Developers hurry to gain approval for projects
CITYWIDE Applications are pending for more than 2,000 housing units, a result of developers looking for approval before changes to development standards went into effect in January of this year, city planners said in a report to the City Council.
The majority of units, 978, are single room studios between 150 square feet and 375 square feet, followed by 654 condominiums, 207 artist live/work studios and 180 apartment units.
As a result of the proposed residential development, 230 existing units would be demolished, including 102 mobile homes at the Village Trailer Park, city planners said.
The report comes as residents pressure elected officials to pass a moratorium on development until an update to the city’s Land Use and Circulation Element (LUCE) is updated, something which is still years away. City planners have engaged the community at several meetings over the last year in an effort to get suggestions on how land should be used for the next 20 years or more.
The next LUCE workshop is tentatively schedule for October, said Amanda Schachter, planning manager for City Hall.
City planners are working on an interim ordinance for the Aug. 28 council meeting that would freeze development in the manufacturing/industrial area of the city, which is under extreme pressure from developers looking to build artist live/work studios. Three projects are proposed for the industrial areas of the city, including a 91-unit project at 1610 Colorado Ave., a 66-unit project at 1639 11th St. and a 48-unit project at 2834 Colorado Ave., according to city planners. A single room occupancy project, or SRO, is proposed with 623 units at 3025 Olympic Blvd., and a 5,760 classroom addition to the New Visions Foundation campus at 3131 Olympic Blvd. has just received planning entitlements and awaits plan check.
Two “modest” media production/post production facilities have been proposed for a total of 10,500 square-feet, and the owners of the Village Trailer Park have plans to remove 102 trailers and replace them with a mixed-use project consisting of 102 affordable, rent controlled SROs and 247 1 to 2 bedroom condos. Also proposed is 48,000 square feet of studio and retail commercial floor area over one level of subterranean parking.
Residents are concerned that projects such as that will overwhelm the city’s aging infrastructure and would increase traffic congestion as well as change the dynamic of certain neighborhoods. The Santa Monica Coalition for a Livable City (SMCLC) has partnered with all of the major neighborhood groups in the city to call for a city-wide moratorium on developments so that city planners have the time to concentrate on the LUCE process instead of processing development applications.
“Development is steamrolling along in Santa Monica in an interim period between the old General Plan and the new one and this development, we don’t believe, would be approved under the new General Plan being developed by residents,” Diana Gordon, a spokesperson for SMCLC.
“The issue is how do we halt development until a new plan is adopted in 2009,” Gordon added. “Residents and the coalition believe that without their insistence at meetings with the city and before the Planning Commission, that the interim ordinance the council plans to adopt for industrial lands would never have been discussed.”
City planners are extremely busy processing applications for new development, Schachter said, but they aren’t overwhelmed as of yet.
“A lot of projects have come through, but we have a very talented staff and we are working hard,” Schachter said.
The report on development will be updated every quarter because of the heightened interest in the issue, Schachter said.
“It’s a combination of forces,” Schachter said of the Planning Department’s decision to issue quarterly reports. “It’s the amount of development that has been proposed, the interest in the LUCE process and the interest by residents to get a better understanding of what is going on. This will help everyone make better decisions on not just development projects as they come through, but with the growing vision of what we want Santa Monica to look like in the future.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on August 13, 2007. Read the original PDF.