Norco Gives Corona 712 Acres, Opening Door for Development

An unusual transfer of territory from one city to another became official in Riverside County on Friday, opening the door for development in Corona of 3,742 homes and nearly 11 1/2 acres of community shopping areas in the hills dividing the northeastern part of the city from southeastern Norco.

The transfer, recorded Friday morning in the county recorder’s office, moved the border between the cities northward to include within Corona’s boundaries 712 undeveloped acres formerly in Norco.

Although it is not uncommon for cities to swap bits of territory to facilitate delivery of public services to small outlying properties, a transfer of this magnitude is “extremely rare,” said Mischelle Zimmerman, executive officer of Riverside County’s Local Agency Formation Commission.

During her 10 years in Riverside County government--the last five of them with the agency that regulates municipal boundaries--Zimmerman has never seen a city relinquish nearly as much territory, she said.

Official, Unofficial Reasons

The official reason for the transfer is that Corona is better suited to provide utility service to the area because of the hills’ geography and their “natural alignment with the City of Corona.”

Officials in both Corona and Norco admit privately, however, that the transfer has less to do with the routing of sewer lines than with the two cities’ differing approaches to residential development.

This difference extends even to the area’s name. Norco officials steadfastly refer to it as Norco Hills, while Corona opts for Woodlake, a shortened version of the owners’ name for their development, Woodlake Villages.

Corona allows a wide variety of residential development within its borders. The city has been eager to reap the increased revenues that a larger population and increased commercial activity bring, allowing it to expand city services and increase municipal employees’ salaries.

Norco city planners are looking instead to limited commercial developments, like an auto mall proposed for Hamner Avenue, to draw customers from outside the city to provide the sales-tax revenue needed to pay for city services.

Horses are said to outnumber humans by better than 2 to 1 in Norco, where residential zoning laws traditionally have required homes to sit on lots of at least 20,000 square feet, or slightly less than half an acre--in keeping with the city’s fiercely defended “rural character.”

The city does not allow multiple dwellings, like apartment buildings and complexes.

But owners of the undeveloped property in southeast Norco were unwilling to offer only horse ranches in the hills. Richard L. Owen, who with Robert H. Grant owns nearly all of the land involved in Tuesday’s transfer, proposed that the city change its general land-use plan to allow varied development in the area.

Owen’s proposal would have allowed commercial centers, industrial development and a range of housing patterns, from high-density development of 30 dwelling units per acre to large, five-acre ranches, said Ralph (Bud) Plender, Norco’s director of community development.

After the Norco City Council effectively denied Owen’s request in February, 1982, he initiated a campaign to remove his land from the city’s boundaries--with or without Norco’s approval, Plender said.

A 1982 bill in the state Legislature would have allowed the transfer to take place without Norco’s approval, but it was dropped by its sponsor, Sen. Joseph B. Montoya (D-Whittier), on the very day a hearing on the measure had been scheduled.

History of Negotiations

Montoya said the measure was aimed at removing “elitist” obstacles to housing construction but was rendered unnecessary by an agreement reached by the city and the landowners several days earlier.

At the urging of state Sen. Robert Presley (D-Riverside) and then-Assemblyman Walter Ingalls (D-Riverside), the two sides sat down to negotiate an end to the dispute, Plender recalled.

Norco officials told the landowners they were concerned about permit and public facilities fees they would lose were the project to become part of Corona, particularly those that would help to upgrade the city’s aging, overburdened sewer and water systems.

“Owen offered to pay his share, and that was the beginning of the agreement,” Plender said.

The property owners agreed to pay Norco $2,000 an acre, or more than $1.4 million up front, plus $750 per unit constructed, or more than $2.8 million if all 3,742 units approved by Corona are built.

The developers will pay those fees on top of those required by Corona, said William Ketteman, Corona’s planning director. “That is a private agreement between the City of Norco and the developer, and we have stayed clear of that.”

Norco not only receives a substantial financial boost, but also avoided a continuing--and potentially very costly--battle over the area’s general plan and zoning that would undoubtedly have delayed any development and hence delayed the city’s eventual collection of fees.

About 250 homes, on as many acres, will be developed by Owen and Grant on Norco’s side of the new city border--which follows the area’s planned pattern of curving streets. Those houses will be developed under Norco’s existing land-use plan and zoning standards, Plender said.

Because of the area’s topography, Norco city officials said, the denser development planned for the Corona side of the hills will be visible to only a few Norco property owners--at the top of the ridge.

Norco’s agreement to release the land for annexation to Corona began a lengthy process that included public hearings and council votes on such esoteric measures as removing 620 acres of the land from the city’s redevelopment area.

Owen and Grant, meanwhile, had already begun working with Corona city planners, enabling the Corona City Council to approve new land-use and traffic plans for the area Wednesday night, before the annexation was recorded. The landowners are scheduled to appear before the city’s Planning Commission later this month, with their proposed specific plans and tract maps for the project.

Those plans could be considered by the City Council before the end of November, leaving only administrative steps to be completed before ground breaking.

Woodlake Villages eventually may include in Corona up to 658 houses at low density averaging 1.5 units per acre, 1,633 homes at medium density averaging 12 per acre and 1,451 dwellings at high density averaging 23.1 per acre, Ketteman said.

The development’s plans also include 11.4 acres slated for commercial use, 16.4 acres for parks, 7.5 acres for utilities and 46.2 acres for streets and freeway right-of-way, he said.