Hollister
– Members of the city’s planning commission and the general
public said at a recent meeting that they are unhappy with
Hollister’s growth cap.
Hollister – Members of the city’s planning commission and the general public said at a recent meeting that they are unhappy with Hollister’s growth cap.
What began Thursday evening as a review of Development Services Director Bill Avera’s preliminary plans for post-moratorium development became a broader discussion of growth in Hollister.
Meeting attendees said they were concerned about Measure U, a 244-unit growth cap imposed by Hollister voters in 2002. Planning commissioners and others said they’d like to see exceptions created for affordable housing and downtown development, or to see the cap thrown out altogether.
“To me, growth by initiative is a no-no,” Planning Commissioner Charlie Scott said. “You have to have growth in order to live.”
Local development has been at a virtual standstill since 2002, when more than 15 million gallons of treated wastewater spilled into the San Benito River. The Central Coast Regional Quality Control Board imposed a moratorium on sewer connections in Hollister until a new wastewater treatment plant is completed. The plant, now under construction, is scheduled to be finished by December 2008.
According to Avera, there are nearly 1,200 residential units that had already received allocations and have been on hold since the start of the moratorium. City staffers have also estimated that Hollister’s planning department could be deluged with applications for another 2,500 to 3,000 new units after the moratorium is lifted.
Avera also noted that as he develops the city’s post-moratorium plans, he’s being pulled in different directions: One state agency wants Hollister to build more affordable housing, but another agency has imposed a moratorium on sewer connections and local voters have imposed their own growth control measures.
“I’m playing by the rules I have to live by now,” Avera said.
Tony Ruiz, who heads a local group promoting new urbanism, said creating an exemption for downtown infill development would be a way to direct and control growth.
“That’s really the issue – not only to provide the homes, but to provide the homes in the right place,” Ruiz said.
Scott said that although Measure U received popular support because of locals’ perceptions that growth had gotten out of control in the late 1990s, that really was not the case. The problem wasn’t Hollister’s planning, Scott said, but rather the allocations that developers received in the early 1990s but did not use until the economy picked up after 1995.
Planning Commissioner David Huboi said he is particularly interested in an exemption for affordable housing, since such an exemption is called for in the city’s general plan.
However, because Measure U was passed by the voters, City Attorney Stephanie Atigh said any exemptions would have to be approved by the voters as well.
After the meeting, Huboi – who chaired the campaign to pass the Measure R sales tax increase last year – said he doesn’t have any immediate or specific plans to lead a campaign to loosen Measure U. That campaign, he said, will have to be a grassroots effort.
“I’d love to be a part of it,” Huboi said. “But I’d rather someone else took the initiative to be the chairperson. Of course, I didn’t want to be the chairperson of Measure R either.”
Anthony Ha covers local government for the Free Lance. Reach him at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or [email protected].
