Anti-Growth Restrictions Fail in Irvine : City Council Decides Not to Extend Curbs at Business Complex

The Irvine City Council has decided not to extend tough temporary development restrictions on the Irvine Business Complex that were imposed because of questions about whether long-term limits on growth were being violated.

The council imposed the restrictions July 14 in an interim law that will expire Aug. 28. The council voted Tuesday, 3 to 2, for an emergency law to extend the restrictions, but under state law, an emergency ordinance requires four affirmative votes to be passed, City Clerk Nancy Lacey said.

Council members C. David Baker and Sally Anne Miller cast the dissenting votes.

The temporary restrictions were imposed after it was discovered during a joint staff meeting of the city’s Public Works and Community Development departments that the two agencies’ records on the amount of developed acreage in the Irvine Business Complex did not agree.

That discovery raised the possibility that construction had exceeded long-term development limits the city set in 1985. The area in question is bordered roughly by the Newport-Costa Mesa Freeway (California 55), Barranca Parkway and Warner Drive, Jamboree Boulevard and Campus Drive.

Report Cites Increase

At its July 14 meeting, the council passed a 45-day emergency plan freezing approval of permits needed to build in the area and limiting development south of Main Street to 17% of a landowner’s property, rather than the 35% approved in 1985.

Assistant City Manager Paul Brady Jr. presented a report at the Tuesday meeting that says the city has already approved 36.5 million square feet of development in the area and that it is considering another 3 million square feet--a 22% increase over the 34.5 million square feet approved in 1985.

That much development, Brady contends in the report, could create major traffic problems. Brady sought to extend the interim development restrictions to ensure that a possibly bad situation would not become worse.

But former Irvine Mayor Bill Vardoulis said Brady’s figures are misleading. The development limits set in 1985, he said, were intended to apply only to leasable office space.

The square footage figures Brady presented, he said, include large atriums, cafeterias, elevator shafts and other unleasable areas. Such building features have no effect on traffic, Vardoulis said. He said the city is worried because officials are counting square footage that should be ignored.

Independent Audit Under Way

Representatives of developers in the Irvine Business Complex argued Tuesday that any moratorium on development could send their lenders into a panic and could jeopardize the complex.

Irvine has touted the area as a future hub for Orange County. The developers’ representatives said they would take their plans elsewhere if their construction loans are threatened.

Miller and Baker objected to what they called punishing the business community for the city’s mistake. They said it would be improper to act before the completion of an independent audit that will determine whether the amount of acreage to be developed exceeds the limit set in 1985.

That audit is now under way by DeLoitte, Haskins & Sells of Costa Mesa. Both the independent and city staff studies of the matter should be complete within a month, Brady said.

“We’ve given ourselves a giant headache and we’re trying to cure it by chopping other people’s heads off,” Miller said.

Baker added that Irvine has a reputation for planning, not panicking.

“We may be running to the lifeboats, and we don’t even know if we’ve hit anything yet,” he said.

But Councilman Ray Catalano argued that the council represents more than the business community. Traffic jams affect all residents, he said. He implored the council to extend the law until the city manager’s office can determine which figures are correct and propose some kind of solution.

City Clerk Lacey said the council will reconsider the situation in early September.

The council could call an emergency meeting before then, however, Brady said.