INSIDE CITY HALL Here are some items...

INSIDE CITY HALL

Here are some items the commission considered at its meeting this

week.

MOBILE HOME CONVERSION ORDINANCE

The commission considered approving a mobile home conversion

ordinance.

On July 7, the City Council directed planning staff to change the

city’s procedures for mobile home park conversions. The city’s

present procedure is limited. In preparing the draft ordinance,

planners reviewed the ordinances of cities such as Laguna Beach and

Huntington Beach, as well as the Golden State Manufactured Home

Owners League.

The proposed changes to the zoning code would expand the city’s

procedures to include mobile home park closures in addition to mobile

home park conversions. The draft ordinance specifies the procedure

required for a mobile home park conversion/closure and what

constitutes “reasonable costs of relocation” when the commission

considers a mobile home park closure report.

Planning staffers recommended the provision of the ordinance be

applied to pending mobile home park conversion applications such as

the one filed by Joe Brown to turn the El Nido and Snug Harbor

Village parks into a medical office building.

WHAT HAPPENED

Staff recommended continuing the issue for a variety of reasons,

including wanting more time to work on an interim ordinance that

would provide aspects they felt the council needs to deal with

Brown’s properties without making the entire draft ordinance

retroactively applicable to Brown. The commission agreed and

continued the item to Nov. 10.

WHAT IT MEANS

The Planning Commission will reconsider the issue on Nov. 10.

POLICE FACILITY EXPANSION

The commission considered a request for an extension from the

police department.

WHAT HAPPENED

Last October, the commission approved the final master plan that

allows the construction of an 11,000-square-foot expansion of the

police facility. The police department is requesting a one-year

extension, which will allow building permits to be obtained for

improvements to the basement.

The commission approved the request.

WHAT IT MEANS

The police department will get the one-year extension.

PLANNING APPLICATION

The commission considered an application from Tim and Doug

DeCinces for a four-unit, two-story development with an exception

from open-space requirements.

The development was originally proposed with five units.

WHAT HAPPENED

The commission approved the application, although staff had

recommended denying it because it believed there was no justification

for the exception.

WHAT IT MEANS

The DeCinceses can build their development with an exception from

open-space requirements.

WHAT THEY SAID

“The staff is duty-bound to make that kind of recommendation on a

parameter like that, that is in the code,” Chair Bruce Garlich said.

“I argued [the DeCinceses] had made a good-faith attempt to meet the

40% open space requirement, and the difference was quite small, and

if you expanded landscaping along the driveway by less than a foot,

you could meet [the requirement] and someone driving by wouldn’t know

the difference.”