Council - I ask you to contest this project. While not an attorney, I
believe there are solid grounds that a court might support:
- The punishment to our community - for generations to come - far
outweighs the "crime" of submitting what the city believed was a compliant
Housing Element
- The "project" has never complied with the minimum percentage of
housing required for the Builders Remedy legislation to apply to it.
- Conducting an EIR is not a tactic to delay the project but it is a
critical step to identify potential negative impacts on our small community
and also to identify critical mitigating steps to be taken. With the
extremely serious impacts of the approved Parkline project in the same part
of town, this behemoth would totally crush traffic flows in the
mid-peninsula, worsen the housing shortage (compare the number of new
workers and the number of homes provided -- no other community can be
relied on to fill the gap), and overload the city infrastructure.
- The city finances would be hit by litigation. But the city finances
would be decimated even more if the city is left holding the bag to create
the infrastructure needed to support the project (think roads, water supply
and piping, sewage, schools, storm drains, city services, etc.). Even the
fire district does not have the equipment it needs to support massive
skyscrapers.
- The city, as I understand it, had consulted with the state housing
folks prior to submitting the Housing Element, and had reason to believe it
would be accepted. That guidance was needed because there are not extensive
guidelines. HCD took months to return its rejection, a lot of which was
about the citys narrative, not about the number (that exceeded the
allocation), during which time this skyscraper office project was proposed.
Something is very wrong with this picture.
You represent the current and future residents and businesses of this
community. The proposed project is wildly out of scale and beyond the
ability of our town to support. Choosing not to fight it in every way you
can is not what you were elected to do. Surely in a community like ours
there could be financial supporters for a strong legal defense. Stand
strong and get creative. Do not give in.
Patti Fry
