11 ATTACHMENTS 02-04 - Laserfiche WebLink

DRAFT Ms. Testa stated that the Planning Commission has an obligation to take seriously what is in the General Plan. She indicated that 1,500 additional units have been approved, and the City is looking at another 1,759 units with the Preferred Plan; yet every campus in Pleasanton exceeds the Pleasanton General Plan recommendations, and there is no plan whatsoever to mitigate the growth in the schools. She added that this does not even address the severe impact to the middle schools and the high schools. She reiterated that PUSD has finally said that this is a problem and that it cannot continue to move forward and ignore this huge problem. She stated that lovely neighborhoods are an asset and that it would be nice if growth is mitigated before it becomes a crisis. Ms. Testa stated that the Planning Commission knows that SB50 says not being able to mitigate school growth cannot be taken as a consideration if this Plan gets so far along that industrial land is rezoned to residential. She added that if this is allowed to get so far down the line that there is no longer any way of mitigating this crisis, she would hope that the Commission is looking at this crisis in other projects it is considering as well. She indicated that a Preferred Plan is not needed right now; this land is not zoned residential right now, and the City is not forced to build houses on it that the schools do not have room to address. Ms. Testa stated that at the last Planning Commission Work Session, she was really impressed with the constant comments that kept coming regarding how this project benefits this neighborhood and Pleasanton. She indicated that right now, any of these residential projects are going to dramatically hurt Pleasanton. She noted that growth should pay for itself, and right now, all of these children are coming to Pleasanton schools, and there is no way of addressing that mitigation without the community coming back as property owners and tax payers and once again being demanded to pay for the mitigation of growth to the schools. She indicated that there is no way PUSD can get the new schools with the fees that are currently being collected. She emphasized that PUSD's capital funding is in crisis, and it cannot be continually ignored. Heather Liang, President of the Homeowners Association for the Ironwood community and speaking on the community's behalf, expressed the community's concerns about the Preferred Plan and what will be put on the East Pleasanton Specific Plan area. She indicated that they have a fairly large community here and the residents are concerned about the different percentages that Ms. Stern has presented. She stated that the Preferred Plan, as it is written today, has a very high percentage of taking on the overall RHNA percentages, including a very high percentage of multi-family housing. She questioned why East Pleasanton should have to be over-burdened with this big percentage of RHNA numbers and that there should be a balanced distribution that was mentioned as the goal of this Plan. She indicated that East Pleasanton taking more than 50 percent of the share is not very balanced, and the Plan should look at Pleasanton overall and not focus on East Pleasanton alone. She noted that the recently approved Auf der Maur project, combined with this Preferred Plan, will add more than 2,000 units in a very concentrated area in East Pleasanton that already has DRAFT EXCERPT: PLANNING COMMISSION MINUTES, 9/25/2013 Page 13 of 28