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January 24, 2006

Cloverdale to consider setting urban growth limits

A citizens' advisory panel is recommending that the City Council back expansion limits during this year's general plan update, setting the stage for a ballot measure in 2007.

The push comes as planners forecast a 50 percent increase in Cloverdale's population over the next 15 years.

"I think it's time to talk about it," Mayor Bob Jehn said Monday. "Some people think it needs to happen, that it's the right thing to do."

Over the past decade, in an effort to check suburban sprawl, voters in the county's other eight cities have established geographical boundaries limiting where residential and commercial development can occur.

Cloverdale leaders have resisted taking the step, in part because natural boundaries, such as hills to the north and west and the Russian River to the east, create natural limits.

But after a 1½-year study, the 15-member panel appointed by the City Council is suggesting Cloverdale adopt a formal boundary to clarify its intentions. Policies limiting development to flat land and preventing houses in farm areas aren't enough, the panel said.

"We need to spell it out," said Carolyn Marcinkowski, an advisory panel member and retired business owner who moved to Cloverdale five years ago. "The natural boundaries we have - the river, the hills - have worked in the past, but with the pressures that are coming, growth is spreading."

David Ziegenhagen, another panel member, said an urban growth boundary would prevent "developers and planners from dancing around" existing policies.

"Those things get a little mushy," said Ziegenhagen, a resident of the Clover Springs retirement community since 2000. "A boundary makes it a little easier to fend off the hillside full of houses."

The panel will give its report to the City Council on Wednesday.

Cloverdale has been one of the fastest-growing cities in Sonoma County.

Spurred by lower housing prices, it grew 67 percent from 1990 to 2005 - the fastest rate in a slow-growth county - topping out at the current population of about 8,200.

Subdivisions of upscale retirement and single-family homes cropped up along the western edge.

More building is now expected in the south.

Voter-approved urban growth boundaries are seen as a powerful tool in defining the physical limits of cities. They usually are enacted for 15- or 20-year periods and can only be reversed with a referendum.

Healdsburg, Santa Rosa and Sebastopol were the first cities to adopt urban boundaries in 1996. Rohnert Park and Sonoma were the most recent, in 2000.

Bruce Kibby, Cloverdale's community development director, said the advisory panel discussed a southern boundary near Dutcher Creek Road because of the potential for the city to expand into the Alexander Valley.

If the City Council decides to put the matter to voters, it would likely not come until 2007. Jehn said the council could put it on the ballot sooner but would be unlikely to do so .

The city would spend 2006 conducting environmental studies and public hearings, Kibby said.

The City Council also could reject the idea. Council members have been reluctant to add layers of regulation when current policies give them control over growth, Kibby said.

"The question has come up before and the council has felt it was not necessary," Kibby said. "The sense was they were doing a good job, that goals of a boundary were met by policy actions."

But that thinking is wrong, said Daisy Pistey-Lyhne of Greenbelt Alliance, a nonprofit group advocating "smart growth" designed around pedestrians, public transit and providing affordable housing.

Pistey-Lyhne said an urban growth boundary would redirect development from the fringes of the city while preserving farm land and preventing sprawl.

The belief that natural boundaries will prevent growth is untrue, she said.

"We're very pleased to see the citizens of Cloverdale are starting to move in this direction," said Pistey-Lyhne, whose group met with the advisory panel. "We think an urban growth boundary is a great idea."

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