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Citizens for a Caring Community January 11, 2013 Ivi SERIAL Mayor Jerry Thorne Council Pleasanton City Council Members City of Pleasanton n of Packet P.O. Box 520 —/{j /2013 Pleasanton, CA 94566 '^ /.___�.-___ Dear Mayor Thorne and City Council members I understand that you will be reviewing the East Side Specific Plan Task Force's (ESSPTF) draft Vision Statement at your next meeting. I have attended a number of the Task Force meetings, including the last one on December 6, where members discussed the Vision Statement. During that meeting both ESSPTF members and the public expressed some frustration with the process of arriving at a" vision" that represents any consensus of opinion as to what should happen on Pleasanton's East Side. After participating in the Hacienda Task Force, a group of similar diverse opinian, I was struck by the difficulties the ESSPTF seems to be having. I believe that the Council can assist the process by giving clearer direction on the questions you would like the group to address. Unlike the Hacienda Task Force, the ESSPTF lacks the direction of a specific number of housing units to design for. As a result it has focused on trying to develop a plan as good as what may be its "druthers", which is no housing at all, or very little, and especially not higher density workforce housing affordable to families earning less than 80% of the County's median income. This has made finding any consensus especially' difficult. At its last meeting the Task Force and attending public took up the question of whether the East Side should be developed at all. There are many, and perhaps a majority of Task Force members who believe that the area should not be used for housing, and especially higher density workforce housing. The Council's resolution creating the ESSPTF allows the Task force to recommend a "no development" option if it wishes to do so. The Council could then accept this recommendation, and move on to updating the Housing Element by finding room to meet our workforce housing requirements on other sites within Pleasanton. If the "no development" option does not have ESSPTF majority support, the Council should refocus the ESSPTF's discussion to assure that East Side development makes a proportional, appropriate contribution towards meeting Pleasanton's current and future mandated housing requirements. The Land Use Element of the Pleasanton General Plan anticipates that the ultimate land use in the East Side Specific Plan Area would generate no increase in Pleasanton jobs. (Previous General Plan land uses showed the area generating 11,000 jobs.) But it does not presume to specify whether long term land use would be as housing or open space. Either way, Pleasanton's need to provide housing for jobs generated at build-out would ultimately be reduced by 11,000 jobs, from 97,000 jobs down to 86,000 jobs. (Land Use Element page 2-7)