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Subject: FW: EPS -Item 14 mrz From: Brock Roby [ €;i1 �n,�t>- �� r.�.��.�.��.,.� �... Sent: Tuesday, May 19, 2015 9:00 AM J g To: Mayor and City Council s _ [ L �/ Subject: EPSP - Item 14 Mayor Thorne and City Council Members, I am writing as an East Pleasanton Specific Plan Task Force Member to encourage you to continue the planning effort to an appropriate and reasonable conclusion. Although I grew up in a small town and consider Pleasanton a bigger city than I might typically prefer, I am concerned about the public process that is about to take place if you halt planning tonight. I want to suggest some reasons why you should not stop the EPSP planning at this point: i. Pleasanton got to where it is by smart planning: Pleasanton is seen as a desirable place to live by many. It did not happen by accident. It has been the City of planned progress for a long time. In general, smart planning has always had to take into account many impacts and potential obstacles to proposed land use(not just here in Pleasanton): Environmental impacts, wetlands,biological habitat, earthquake zones, traffic, airport zones, economic impacts, water quality, flooding, sea-level rise, geotechnical conditions, schools, air quality, noise, aesthetics, archaeology, historical significance, utility infrastructure capacity, and water, to name a few. For all of these impacts and others,there are mitigations that can be considered at the planning level... but planning does not need to stop. If the drought is a concern, make net-zero water impact a condition of the planning process. Write it into the specific plan conditions: All future development needs to mitigate the impact on domestic water use by providing recycled water and existing home upgrades to off-set any new demand. This is a possible condition of approval. But planning does not need to stop for this. 2. The Fate of Future Community Involvement: As a Task Force member, I do not believe you owe anything to us—our efforts to help were voluntary and without expectation of any particular result. However, I do believe it is a dangerous precedent to establish a task force of citizens to study at great length a complex and important community matter for the sole purpose of advising the City Council, and then make a final decision on the matter without consulting that task force. No one will ever again take the call of being a task force member serious. Why should they when the City Council can decide to not consider their input after years of effort on a given task? I do not know how our task force would vote on this issue tonight, but I do know it is wrong to not ask them. If the trend is to listen to those who speak the loudest then we should forgo taking the time to educate citizen task forces and start making decisions based on email campaigns, public forums, and anonymous blogs. Is that where Pleasanton is heading? 3. Many are Uninformed of Potential Unintended Consequences: When we started our drought restrictions a year ago, some were mad at the City Council for not planning ahead for the drought. Little did they realize that a previous City Council actually did have the foresight to plan ahead and partnered with DSRSD to construct a reverse osmosis plant that could allow waste water generated in Pleasanton to be converted to a water quality standard safe for introduction back into our potable water system. At the time a public campaign against the project—referred to as "toilet to tap"by those who were opposed —brought the program to a halt. Here we sit a few years later realizing just how vital that program could have been, yet we yielded to the emotions of the loud. I am personally fine with not building more housing on the East side if that is what the majority of Pleasanton residents want. But I wonder if most people realize that this land is currently zoned as industrial? If we pass up tree-lined streets, acres of parks, a new school, and a free El Charro connection, in exchange for more industrial facilities with their 1