LAFCO Votes to Enlarge Sphere of Influence

Vanguard is Concerned About the Process of the 5-0 LAFCO Vote

In a strange turn of events the evening of March 6, 2008 the Davis City Council passed a recommendation for the Sphere of Influence (SOI) that was notable in that it excluded from its sphere two controversial properties on Davis' periphery--Northwest Quadrant, Covell Village and the Nishi Property. The motion made by Lamar Heystek and seconded by Mayor Sue Greenwald passed by a strange vote of 2-1-2. Councilmembers Stephen Souza and Don Saylor, a month before the council election decided to abstain from that vote.

This was a reconsideration of a vote that had originally attempted to make the SOI extremely large. When LAFCO originally took up this item in April, they expressed concern that the size of the original SOI would invite properties not intended for development in the foreseeable future. LAFCO's report warns that adding such areas would lead to land speculation on those sites for the purpose of development.

As a result, the council revisited the issue. At the May meeting Councilmember Heystek complained about the lack of clear direction from city staff on the issue of the SOI.

"I don't see this as merely a ministerial action of the council, because personally I will speak very frankly, I don't feel that I received enough information from city staff to be able to make a decision. I understand that LAFCO has made a recommendation that certain sites be excluded, but I have not received information for our staff as to why certain sites should be included."

He continued:

"I don't understand and I haven't heard from city staff, why we have to include other areas such as the northwest quadrant, such as Covell Village, such as the Nishi site, when we know we already have Measure J, when we know we already have the pass-through agreement, and we know that those are really the strongest protections from unwarranted or undesirable development on our borders."

As Councilmember Heystek pointed out, it appears in the next five years we neither intend to expand city services into these areas nor develop in these areas--so why include them in the SOI?

As a result of that discussion, the motion to exclude the Northwest Quadrant, Covell, and Nishi was passed largely because neither Councilmember Souza nor Councilmember Saylor voted on the matter.

Flash forward to Monday at the LAFCO meeting.

The LAFCO staff recommendation rejected the Davis City Council's proposed boundaries.

This is from the LAFCO staff report:

As previously discussed, a sphere of influence under LAFCO law is a guidance document for the Commission to determine what areas are best suited for inclusion, or removal, from a city or special district. Historically, spheres of influence for cities in Yolo County have been drawn tightly; however, those lines must be drawn with the intent to meet the projected growth and service capabilities of the affected agency. The latest request by the City of Davis would not provide sufficient land within the sphere for the City to meet its own population growth projections in the coming years.

Staff believes that given existing policies, service capabilities and impacts on agricultural land, the LAFCO staff recommended sphere of influence includes the areas that are best considered for annexation over the next twenty years. The staff recommended areas that are already developed, are infill property, or have already been evaluated in previous studies. The City’s current land use policies call for controlled and well planned growth. The County’s general plan identifies itself as the protector of agricultural land. The land use policies in conjunction with the City-County Redevelopment Agreement and Davis’ Measure J provide strong adjuncts to controlled growth in the City of Davis. The staff recommended boundaries balance the need for some expansion of boundaries while addressing the need for deliberate, logical and orderly annexations.

The first map is the Davis City Council recommended Sphere of Influence:

The second map is the LAFCO staff recommendation:

The LAFCO recommendation is as follows:

a. Ten year sphere of influence:

i. City owned property: Davis Municipal Golf Course, City of Davis Park on County Road (CR) 102 (Old Landfill Site), and Davis Wastewater Treatment Plant.

ii. Urbanized properties: El Macero, Willowbank, Royal Oaks (formerly Barthel’s Mobile Home Park), Rust home site parcel, and University of California, Davis campus.

iii. Undeveloped properties: Covell Village (Hunt-Wesson) parcel, Mace Curve parcel and Nishi parcel.

b. Twenty year sphere of influence:

i. Urbanized property: Cactus Corners (CR 98 and Russell Blvd).

ii. Undeveloped property: Northwest Quadrant (north to Binning Tract subdivision, east to State Hwy 113, south to Covell Boulevard, and west to CR 99).

The LAFCO board that includes Davis City Councilmember Stephen Souza as the representative from the Davis City Council and County Supervisors Helen Thomson and Matt Rexroad, voted to pass staff recommendation 5-0.

Key Commentary Regarding the Role of Councilmember Stephen Souza's Role in This

As a member of LAFCO, Councilmember Stephen Souza has a duel role in this process. He sits on the board of LAFCO but he also needs to represent to LAFCO in this matter, the wishes of the Davis City Council. In the packet to LAFCO was presented the Davis City Council's recommended SOI.

Responding to a question from Councilmember Lamar Heystek last night, Councilmember Souza acknowledged there was not much discussion on the item at the Monday meeting. He did mention that Supervisor Rexroad had asked him about what the Davis City Council wanted. Councilmember Souza conveyed the impression at the LAFCO meeting that this is what the Davis City Council wanted and had mentioned his role on LAFCO as the reason for him abstaining from the vote.

I spoke up at the City Council, which is something I do not ordinarily do, to clarify this point.

Here are my comments:

"I wanted to raise the issue of yesterday’s LAFCO vote on the sphere of influence. I was not able to attend the meeting, however, talking to folks who did I got the impression that the message was somehow conveyed that the LAFCO staff report was what the council majority wanted. [Note: Councilmember Souza had actually acknowledged this in response to Councilmember Heystek's question]

I am a bit confused by that if it is that case, because the most recent vote that I am aware of on May 6, 2008 ended with a very different recommendation from the Davis city council.

That vote was a bit odd in that two members supported, one opposed, and two members abstained. However, it was a valid vote of the council. The motion passed and that was the recommendation ostensibly sent to LAFCO.

If that is the case, then I do not know how it could be accurate to suggest that the majority of the Davis city council wanted anything but the May 6th vote results.

As such I am very confused and would like an explanation as to how the message was apparently conveyed otherwise. And I would like to also know if the will of the council, as expressed by vote on the night of May 6th, was represented by the current LAFCO representative from this council."

Unfortunately I did not get an answer to those questions, although there was the beginning of a heated exchange, when another member of the public, Eileen Samitz, spoke during public comment in an attempt to get an answer on this issue. The Mayor [probably wisely] however cut off Councilmember Souza as he was about to respond to Ms. Samitz's comments and moved the meeting forward.

As I stated at the meeting, I believe that Councilmember Souza had every right to vote as he did, however, my concern was he somehow conveyed the impression that there was a different will of the council majority than the one reflected in the vote taken on May 6, 2008, which was the only vote on the topic and therefore should have been, despite its strange numerical nature, the reflection of the council's desires on this subject.

My concern is therefore strictly procedural here. I do not understand how the councilmember arrived at a different conclusion from Davis' own recommendation.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: Pro-Development Candidates Not Forthcoming on their Growth Positions

Sacramento Bee Coverage of the Davis City Council Race

The Sacramento Bee had a pretty interesting spread on Monday laying out various positions by the Davis City Council candidates on growth.

Given that the Sacramento Bee had limited space and that this will be their only article on the race, they did a good job of getting to the core of the issues and the differences between the candidates in a campaign where many of the candidates sound the same even though they have pretty divergent policy goals.

To start, the happenstance of alphabetical order served to dramatize this point. The first three candidates in the alphabet opposed Covell Village. The last three supported it. That happenstance creates an appearance of stark differences between the candidates.

Measure J and the one percent growth guideline have been covered here. You can see more clearly here that Stephen Souza diverges from his colleagues on his side of the matrix on Measure J, but you can also see that that is the only place that he really diverges from them on.

The point also needs to be made again that Measure J is indeed a lengthy document, but it is really straight-forward and not complex. A non-lawyer or even a non-planner can easily pick it up and understand it. On the other hand, one of the reasons that it is so lengthy is that the drafters of the Measure J went to great lengths to define their terms and define explicit exemptions to avoid loopholes. Any attempt to streamline it will re-open some of those loopholes and thereby weaken the measure.

Question 2 is one that really has not been asked or addressed in forums to do that. So I am going to go through those answers, since they are brief.

The question is would they support a renewed effort to develop the Covell site?

The first three candidates Cecilia (my wife), Sue Greenwald, and Rob Roy give various versions of "no."

Cecilia Escamilla-Greenwald:

"I do not support developing beyond the borders of the city. We have enough land available within the city's boundaries."

Sue Greenwald:

"I just think it's way too soon to consider that."

Rob Roy:

"We have to focus on infill development. Building out is the wrong direction. Davis will sprawl and lose its character."

The next two candidates Don Saylor and Stephen Souza do a nice job of dancing on the issue.

Don Saylor:

"I haven't seen a revised Covell Village plan. I'm not going to say never, and I'm not going to say I'm all for it."

Is the first part of that answer honest? John Whitcombe's group has been meeting through out the city. I know quite a few people that they have met with to outline their plan for Covell Village. They even met with Cecilia. Are you telling me that they have not met with one of their biggest allies on the council but they met with Cecilia? I kind of seriously doubt that. The honest answer here would be "yeah, I'd consider it." Instead he tries to dance on it.

Stephen Souza:

"If a proposal at Covell Village came forward, I would be interested in looking at it and discussing it."

That's at least a better answer than Saylor's.

Sydney Vergis:

"If the neighboring Hunt-Wesson property is developed, we might want to look at mater-planning that whole area and do it right."

Either Vergis is more pro-growth than Souza and Saylor or she's less shrewd politically, but I think she puts on the table the view that the pro-development side of the ledger sees--a way to develop Covell alongside the Lewis Properties.

For a table that has four very brief answers, in many ways this tells people all they need to know about growth. And then it depends on which side you come down on the issue.

LAFCO Draws Out Differences On Growth--Souza and Saylor Abstain

I take this time to draw on Tuesday's vote yet again, because it seemed to get lost in the complexity once again.

There are two elements to the City Council's Sphere of Influence vote.

First, the need to revisit it was fundamentally due to City Planning Director Katherine Hess' misinformation to council about the meaning of the sphere of influence.

LAFCO lays it out very clearly that the sphere of influence intends to define all the lands to be developed for urban uses. Katherine Hess tried to argue that the city simply would control the land in the SOI whether it was developed or not. That clearly was not true last year when the county tried to study development of land inside the SOI on the edge of Davis. Stephen Souza at the LAFCO meeting tried to argue that there are multiple types of urban uses for land, but he quickly recognized after discussions at LAFCO that this was not the conventional view and that having an overly large SOI might open the process down the line to inclusion in the General Plan and thereby do the opposite of what was intended.

The second intrigue in the meeting is Lamar Heystek's motion removed all of the large peripheral parcels from the Sphere of Influence. Mayor Sue Greenwald seconded this motion.

The argument here is that there is no compelling reason to add more land that could become targeted for growth when there is no protection afforded to the land by being placed in the SOI. It simply signals LAFCO that there is an intent to develop these lands for Urban uses.

Ruth Asmundson opposed the removal of the peripheral parcels, as we would expect.

What no one expected is that Councilmembers Don Saylor and Stephen Souza abstained from the vote. This demonstrates their fear of on the one-hand offending their developer friends, some of whom were in the audience asking to be included in the SOI. Obviously they felt that there was some benefit to being in the SOI.

On the other hand, they did not outright vote against the measure to belie their pro-development colors. They have tried to walk this fence for a long time. They supported Covell but argue that it's good smart growth planning. They support the 1% growth guideline, arguing that this represents a low growth rate and that we are not growing at one percent anyway.

Because of the two abstentions, for the first time ever, Sue Greenwald and Lamar Heystek's two votes carried the day by a 2-1 margin. In order to not expose their true intentions on growth prior to the election, Souza and Saylor were completely silent on one of the most important growth issues for the LAFCO SOI for Davis.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Strange Vote Leads to Drastically Reduced Sphere of Influence

It seems likely that when Lamar Heystek made his motion to exclude a large number of properties from the city's sphere of influence, that he never expected to prevail.

In light of discussion at the LAFCO meeting at the end of March, the City Council agreed to have new discussions on a proposal by the city to dramatically expand the city's sphere of influence (SOI).

My question at the time of the LAFCO meeting was whether a larger or a smaller sphere of influence provided more protection of agricultural land and gave the city more control over its future growth. Originally, the city felt that having a larger sphere of influence would maximize the city's ability to grow. However, points made at the LAFCO meeting undermined that philosophy, particularly two points. One that a larger SOI might contribute to the need for an expanded provision of services. Second, that an expanded SOI might contribute to greater pressure to grow from those developers who owned the lands now included in the SOI. The thinking was that this would facilitate a move down the line that would include these properties in a future General Plan for development considerations.

Finally, there is the fact that the lands considered for development by the county last year were in the SOI, and the SOI did not appear to grant the city any additional growth protect. A point reiterated later in the evening by City Manager Bill Emlen.

"In other areas, a sphere of influence has not stopped counties from approving development right next to a city."

In a good discussion that ensued, City Planner Katherine Hess suggested that growth pressure would probably occur regardless of the size of the SOI. The main tools that the city of Davis has as protection are the pass-through agreement and Measure J.

Even after this discussion, it was not entirely clear what the city would gain either way by changing their SOI.

City Councilmember Don Saylor said:

"I don't hear us having an overwhelming case one way or another to change it frankly, and I think the value of our other land use tools is far in excess of whatever happens on this decision. I'm fairly neutral on which way we end up coming down on individual cites in the list or not in the list because I think the real issues are going to be ongoing in discussions between the city and the county on the pass-through agreement and with the voters on Measure J. And the next general plan with the city and the county. I don't see this as a make or break decision."

Now this is what we were told by City Staff and by Stephen Souza. However, during public comment--and we are talking about public comment at midnight--representatives from developers of Oeste Ranch, requested their property be including in the SOI.

Councilmember Don Saylor moved that that the city request LAFCO to add Mace-Covell Gateway to the SOI, the staff recommendation.

"We ought not to apply too much emphasis or importance to this. As I understand from the discussion tonight this is not something that we can achieve many objectives doing."

Then Lamar Heystek spoke:

"I don't see this as merely a ministerial action of the council, because personally I will speak very frankly, I don't feel that I received enough information from city staff to be able to make a decision. I understand that LAFCO has made a recommendation that certain sites be excluded, but I have not received information for our staff as to why certain sites should be included."

He continued:

"I don't understand and I haven't heard from city staff, why we have to include other areas such as the northwest quadrant, such as covell village, such as the Nishi site, when we know we already have Measure J, when we know we already have the pass-through agreement, and we know that those are really the strongest protections from unwarranted or undesirable development on our borders."

LAFCO's report warns that adding such areas would lead to land speculation on those sites for the purpose of development.

As Councilmember Heystek pointed out, it appears in the next five years we neither intend to expand city services into these areas nor develop in these areas--so why include them in the SOI?

He then made a substitute motion to exclude Covell, the Northwest Quadrant, and the Nishi site from the recommended sphere of influence. It was seconded by Mayor Sue Greenwald.

As Mayor Sue Greenwald pointed out, we have reduced our growth from a 1% growth guideline to a 1% growth cap.

"These should be areas that we are realistically considering for growth in the next five years."

When Councilmember Heystek made this motion, it is unlikely that he believed it would pass. However when both Councilmembers Souza and Saylor abstained, the motion passed 2-1 with Ruth Asmundson the dissenting vote.

The reason this motion was made and considered important by Councilmember Heystek is that inclusion of areas within the SOI could lead to their inclusion in the 2010 General Plan. These are sites that were ranked relatively low by the Housing Element Steering Committee and thus the inclusion in the SOI could lead to the owners of the properties (such as the Northwest Quadrant) to push for inclusion in the General Plan. As mentioned during the LAFCO meeting, this may not directly lead to development but could potentially be the first step along a path that leads down the road to development of these sites.

Why both Councilmembers Souza and Saylor decided to abstain is an open question. What the vote means, is also unclear, however, council is now recommending that the Covell Property, the Northwest Quadrant and Nishi Propety all be excluded from the SOI.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: A Tale of Two Reconsiderations

Ordinarily in a given term you can count the number of reconsiderations on one hand. In fact, before Tuesday night, I can only remember one reconsideration the entire City Council term, that was a vote on a park survey, when Ruth Asmundson was absent and the vote would have been deadlocked on a $70,000 park survey until Councilmember Don Saylor strategically voted against it in order to be able to move for reconsideration. The parliamentary rule is that only a member who voted for the winning side can move for reconsideration.

However, on Tuesday night, the council voted not once but twice to reconsider votes--for very different reasons.

SPHERE OF INFLUENCE

The first reconsideration was on the Sphere of Influence recommendation to LAFCO. As we reported on Tuesday, it became clear to us watching the meeting that the Davis City Council approach was indeed off. The City Council had voted to expand the Sphere of Influence (SOI) area mainly because they believed that the larger the area that they controlled, the better they would be able to prevent growth.

During the course of the LAFCO meeting it became obvious to all that expanding the size of the SOI would not grant Davis any added protection. Indeed Robert Ramming pointed out that the county's proposed study areas all occurred within the current SOI. At the same time, Supervisor Matt Rexroad pointed out that on the map these did not look like greenbelts and bike paths as Councilmember Souza hoped but rather like a development map.

From a legal standpoint the SOI is a map of urban usage and while Councilmember tried to argue that Greenbelts and bikepaths were urban usages for Davis, it was unconvincing. LAFCO has not operated as such. The SOI is an area for urban develop not a means to prevent growth traditionally.

The bottom line was and Councilmember Souza realized it during the course of the discussion on Monday, the ultimate impact of placement in the SOI might be the inclusion of a property in the general plan, that leads to speculative valuation of the property, and growth pressure. We may have no intention of growing today, five years from now, or even ten years from now, but we also have little control over the process down the line. In essence we may be starting a process that will actually lead to the opposite of what we intend.

As I spoke with members of the community and councilmembers after the Monday meeting, it was obvious to me that no one knew the consequences of placement in the SOI nor did they know exactly which way would offer more protection. Indeed I asked that very question at the LAFCO meeting and no one could answer it.

It became obvious that Davis' City Staff had done a poor job yet again of preparing the Davis City Council and it turned the process into almost a farce.

As Supervisor Matt Rexroad wrote on his blog following the meeting:

"The Davis City Council has requested to dramatically increase the area within their sphere of influence (SOI). They are doing this in an attempt to have greater control over development on their edge.

I actually want the City of Davis to have control of development on their urban edge. It makes sense to me. As a former Mayor I don't want (or need) the county telling me what I need to do. That is up to the City Council.

Here is the problem. If you increase the area within the SOI you are signaling that development is the desire for this area.

The reality os that Davis does not really want development in the area. They want to control any development in the area -- and probably kill development. That is their choice.

I want to let Davis have control of their boundary. I am just not sure that the request to LAFCO is sincere.

My deal is this -- If a city in Yolo County wants to annex land or increase their control of their edge I will work to make the deal happen. This request does not really appear to be that at all."

Throughout the meeting there were references to Davis doing things differently. For members of the Davis City Council, I believe that was a point of pride. For others it is a point of mockery. But at the end of the day it was former Davis Mayor Jerry Adler who made the essential point that Davis was trying to use the SOI as a growth-control device and it was never intended to be such. In fact, just the opposite. And while Davis can be Davis, from a legal standpoint, what Davis was hoping to do would not have worked.

Davis City Councilmember Stephen Souza was correct to urge his colleagues to reconsider, he argued that point well, and they did by a 5-0 vote. It will come back for new consideration in early May right before the LAFCO meeting. I think that may be too long and it does not give them much room for error, but it was the right thing to do.

Davis Korean Church

I cannot say the same for the other move for reconsideration. This has to do with the remodel of the Korean Church in Davis. At a meeting just two weeks ago, the council had during the course of granting their conditional use permit, imposed a required of solar panels on the church--under the condition that if it was too burdensome to the church they could remove that imposition.

What followed was a political football that developed when a member of the church forwarded an email from the Mayor to Davis Enterprise Columnist Bob Dunning who picked up the football and ran with it as far as he could, fanning the flames on this issue and carrying the water of Councilmembers Souza and Saylor.

So Councilmember Don Saylor pulled the item off the consent calendar on Tuesday, moved to approve the second reading for remodel but at the same time moved for reconsideration on the solar panel requirement. The expressed reason was for clarification of what had been passed unanimously at the previous meeting.

As Councilmember Heystek pointed out, he knew full well what he was voting for at the time and saw no reason to reconsider it. Mayor Greenwald decried the fact that the council was reconsidering based on a newspaper columnist's opinion and also the fact that a councilmember had taken the issue to the newspaper columnist to begin with.

Indeed at the council meeting this Tuesday, Mayor Greenwald argued that the church had looked into the issue and the cost of the photovoltaics were less than the church members had originally feared. But the other point is that the cost consideration was actually placed into the original motion--and yet if you read the Bob Dunning columns, you would never have known that.

The observant reader would notice that in fact Bob Dunning had taken up the church's cause well before the meeting in mid-March--writing five columns about the church from mid-February up until the vote. Dunning's March 20, 2008 column tries to paint Sue Greenwald as the extremist and Don Saylor and Stephen Souza as the voices of reason.

But as Crilly Butler writes to the Davis Enterprise, Bob Dunning does not get all of his facts right nor does he paint a full and accurate picture in his March 20, 2008 column.

Writes Mr. Butler:

"First, considering the scope of this huge expansion project, the cost of solar panels will be tiny. The price he mentioned — $40,000 to $80,000 for 2 to 4 kW — is ridiculous. I'm considering a 3 kW installation for my own home and have been quoted about $17,000 after rebates.

And considering that the expansion was already going to be wired and framed for solar on its nicely pitched, unshaded, south-facing roof, it should be a slam dunk. Not to mention that the panels will pay for themselves within a few years, and after that, it'll be pure profit for the church ! Not bad for a modest investment in a green future, and certainly not the onerous "blindsided by city's solar experiment" that Dunning 's column suggests.

Secondly, Dunning implied that the church would be the city's "guinea pig" for solar requirements. The truth is, the City Council has included solar panels as a condition of several recent projects requiring zoning and General Plan amendments (just as in the case of the church project). I hope it will continue to do so in the future.

Thirdly, Greenwald mentioned that if the cost was impossible for the church to bear, she would be willing to consider modifying or even eliminating this requirement. Interesting that Dunning forgot to mention this.

If Greenwald's request was so inappropriate and unreasonable, why is it that her motion was passed unanimously by the entire council?"

Don Saylor suggests in Dunning's April 1, 2008 column:

"In short, I will need three votes to place this on a future agenda for discussion. I will make the case that it is a bad idea to impose this requirement at the last minute with no policy in place and no rational assessment of the need or benefit for this requirement for the specific project."

I am not opposed to having a universal requirement here, however, this is hardly the first time the council has made last minutes requirements for projects--it is within their power to do so, and there is a precedent for it with regards to solar panels. Both Mr. Saylor and Mr. Dunning would have a point here if the council had not placed into the requirement a provision that would allow reconsideration if the cost was prohibitive. The voice for reason angle is interesting but again distorts the fact that the original discussion and decision were not unreasonable.

I am sympathetic to the view that if costs are prohibitive to a non-profit such as a church, it should not be imposed on them--but then again, was that not already addressed in the original motion? The objection seemed to be that this was done last minute, but it was also clear that council not only had the right put this requirement in but had in fact done so in the past.

I do agree that the council needs to address the issue of energy efficiency and alternative energy sources overall. I think the model that Berkeley has set up--looking at subsidies for the use of solar--that could be paid off over time with energy savings is the way to go.

The city has set up a climate action team to look at such things, but we really do not need to reinvent as many wheels as we think we do. We ought to look at what is being done, adapt it to Davis and improve upon it first and then look toward new things.

Reconsideration in this case is a dangerous precedence and demonstrates how some of the avowed environmentalists can nevertheless be subject to heavy political pressure when an issue is taken up by political columnists.

At the original meeting, Councilmember Souza suggested that we ought not try to "out-green" each other, but at the same time, it seems clear that some members on this council will cave on issues under political pressure.

I see no reason that we needed to revisit this vote. The council had already put in a provision to reconsider if the photovoltaics proved to be too expensive. This was completely a political calculation rather than a policy move.

In the end, the council reconsidered two votes, the first one was a good move made by the council as a whole, the second one smacked of politics.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: Does Small or Large Sphere of Influence Best Protect Ag Land?

After watching the LAFCO meeting and discussion for awhile last night, I did something I do not do very often--I got up and spoke during public comment. I asked them the very basic question--what does inclusion in the Sphere of Influence afford the city of Davis? Does it provide any additional protection against growth? No one had an answer for that question.

Mayor Sue Greenwald in the comment section of the Vanguard last night said the following:

I have posed the following question to a number of planners, attorneys and a past SACOG chair: “If, hypothetically, the city of Davis were to want to grow as slowly as possible, would be want a larger or a smaller sphere of influence?” The answer I have gotten from all of the experts to whom I spoke was, “it is unclear”.

As I watched the meeting last night, I became swayed by the questions of Supervisor Matt Rexroad, one of the LAFCO members and by the comments of a member of the public, Robert Ramming. The conclusion that I have reached is the opposite one that the council reached.

Frankly I did not buy the answers that Councilmember Stephen Souza gave on the dais last night as a member of LAFCO. The idea that we can have an agricultural urban land use. The idea that we are going to use the Sphere of Influence land to create some kind of greenbelt and bike route. That Davis is unique, it is different, it does things differently, it breaks the mould.

If you look at the map, it does not look like such a set up. It looks like plots of land for development. Maybe not in Stephen Souza's mind. Maybe not this year. Maybe not five or even ten years from now, but it gets the ball rolling.

Talking to Supervisor Rexroad after the meeting, it was not his intention to really make a persuasive argument there. He told me he is a city-centric person and that what a city wants to do, he is pretty much going to let them do. At the same time, he does not seem comfortable with allowing the city of Davis to expand the sphere of influence.

Yeah I know there are a large amount of people that do not like Mr. Rexroad for a variety of reasons, but since he has been County Supervisor, he has been pretty consistent on his land use policies, and while I disagree with him on many things, in terms of land use in the county, there are not many votes that I disagree with.

Here is what I gleaned from last night's discussion. If Davis expands the Sphere of Influence, it could cause the city a lot of problems. First from a legality stand point, all land will have to be put into the general plan. If you go beyond what you need, that is actually a very costly prospect. Second, if you are an owner of the included property, you can force basically one way or another, your property to be included in the general plan discussion. That does not directly lead to development, but as Matt Rexroad pointed out, it begins a very long and arduous process.

Third, and here is the point that Robert Ramming raised last night--it does not protect your borders from the county. As Mr. Ramming pointed out, the county's general plan looked at several parcels around Davis' border, these properties were all in the Sphere of Influence. It is clear therefore, that inclusion in the Sphere of Influence offers little in the way of protection against county development. What saved Davis was the pass-through agreement and probably the cost to the county of gaining access to city services, not the Sphere of Influence.

Again, an unnatural expansion of the Sphere of Influence means that you are realistically talking about urban uses of that land in the next twenty year period. Mr. Souza was talking about greenbelts and bike routes as urban uses, but that's not what the map looks like. There is no belt around Davis with the city's proposal. It is a bunch of plots of land to west and a bunch to the east, with a gap in the middle.

Davis is going to change what an urban use is? That was Souza's argument is was downright unconvincing to anyone there.

Fact is, that I would not even have given this proposal the time of day except that Sue Greenwald and Lamar Heystek signed onto it. But on this issue, I think they were well-intentioned but ultimately flawed. From this discussion, I think inclusion in the Sphere of Influence, offers potentially unforeseen impacts of starting the development process for lands that this council likely does not support or foresee, but they have no control over future councils.

For this reason, I think that the best strategy is keep the Sphere of Influence as small as possible and to not include lands like Covell Village and the Nishe Property that you do not intend to develop if you are Sue Greenwald or Lamar Heystek.

Finally, I have a bone to pick with Katherine Hess, the City's Planning Director. At the beginning of the talk was an assessment of city's strengths and weaknesses. They go on to list, things like lack of a fourth fire station, not enough firefighting staff, not enough police staff, and my favorite, the budget is balanced with no foreseen problem. The last one is extremely problematic. The city is talking about having to have a string of new taxes to finance existing programs. Despite fancy budgeting assumptions, the future projections are a continued budget deficit due to structural issues with city pensions and salaries. The other points are issues of controversy, reasonable people disagree on the extent that those are needed or affordable. To present this as matter of fact was disingenuous at best. I was told that was all Katherine Hess' doing.

I think the Davis City Council got bad advice overall on how to proceed with the Sphere of Influence. I think they risk turning LAFCO on its head, doing the opposite of what was intentioned. Davis cannot be the first city that has thought of this, but the legal consequences and unintended consequences are immense.

At this point, I am thoroughly convinced that the opposite approach is best--keep the Sphere of Influence as small as possible and keep areas outside of the General Plan to the extent legally possible.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

What the Sphere of Influence Means For Davis Growth

Tonight at the Davis City Hall Community Room, there will be a LAFCO hearing on Davis' Sphere of Influence.

LAFCO is proposing a couple of properties be added to the Davis sphere of influence namely the Northwest Quadrant and the Nishi property. While at the same time it removes the Shriner's property east of Wildhorse and north of Covell, areas east of El Macero and areas west of Davis but east of Pedrick.

According to the report:

"The changes from the existing SOI, adopted in 1988, reflect the likely boundaries and best growth areas for the city."

Furthermore it goes on to conclude:

"In addition, the City’s current Housing Element indicates that these sites are more ideal for the projected growth of the City. The proposed SOI promotes a compact city, thereby discouraging urban sprawl, while allowing for steady growth. This represents an overall reduction of approximately 400 acres of undeveloped land from the 1988 SOI."

The question is what does this mean if anything for County Proposed growth and the pass-through agreement.

On February 26, 2008, the Davis City Council did something very unusual--they unanimously agreed on something. In principle, they agreed:

"the Sphere of Influence should be as large as realistic. There is continuing growth pressure on

the perimeter of our community. A larger Sphere of Influence will help discourage urban sprawl, promote efficient governmental services, and preserve open space and agricultural lands, consistent with the purposes of the LAFCO review."

As a result, the Davis City Council lists 10 sites that they want in the sphere of influence, some of these are already included, some of are not. There would seem that the city has some say over what gets included and what does not.

Both LAFCO and the Davis City Council seem to have as their goal controlling sprawl and preserving open space and agricultural lands, why do they have two very different visions for how to do this?

Here is some documentation from LAFCO.

"The sphere of influence is an important benchmark because it defines the primary area within which urban development is to be encouraged. In a 1977 opinion, the California Attorney General stated that sphere of influence should "serve like general plans, serve as an essential planning tool to combat urban sprawl and provide well planned efficient urban development patterns, giving appropriate consideration to preserving prime agricultural and other open-space lands."

Along this same line of reasoning, the California Appellate Court has held that spheres of influence must be adopted before an annexation to the affected city or district can be considered. Section 56650.5 limits the validity of annexation proposals in specified urban areas unless the request is consistent with the applicable spheres of influence. Section 57025 requires LAFCO to send notice of pending annexation hearings to those affected agencies whose spheres contain territory within the proposal.

LAFCO has sole responsibility for establishing a city's sphere of influence. Further, the LAFCO is not required to establish a sphere that is greater than the city's existing boundaries. LAFCO may take joint action to approve an annexation while at the same time amending the city's sphere of influence.

LAFCO officials and local decision-makers recognize the logical assumption that the lands lying within the sphere are those that the city may someday propose to incorporate. If the city finds that annexing an area outside its sphere would be in the public interest, it should request that its sphere be amended to include that area."

Given that, it is interesting that Davis would want to expand its sphere of influence, since ordinarily if you want to limit your growth, you decrease the sphere of influence.

To answer this, we should look to Measure J and the Pass-through agreement. The City of Davis probably believes that it has more control over its growth by keeping areas under its control. Measure J means that even if a property is under the sphere of influence, it still maintains the ability of controlling growth through the voter approval requirement.

At the same time, the recent threat to growth has come not from within the city of Davis but from the county. Does inclusion in the sphere of influence give the city more over its growth? The pass-through agreement would seem to be dependent on the sphere of influence but actually a larger city planning area. However, it seems possible that there a stronger ability to control one's sphere of influence. Just not sure about that.

This should be an interesting meeting tonight, unfortunately there is also an interesting meeting at Emerson to determine what will happen with the Junior High School.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Will LAFCO Changes to Davis' Sphere of Influence Open the Door to Growth on the Periphery?

Lost in the shuffle was a report in the Davis Enterprise that Davis' sphere of influence would be reduced by LAFCO.

In the Davis Enterprise article this is presented as a means to "preserve more prime agricultural land."

Claire St. John of the Davis Enterprise writes:

"'The changes from the existing SOI, adopted in 1988, reflect the likely boundaries and best growth areas for the city,' the consultant, PMC, wrote in a report. 'The primary differences between the 1988 adopted SOI and the proposed SOI include the removal of several prime agricultural areas, moving the university property within the 10-year SOI and adjustment of areas to reflect where growth is likely.'

A reduction of about 400 acres is proposed, most of which is prime agricultural land. The proposal also includes some re- jiggering to reflect where Davis is likely to grow in the future."

However before this can be approved, there will be a public process and a discussion of at the February 26, 2008 Davis City Council Meeting. This discussion takes place two weeks after the discussion of Davis' one percent growth rate.

The article suggests both Davis Supervisors are concerned about the new boundaries.

"Thomson and Yamada, who also serve as Yolo County supervisors, said they would prefer to see the sphere of influence stretch more to the west of Davis where services such as a hospital, nearby grocery store and other amenities already exist. To include those lands could give Davis more control of its growth and avoid having development forced on it as happened with Mace Ranch.

'By failing to include that property, the city was caught off guard,' Yamada said.

'The question in 1986 was if Davis was taking its fair share of growth,' Thomson added. 'Some people didn't think so and they ganged up and Davis has been paying for it every since. You don't have to grow to the sphere. It's just that that's what you evaluate when you look at annexation.'"

The larger concern however, might be the fact that if areas are not included in the sphere of influence, they might not be covered under the pass-through agreement. That means that the county might have a greater ability to develop on Davis' periphery or close to Davis' periphery under a new arrangement.

Councilmember Stephen Souza, an alternate on LAFCO is quoted in the Enterprise article:

"When reached later, Souza, who is also a Davis City Council member, said Davis now has control over its borders under Measure J. That measure requires voter approval on any General Plan change from agriculture to urban use.

'We have placed a provision in our municipal code that allows us to have ultimate control over any development outside the city of Davis,' he said. 'I believe we should control our own destiny, we should not be controlled by others. When I say 'we' I mean we, the citizens of Davis.'

Any border development needs to be discussed with the county and vice versa, Souza added. That hasn't been the accepted practice in recent years, Thomson said.

'We shouldn't be talking at each other, we need to be talking with each other,' he said. 'We affect each other.' "

In addition to the Davis City Council meeting, LAFCO will take up public comment on the proposed sphere of influence on the evening of March 31, at the Davis City Hall.

One of the issues that must be clarified is whether shrinking the city's sphere of influence instead of protecting prime agricultural land will actually leave it more vulnerable. Davis has Measure J in place to protect its periphery and require a citizen vote. Davis also a pass-through agreement with the county that enables it to have a say in development on its periphery. If changes to the boundary alter that arrangement, we could be looking at a repeat of what happened last summer.

Additionally, the county has not taken the three studies areas proposed at that time off the table, but they might have an easier track elsewhere including along the I-80 corridor if this comes to pass.

Davis residents need to watch this with great interest in the coming weeks.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: The LAFCO Debate

Earlier this week there was a dispute as to who should fill the vacant LAFCO seat now that Frank Sieferman who had occupied the second Yolo County Supervisor seat lost reelection to Matt Rexroad. Mr. Rexroad argued it should be him since Woodland needed representation on LAFCO. Chair Mariko Yamada had planned to appoint herself to LAFCO arguing that she had greater experience with county issues and that as County Supervisor one does not represent one particular locality.

In the end, Ms. Yamada was overruled by her colleagues on the board by a 4-1 vote. However, we sympathize with both the position of Mr. Rexroad and the position of Ms. Yamada.

LAFCO is the Local Agency Formation Commission and contains members of the public, from cities, and from the county. There is one seat given to a member from the public, two seats from cities, and two from the County Board of Supervisors.

LAFCOs are responsible for coordinating logical and timely changes in local governmental boundaries, conducting special studies that review ways to reorganize, simplify and streamline governmental structure and preparing a Sphere of Influence for each city and special district within each county. The Commission's efforts are directed to seeing that services are provided efficiently and economically while agricultural and open-space lands are protected.

The regular city members are William Kristoff from the West Sacramento City Council and Tom McMasters-Stone from the Winters City Council. The alternate is Davis City Councilmember Stephen Souza. There are two city representatives and those representatives rotate.

There are also two County Supervisors on LAFCO. Helen Thomson who represents part of Davis holds one seat and Frank Sieferman had served prior to his defeat in November by Matt Rexroad.

Woodland Daily Democrat Jim Smith argued that Mr. Rexroad should be appointed due to the lack of representation for Woodland:

In this case, however, if Yamada does get herself appointed to LAFCO, it will mean minimal representation for Woodland.

This will be important because Woodland has number of annexation issues coming up in the future following last June’s expansion of the city’s urban limit line.

Former 3rd District Supervisor Frank Sieferman Jr. sat on LAFCO before he became chairman of the Board of Supervisors. However, if Yamada gets on the board then Davis could have an unfair advantage, since Supervisor Helen Thomson already is serving on the commission.

While we sympathize with the position that Woodland needs representation, we wonder if that representation issue should be solved through a seat that is supposed to represent the County's Interests (the entire county) on LAFCO rather than a seat designated to represent city interests. The problem it seems to us is that only two municipalities have representation at a time. Now in terms of mathematics it makes sense since there are five seats on LAFCO, two from cities and two from counties.

However, the seats on LAFCO from the county supervisors are supposed to represent county interests. If Mr. Rexroad who is now appointed is merely representing the interests of Woodland, then he is not serving the county well. In the end, this dispute may be better solved through structural changes to at least allow each municipality to have their interests heard--through the designated city representatives rather than creating a surrogate advocate at the county level. Mr. Rexroad is no longer on the Woodland City Council, he now represents the County of Yolo on such bodies as LAFCO even as he represents his constituents on the Board of Supervisors.

It seems to us improper to use one of the designated County seats as a substitute for the lack of a seat at the city level--that would seem to put county-wide interests at a disadvantage. If the concern by Mr. Smith and Mr. Rexroad truly is the lack of representation that Woodland had, perhaps the entire composition should be examined. If Mr. Rexroad approaches his position as representing Woodland interests, county residents as a whole may be short-changed.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting