What is LAFCO
’s usefulness and how is the agency accountable to the people?
LAFCO, or the Local Agency Formation Commission, is a “state
mandated local agency set up to oversee the boundaries of cities
and special districts.
Encouraging orderly boundaries, discouraging urban sprawl, and preserving agricultural and open space lands are the key goals of LAFCO,” according to the Santa Clara County LAFCO Web site.
Put bluntly, the state wanted to discourage sprawl and repetitive, indistinct communities that are so typical of much of Southern California and created a LAFCO for each county.
In Gilroy, residents have seen how LAFCO uses its power over city annexation requests to achieve this end. Even though it has no jurisdiction over any city’s general plans, LAFCO members disapproved of Gilroy’s decision to include 660 acres east of the outlets in its plan. To pressure the city into changing its general plan, LAFCO refused to allow Gilroy to add 23 acres owned by Hollister’s Rich Barberi next to the sports park into the city’s boudaries. This creates an unincorporated island, one of the bad planning practices LAFCO is supposed to discourage, not encourage.
What can we do about it? Nothing, because LAFCO members are appointed, not elected.
Meanwhile, San Jose is moving full-steam ahead with developing Coyote Valley. It’s on track to remove long-standing triggers from its general plan that would allow development of houses before sufficient jobs are in place. This is happening despite the fact that San Jose has plenty of in-fill areas to develop, making Coyote Valley development unwise, unnecessary, and defining the sprawl occuring all around us perfectly.
This huge development will have wide-ranging impacts on the entire region, yet LAFCO has been strangely silent on Coyote Valley, exerting no pressure of which we’re aware to discourage San Jose from unwisely developing Coyote Valley before it’s needed, as defined by the city’s long-standing triggers.
We can only note the size and political clout differences between Morgan Hill, Gilroy and San Jose and conclude that is why the communities are treated differently.
But we can encourage our state senators and assembly members to take note of the situation and propose legislation to make LAFCO members accountable to the voters by forcing them to run for office.
We applaud the goals of LAFCO. We don’t like sprawl, either. Sadly, Santa Clara County’s LAFCO, at least, seems to be missing the mark badly in achieving its anti-sprawl goal.
It’s never wise to empower people or panels with no system of accountability. We urge our state representatives to make LAFCO members accountable to the residents whose lives they impact.
