Change in scope for study to include how to pay for greenbelt
areas
After more than a year of work, the Urban Limit Line Advisory Committee will place its product to date before the City Council Wednesday night.
Council will pick it up, carefully – because drawing lines through people’s property is controversial – and see what is in and what is outside the line. The Urban Limit Line (ULL) will largely determine what property owners can do in the future with lands that are both outside the line and inside the greenbelt.
No vote will be taken on the proposed Urban Limit Line but committee members and the general public can speak about their concerns. Council will vote on modifying the study’s scope of work to include developing an “implementation plan” and the added costs of the consultant overseeing the plan and its preparation.
The original contract called for the consultant, Moore Iacofano Goltsman (MIG) to receive $245,783, which included a $22,050 contingency. The modified contract, if approved, would reduce that figure to $225,073. The $20,710 removed from the contract will be allocated to the ULL Study in evaluating property values ($3,000) and to supplement contract planner funding.
Council will vote on modifying the contract and authorize the use of the contract’s $20,000 contingency to cover the added work. The project, now scheduled to be completed in November, has been delayed because the city did not ahead of time settle on a method of paying landowners who would not be able to develop their property.
The committee has been working on the ULL report since January 2003.
The implementation plan was deemed necessary after property owners complained that they would receive no financial compensation for giving up the chance to develop land they own outside the ULL and inside the greenbelt, a situation that would reduce their property values.
At the advisory committee meeting on Jan. 9, members asked for an evaluation of an assessment district or other shared funding techniques that might be used to fund the outright purchase of land to be preserved or of a conservation easement. With an easement, the property owner continues to farm but gives up – for a price – the chance of future development.
Other cities have partnered with Santa Clara County agencies such as the Land Trust, the Open Space Authority and the Nature Conservancy to finance purchase of land (Fee Title) or development easements.
The committee also asked for a master plan concerning future development on the south east quadrant. Answering these questions will require the contract to be modified.
Some funds – $70,000 – were saved from the original contract, plus the $22,050 contingency, and could be used for the modified scope of work.
“Reordering the MIG contract, including the $22,050 contingency, still results in savings of MIG contract funds for the city,” the staff report said.
Ways to formally mitigate the possible loss of prime agricultural land to urban use – a county requirement – will be delayed until the City of Gilroy completes its plan. The cost of preparing a plan for Morgan Hill would be high, the staff report said, and Morgan Hill might decide Gilroy’s plan is sufficient.
The tentative line, according to Planning Director David Bischoff, is fairly uncontroversial on all but the east side.
“On the west side the line does most of what everyone wants,” Bischoff said. “It generally follows the city’s Urban Growth Boundary.” The western line excludes El Toro Mountain and all hills on the west side, except for the Castle Ridge area.
“Looking west, everything that is green (in the spring) and open,” Bischoff said, “will stay that way.”
The line continues north to the edge of the city limits at the boundary of the huge Baird cattle ranch west of Santa Teresa Boulevard.
The ranch is both outside the ULL and inside a greenbelt.
The Urban Limit Line is the ultimate limit of urban development for the city. Committee has not yet determined how to exactly define a greenbelt or what types of uses would be acceptable within a greenbelt. Parcels smaller than 10-acres in size are not likely candidates for inclusion within a greenbelt.
“What’s allowable as a greenbelt may depend on the city’s ability to pay for it,” Bischoff said. The cost to acquire easements or to buy the property might be too high. An alternative might be to allow a single house on each parcel instead of forbidding building totally.
The issue of financial compensation threatened to split the committee last fall when property owners, especially on the agricultural east side discovered the city was not intending to discuss ways to compensate land owners for giving up their development rights. The issue hinged on the value of undeveloped greenbelt areas for all versus the rights of property owners to secure their financial future.
A greenbelt was described by Councilwoman Hedy Chang and committee vice chair as adding to the quality of life in Morgan Hill – the reason most people want to live here.
“We have things here other cities wish they had,” said committee member Mark Grzan. “If we don’t plan now we will lose this and become just another Mountain View or Sunnyvale. Once it’s gone, it’s gone.”
The line follows the city limits north to Tilton Avenue, wraps around Burnett Elementary School, and follows Morgan Hill’s sphere of influence to Monterey, cutting Ann Sobrato High School in half – the sports fields in San Jose’s greenbelt and the campus in Morgan Hill – edges Coyote Creek County Park, follows Malaguerra and Cochrane Road in front of the park’s picnic area, then moves south along the lower foothills.
At East Dunne Avenue, the ULL moves up the hills and surrounds Jackson Oaks, Holiday Lake Estates and Jackson Meadows, keeping them all inside the line. Jackson Oaks was developed with dedicated open space that is not considered official green belt.
Again following the foothills, the line comes down Carey Avenue, turns west at East Middle Avenue and finishes the trip at the southern city limits, meeting up with Santa Teresa Boulevard. The Math Institute Golf Course on Foothill Avenue is inside the greenbelt and outside the ULL.
Both Mayor Dennis Kennedy and Councilman Steve Tate are out of town and will attend the meeting by speaker phone. Kennedy is in Washington, D.C., with representatives of the Santa Clara Valley Water District, lobbying Congress for funding of PL566, the partially completed – except for a stretch through Morgan Hill – project to renovate the Llagas Creek waterway and eliminate persistent flooding. Tate is on vacation.
All PL566 funding was removed by the Bush administration in the 2004-05 proposed budget.
The complete Council agenda is available at the City Clerk’s desk in City Hall and on line. City Council and/or the Redevelopment Agency meets at 7 p.m. most Wednesdays in City Hall Chambers, 17555 Peak Ave. Details: www.morgan-hill.ca.gov or 779-7271. Council meetings are broadcast live on cable access channel 17.
