S.D. Mayor, Struiksma Seek Growth Limits

San Diego Mayor Maureen O’Connor and Councilman Ed Struiksma on Wednesday unveiled dual plans to drastically restrict the city’s growth, which they say is overwhelming streets, sewers and other essential municipal services.

O’Connor’s proposal would scale back construction to a level linked to 1984 population forecasts, which would lower the growth rate by about 60% citywide.

Struiksma’s more stringent measure calls for an immediate citywide ban on building permits while the city prepares and enacts other growth-control measures. Both O’Connor and Struiksma urged increases in the fees charged to developers.

Stunned by the severity of the proposals, a building industry spokesman Wednesday night blamed the two plans on a political debate that “now has gotten hysterical and emotional.”

Anti-Growth Stances

“I think it’s obvious in this political climate that politicians seeking higher office or wanting to stay in office are trying to out-no-growth each other,” said Kim Kilkenny, legislative counsel for the Construction Industry Federation. “I think it’s only a matter of time before they will want us to sacrifice our first-born male in order to accomplish no population growth. It’s gotten that absurd.”

Kilkenny was particularly critical of Struiksma’s proposal for an immediate citywide moratorium on building permits.

“It is the most irresponsible proposal I’ve seen in my 12 years of following city government,” he said.

Report Sparked Proposals

The impetus for Wednesday’s political bombshells was a report submitted to the city’s Planning Department earlier this month by Robert H. Freilich, the Kansas City, Mo., consultant who helped draft the city’s original 1979 Growth Management Plan. Freilich and a citizens’ task force have been studying development in San Diego as the first steps toward updating the 1979 plan.

That original 1979 Growth Management Plan was designed to guard against Los Angeles-type sprawl by using a system of building fees to encourage redevelopment in the aging inner-city neighborhoods, as well as orderly development in outlying areas such as Mira Mesa, Penasquitos East and University City. Land farther north was set aside in a land bank, off-limits to development until 1995.

The plan was enacted after the tax-cutting measure Proposition 13 and was designed to use the development fees to finance necessary police stations, streets, sewers, libraries and fire stations for San Diego’s growing population.

In his April report to the Planning Department, Freilich said San Diego is being threatened by unusually fast growth--2.5 times faster than what was projected in 1984 by the San Diego Assn. of Governments. The forecast for growth last year was 12,000 housing units, but developers built 29,000, more than double, said Freilich.

“If this growth rate continues unabated during the two-year plan update period, there may be a serious and irrevocable detrimental effect upon the city,” Freilich wrote in his report. “Certain elements of the plan and implementation strategies may be abrogated before they can be put into place.”

Using Freilich’s report as a springboard, Struiksma convened a press conference Wednesday and called for the immediate ban on building permits. He also proposed that the city place a referendum on the November, 1988, ballot to establish an annual quota for how many homes can be constructed in each neighborhood.

Until that vote, Struiksma said, the city should adopt an interim ordinance that would limit development based on projections provided in community plans. Meanwhile, he said, the city should increase the development fees it charges to builders to finance parks, streets, libraries, police stations and other municipal amenities.

“I recognize this proposal represents a radical departure from our current policy,” Struiksma, who is expected to make a run for the mayor’s seat in the 1988 election, told reporters. “However, maintaining our current posture does not give us the tools we need to resolve our problem.”

Trying to Buy Time

O’Connor later held a hastily called press conference to announce a growth-control plan of her own.

Flanked by Freilich and Councilwoman Abbe Wolfsheimer, O’Connor said her proposal would buy time to update the Growth Management Plan by using an interim ordinance to slap limits on how much can be built in each community, based on the 1984 Sandag growth projections. Freilich said later that the effect of those new limits would be to roll back the growth rate by 60% citywide, and much more in the faster-growing areas.

After the Growth Management Plan is brought up to date, the entire plan should be placed on the ballot, O’Connor proposed.

O’Connor’s proposal also adopted recommendations by Freilich to make sure that developers build the necessary roads and public amenities at the same time--and not after, as allowed by current regulations--that they erect housing and the population booms.

The mayor said her plan would be presented to the City Council for consideration on May 11.

Councilwomen Judy McCarty and Gloria McColl both said they would not go along with the absolute ban proposed by Struiksma. McColl said the freeze would be “unfair” to young families who wanted to buy new homes, but added that she may consider a more moderate approach if statistics prove that communities are growing too fast for their streets and sewers.

McCarty said she was “not prepared at this time to limit growth. There are a lot of questions that have to be answered, like what are the trade-offs in cost and employment?”

“It’s more complicated than just we’re not going to have more houses built,” she said.

McCarty, however, welcomed the growth-restricting proposals because “this issue is finally on the table at last. It’s been whispered about and rumored about, now I’m glad both the mayor and Ed have put this out on the table.

“Now the public will get a chance, I hope, to analyze both the benefits and the costs of growth controls.”

Freilich’s report, which formed the basis of both plans Wednesday, addresses a current proposal by Wolfsheimer to place a building moratorium in the Rancho Penasquitos community because roads, sewers and other amenities have not kept pace with the population.

In a letter to acting Planning Director Michael Stepner, Freilich said that 11,400 housing units currently exist and 3,500 are winding their way through the planning process for an area planned to hold 17,000 units. In 1986, 2,000 units were built in Rancho Penasquitos, Freilich wrote.

Calls for Interim Approach

Calling for temporary steps to halt the development, Freilich wrote that it is “absolutely clear that an immediate interim approach must be adopted to restrain continued development” in the area, or else “development will have overtaken the planning process.”

In addition to the contemplated controls in Rancho Penasquitos, Freilich noted that there are many growth-pressed communities, such as the Mid-City area, that already operate under growth restrictions approved by the council. Instead of random controls, Freilich has suggested expanding growth-reducing measures citywide.

“Penasquitos is a symptom of a much larger and more widespread problem: That is, a rate and amount of growth citywide that is significantly higher than previous projections, which is outpacing the city’s ability to provide necessary public facilities and services, which is reducing the level of service to all residents and adversely affecting the quality of life,” Freilich wrote.

Kilkenny of the Construction Industry Federation questioned the accuracy of Freilich’s report. He said only 1,000 to 1,100 housing units were built in Penasquitos last year, about half of what is claimed by Freilich. He also said it is the city’s fault that money set aside by the developers isn’t spent on roads, fire stations and parks.

Since the early 1980s, developers have paid about $45 million in fees for the public amenities, he said. But so far, the city has spent only $1 million.

“If there are inadequate facilities, it’s the city’s fault for not spending the money, and now they are trying to put it back on the building industry, and that’s not fair,” he said.

Freilich said San Diego has experienced a growth spurt because of lower interest rates and the fact that several North County cities, including Oceanside and Carlsbad, have imposed growth controls.