year.

In addition, the overlay zone greatly tightens controls over what can be built in canyons, on wetlands and on flood plains. For instance, the zone would consider as environmentally sensitive any hillsides that can be seen up to one mile from major city streets or freeways such as Interstate 15.

Threatened Initiatives

Citizens for Limited Growth played a part in passing the measures because the group drafted two proposed initiatives that would have imposed even stricter numerical and environmental controls. The group, for example, had drafted a measure that would limit residential construction to 6,000 units in the first year, 5,000 units the second, and 4,000 units every year thereafter.

The threat of the initiative was so powerful that Mayor Maureen O’Connor referred to it publicly in convincing her council colleagues to adopt the more moderate IDO in June.

In addition, O’Connor convinced leaders of the citizens group to postpone their plans for the initiatives and instead negotiate with prominent developers in private meetings at City Hall over the environmental exemptions.

But Martin said her group was angered by the exemptions granted during Friday’s council meeting--especially those given to major projects to sidestep environmental protections along the Interstate 15 corridor.

At Councilman Ed Struiksma’s request, the council lifted those environmental regulations for developments along Black Mountain Road and Calle Cristobal. It also exempted the 385-acre County Island project, which will consist of 1,350 residential units, and the 1,835-acre Miramar Ranch North project, which will consist of 4,650 residential units.

“One of our major concerns from the very beginning was the I-15 corridor,” Martin said Tuesday. “If you ever look over to where the foothills used to be, there has been some abusive development.

“A lot of our members live in that area, and they were active with us because they saw a chance to save the landforms there,” she said. “That was a major concern for us. . . . Our sense was that the exemptions were major exemptions.”

Martin said it was “dishonest” for council members to pass the environmental protections with the major exemptions. “We don’t have a sense of how bad the damage is,” she said. “We won’t know for a few months.”

Martin also said that members of the group now regret losing time by trying to work with the mayor and other council members instead of working directly to put the initiatives on the ballot.

“Playing politics didn’t help, didn’t work,” she said.

Although the group has two proposed initiatives already drafted, Martin said the group wants to work on the language more, and study how much money and volunteer effort it will take to put the measures on the ballot. She said it will also be contacting slow-growth groups in Orange County and elsewhere around the state to determine what would be the best approach to limiting development.

The BIA’s Reynolds said he expects the business community to fight any citizens’ initiative that would drastically limit growth, especially since fees paid by developers help pay for the streets, sewers, parks and schools needed in burgeoning areas.

“The business community--which includes such organizations as the Chamber of Commerce, the San Diego Taxpayers Assn., the Black Community Alliance--I’m sure is prepared to go forward with making sure that the quality of life in San Diego is not affected by some crazy special interest group ballot initiative,” said Reynolds.

When informed of the group’s intentions to press forward with the initiative, Struiksma said it was an “example of a minority group of people trying to take the rights of the majority away.”

Struiksma said he asked for the exemptions because the City Council had recently reviewed the two major projects, and the environmental regulations would prevent development needed to finance street improvements and school expansions.

“For some lofty political and ideological goals of theirs, they are saying to hell with the community,” said Struiksma. “They don’t care about the overcrowded schools. They don’t care about getting the roads in.”