14 - Laserfiche WebLink

* ~-`!+ ,11I1T Association of Bay Area Governments Bay Area Air Quality Management District Joseph P. Bort MclmCen- 101 El9hih SOeel ~_. Metro olitan Trans ortation Commission P P P.D.Box2050 Oakland, CA 94007-0766 Joint Policy Committee/Regional Planning Program (510)464-7942 (ax (570)433-5542 tedtl@ebag.ca.gov abagsa povAolOioollcvt Date: March 27, 2006 To: Partnership Technical Advisory Committee From: Regional Planning Program Director, Joint Policy Committee Subject: FOCUS and Potential Infill Development Incentives This memo is to update the Partnership Technical Advisory Committee on the inter-agency FOCUS effort and on emerging incentives to support local development efforts consistent withFOCUS. FOCUS In the spring of 2006, the Bay Area, with the assistance of a state grant, commenced amulti-agency regional planning program called Focusing Our Vision, now more easily referred to simply as FOCUS. FOCUS builds upon a rich legacy of recent Bay Area regional planning efforts, in particrilar: • The Smart Growth Strategy /Regional Livability Footprint Project and its "Network of Neighborhoods" regional vision; • The Smart Growth Preamble and Policies adopted jointly by four regional agencies in 2002; • The Transportation for Livable Communities (TLC) and Housing Incentive Program (HIP) initiatives; • The smart-growth-policy-based Projections 2003, 2005, and 2007; • The Transportation and Land-Use Platform in the 2005 Regional Transportation Plan, Transportation 2030; • The Resolution 3434 Transit-Oriented Development Policy. However, FOCUS recognizes that none of these efforts, either individually or collectively, is com- plete and perfect; that regional planning is a continuous learning process subject to constant refine- ment and improvement. As well, even the best plans are only as good as their implementation. The principal improvement, which FOCUS seeks at this time, is greater buy-in among local govern- ments. Local governments, through land-use planning and development controls, are the main determi- nants of how the Bay Area grows. Yet too many of those powerful entities feel (rightly or wrongly) excluded from the regional planning process and uncommitted to a collective vision for the Bay ?,rea. By building aYseries of voluntary compacts relative to mutually agreed Priority Areas-and by demon- strating success in realizing the potential of these areas through both regional and local efforts- FOCUS hopes over time to help remove the walls which currently separate regional and local objec- tives. With a Technical Advisory Committee (TAC), composed of local-government professionals from all nhie counties, regional staff has spent much of the initial FOCUS effort on developing, testing and implementing a regional mapping model for identifying potential Priority Area locations for devel- opment. Acomparable effort is underway with anopen-space coalition, GreenVision, to identify po- tential Priority Areas for conservation. However, the GreenVision effort is evolving at a different pace and is not yet ready to report conclusions. PAGE 8