April 6, 2005 - Top Stories
By DAVID ROSS
‘I have never before heard of a fee that was enacted to put someone out of business,” observed Gary Wynn, the engineer for the proposed Weston Shopping Center.
It IS rare for the County staff to propose levees designed to strangle an entire industry. But there’s always a first time.
Wynn was talking about the proposed county Transportation Impact Fee (TIF). Revised versions of the fees, first introduced at the Board of Supervisors meeting in January, came out last week.
Their purpose, according to the Dept. of Public Works is: 1) to fund construction of identified facilities needed to reduce or mitigate projected cumulative impacts resulting from future development; and 2) to allocate the costs of these facilities equitably among all future developing properties.
These revised fees will be presented to the Board of Supervisors at their April 13 meeting.
They are broken down into two types: a local component and a regional component. Each community’s local fees are tailored to what has been determined to be its future transportation needs.
The proposed fees would raise the price of a single family residential unit in Valley Center by $7,139. They would raise the price of a community shopping center by $22.42 sq. ft.
This would add $7 million to the cost of the Weston shopping center, which is estimated to be about $40 million currently.
This is not the first time that the developers of the shopping center have used words similar to “this action will keep the shopping center from being built.”
This IS the first time that they have been part of a growing chorus of civil engineers and organizations such as the Building Industry Association of San Diego County, who agree that commercial building in the County will grind to a halt if the fees are adopted.
That organization has accused the County of trying to rush through the new traffic impact fees without giving sufficient time to study their impact on the local economy.
Everybody, including Wynn, agrees that some sort of traffic impact fee is needed.
At Supervisor Bill Horn’s State of North County speech in March, Horn asserted, “We need to fix the roads. It’s going to take a lot of money.”
But Wynn feels that the discrepancy between what is being added for residential developments compared to commercial developments, is wrong.
It would add about 4-5% to the cost of a residence, but add 40-50% to the cost of retail development.
“I’m not just saying it will stop the commercial center here,” said Wynn. “It will stop all commercial development in the county because it’s disproportionate.”
For six months projects have been held up in the County. This was caused by changes in state law last year that, in effect , requires the smallest of developments to conduct traffic studies of the cumulative effects of traffic in their areas, costing $20,000-$30,000, before they can proceed.
This has caused an unofficial “moratorium” on developments throughout the County.
According to Chandra Waller, assistant director of the Dept. of Public Works, 270 projects countywide are in the wings waiting to see what the fee will look like—and if it will be approved. These projects are in limbo.
It’s not clear how many projects are being held up in Valley Center, a community not unfamiliar with moratoriums. Some estimates put it at 25 or more, including Valley Center Community Church.
Practically speaking, however, it’s any project in VC that requires a discretionary permit, according to Wynn. “Right now because of traffic impacts, to even do a lot split you have to do a traffic study.”
Andy Washburn, chairman of the VC planning group, has a report scheduled at the group’s meeting Monday, two days before it comes before the supervisors.
TIF has been a long time coming, he observes. It started with a pilot program in Ramona and Fallbrook that was, Washburn says, “apparently successful.”
Last year the VC planning group asked if it could be part of the pilot program, but Fallbrook and Ramona got the honor instead.
Washburn concedes that the proposed fees are high.
“In the case of the [80,000 sq. ft] project that Steve Flynn hopes to do with the Bell family’s property across from the dairy, it is my understanding the the TIF would add three million dollars,” he said.
“It’s huge. This is a huge jump in the amount of fees being asked. Clearly this is way too high a fee. I would hope the Board of Supervisors would see the benefits of reducing the fees.”
It is appropriate, says Washburn, that “both residential and commercial development pay for traffic impacts. You go shopping. You go to work. There is a responsibility at some level for the back end.”
There are traffic impact fees in other counties, but, according to Wynn, they are more like $5-6 per sq. foot for commercial, not $40-50 per sq. ft.
This could have the effect of halting the commercial development that the County hopes to tax—leaving nothing to pay for increased traffic.
“They are shooting themselves in the foot,” said Wynn. “We have a special case here in Valley Center, having been under a moratorium. We won’t be able to do any commercial and in many ways we will add traffic to the roads because people will be driving out of Valley Center to buy their goods.”
Wynn would like to see some of the burden of the fees shifted from commercial to residential.
However, residential property is already hit by high fees.
In February the median price of a home in the county was $472,000, 16% higher than last year.
About eight months after taking a vote opposing the landscaped median for Valley Center Road, the VC Chamber of Commerce has voted to reverse itself.
It’s a new administration and a new understanding of what the median is—and is not—at the Chamber.
“We’re all for it,” Chamber Pres. Tom Bumgardner, who took over as president in January. He noted that the vote of the executive board to support the median was unanimous.
The letter is addressed to Supervisor Bill Horn, and is designed to enlist his support for funding for the landscaped median.
It’s a little bit after the fact, since Horn’s office has already included a request for $1.5 million for TransNet funds to SANDAG (San Diego Assn. of Governments). However the letter does indicate the growing support among members of the community for a landscaped median as part of the widening of Valley Center Road from Woods Valley Road to Cole Grade Road.
The letter observes: “Residents of Valley Center have devoted many years of effort to having a landscaped median on VC Road, and hundreds of residents have signed petitions in favor of the landscaped median. The current plan has been approved by the VCCPG (Valley Center Community Planning Group) and DPW (Dept. of Public Works). The landscaped medians are planned only in front of businesses that have agreed to them, except where DPW requires a median for safety reasons.”
The main reason that the Chamber opposed the median last year was that many businesses along Valley Center Road didn’t understand that having a median in front of their establishment was voluntary, unless it was required for safety reasons, as it is in front of California Bank & Trust and the Old Town Center.
The Chamber sent a survey out to its members, although it didn’t include all of the businesses along Valley Center Road.
After the survey was tabulated the Chamber sent out the letter of concern to Horn’s office.
According to Bumgardner, the Chamber’s fears about the median have now been allayed and the organization sees it as a positive, business-enhancing civic feature.
We thought we’d done with April Fool jokes for a year— Then we learned that the VC Fire Dept. has been cited by the County for washing its engines.
“I don’t have time for this,” an obviously dismayed Fire Chief Kevin O’Leary told The Roadrunner this week.
County inspectors have been very busy in Valley Center in recent weeks, what with shutting down the Optimists barbecued turkey and ham operations, and telling a local market that it had to stop putting in a deli meat selling operation because it didn’t have permits.
Then last week someone apparently turned in the fire department for washing its fire engine.
For, as the fire chief put it, “washing the dirt into the dirt.”
But that’s not how the County’s Stormwater Ordinance sees it.
Cid Tesoro, who was hired three years ago to oversee the County’s new water protection program, told The Roadrunner, “We were informed that the fire engines were being cleaned at this fire department and there’s no best management practices (called BMPs) to address water pollutants getting into our storm drains.”
This Stormwater Ordinance forced the school district a couple of years ago to put in an expensive operation to capture its water.
Does this mean that all fire departments in the unincorporated areas of the county will be cited for washing their fire engines?
“It all depends on the situation,” said Tesoro. “It’s not a clear cut condition. It all depends on what the inspector sees. If we run into a similar situation where they are washing vehicles and not taking due diligence we would treat it same the same.”
The inspector asked the fire department if it could adopt some BMPs to address pollutants.
Asked to elaborate on what that would entail, Tesoro explained, “It would involve some absorbent pad or containment unit where you don’t allow the water to get into the storm drains.
The fire department thought it was exempt from such rules. “I guess we were wrong,” O’Leary told The Roadrunner.
The department has, in the past, explored the option of washing its engines at the school bus barn.
“But when you get back from a call at 2 a.m. and need to wash your truck, you need to wash it,” said O’Leary.
The chief said he has been phoning around to see if any other fire departments have been affected by this ordinance. No CDF (California Dept. of Forestry) stations in the area are abiding by the ordinance.
“They seem to think we are a business entity,” said O’Leary. “We’re not sure how we are going to comply with the regulation.”
The County will reinspect the fire department on April 12 to see if they have complied.
Not washing the engines is not an option, he said.
“You can’t stop washing the trucks. The reason you keep a fire engine clean is for the safety of the personnel. It has to be kept clean. We have regulations that we have to comply with and one of them is keeping our equipment clean,” said O’Leary.
The fire department can also no longer spray the facility or the station or the sidewalks. They will also have to “recover” the water during training exercises with fire hoses.
“We’re having difficulty understanding the problem with washing the facilities, using a power sprayer to wash down our windows. I’m having trouble comprehending what you are putting into the ground. I’m having great difficulty understand this,” said the chief.
None of the CDF operation sin the county are meeting the standard.
* * *
The Stormwater Ordinance came about after the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board issued a new National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Municipal Stormwater Permit to the County in 2001.
The permit is a tool for implementing the Federal Clean Water Act. It required the County to revise its stormwater ordinance.
The reason was that pollution levels were increasing in San Diego County.
Beginning this week the Valley Center Road South Phase 1 switch in traffic from the west side of the road to the east side was scheduled to begin.
On Monday afternoon, southbound traffic along the six mile stretch was to be switched to the east side.
Hauling dirt across Valley Center Road is scheduled to begin on Wednesday, April 6, and continue intermittently for the next six to eight weeks.
Hauling will take place from 8 a.m.-3 p.m., Monday-Saturday. Flaggers will stop traffic in both directions near the top of the hill for about one minute to allow trucks to cross the road.
Motorists are advised to expect minor traffic delays to allow trucks to cross the road. Unplanned traffic breaks may occur to maintain traffic control devices and to perform minor road repairs.
For the next several months, the contractor will be working generally from: 6:30 am - 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday
6 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday.
Observe the posted speed limit of 40 mph in the construction zone to maintain safety and to avoid double penalty traffic fines.
Phase 1 of the road widening is anticipated to be completed in September 2005. Phase II which will take the road widening from Woods Valley Road to Cole Grade Road, is expected to begin this summer.
If you have any questions, call the project hotline at (619) 232-2640.
The Seventh Annual Jaguar Auction, the biggest VC fund-raiser of the year, is this Saturday, April 9, 6 p.m. at the VC high school gym.
This fund-raiser is a live and silent auction complemented by appetizers, desserts and beverages.
Tickets are $10 and ticket holders will be entered in a drawing for a big-screen TV system.
This event provides an exciting fund-raising venue for the various VCHS clubs and teams as well as the VCHS Foundation endowment.
In the seven years since it began, the Jaguar Auction has gained popularity and the profits have increased with each year.
A big part of the total success is due to generosity of the various businesses and individuals in the community and surrounding area that have contributed.
Great deals can be had on a number of products and services. Some of the items up for bid include: Private Jet for up to 8 passenger to Las Vegas; Golf Packages; Asphalt Driveway; one week Costa Rica family vacation; one ton of hay, delivered; Casino table; gift baskets; vacation getaways; and more.
New this year: The auction is served by a computerized system that will make check-out faster and more efficient.
Questions? Call Jolyn Duff at 760-749-6156 or Julie Stroh at 760-749-7863.
The Valley Roadrunner
P.O.B. 1529, Valley Center, CA 92082
Tel. 760.749.1112 Fax 760.749.1688
Website: www.valleycenter.com
Email: editor@valleycenter.com
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