Building Ban Extended in Part of Monterey Park

Responding to concerns over traffic congestion, overburdened sewers and water pollution, the City Council has voted unanimously to extend a ban on construction of apartments and condominiums.

The moratorium, enacted as a 45-day ban last month, only applies to the community’s most congested area, the northeastern part of the city. The council’s action Monday night continues the ban until next May or until a citywide election can be held on whether to downzone the area.

Council members said the ban will provide an opportunity for public debate on residential zoning in the area bounded roughly by the city limits on the north and the east, Mooney Drive on the south, and Fremont Avenue on the west.

This represents about 20% to 25% of the city. Much of the area is zoned R-3 or R-2, which allows for construction of apartments and condominiums.

Council members said they want to find out whether there are tracts of land suitable for downzoning from the multifamily ratings of R-3 and R-2 to an R-1 classification, which permits only single-family housing.

Residents who advocated extending the building ban said problems related to development must be addressed now.

“Monterey Park is facing an urgent situation,” Joseph Rubin told the council and about 50 spectators. “There are questions of how much traffic is too much traffic.” Perhaps, he said, “the ‘too much’ level is already on us.”

Rubin, speaking on behalf of the Residents Assn. of Monterey Park, said: “There is a limited amount of water available, and we cannot create more.”

Former Councilman Irv Gilman, among the dozen speakers at the hearing, said: “There are only so many seats in our schoolrooms.” The council, he said, needs to address one central question: “What should the population of Monterey Park be?”

Part of the discussion centered on what the city’s population is now.

The figures ranged from 62,800, based on a special census released last year, to 80,000, the figure suggested by Councilman Barry L. Hatch, based on the number of users of city services. As many as six to seven adults, each with a car, are living in some single-family houses, Hatch complained.

Despite Hatch’s intense objections, the council also voted 4 to 1 to exempt from the moratorium 14 projects approved before it was imposed. All the projects met the building guidelines, designed to decrease the size and density of multifamily projects and approved by the voters last October.

To rousing applause, Councilwoman Pat Reichenberger said fairness dictated that the council exempt residential projects that have already received some form of approval.

“The units that are planned will not have any adverse effects” on congestion in the community, said Peter L. Tripodes, a Monterey Park lawyer who represented the 14 developers. His clients have plans to build 80 multifamily units, but he said that because some houses will be torn down and replaced by new buildings, the construction would add only 48 units.

Hatch said he did not want to see another condominium or apartment built. “There’s a saying: ‘Not yet New York,’ ” he said, adding that in Monterey Park, he would make it: “Not yet Hong Kong.”

His said his comparison is not racist but is based on his experience of living in Hong Kong for three years. “The poor people . . . are crammed so close. . . . It’s just existing, and we don’t need that here.”

Most of all, he said, “we don’t need to overbuild this city or any city in the San Gabriel Valley.”

When they were first elected in 1986, Hatch, Reichenberger and Mayor Christopher F. Houseman led the effort to enact a yearlong ban on new construction of condominiums and apartments throughout city. That same year, the council also imposed a limit--lifted last fall--on new commercial construction.

According to City Planner M. Margo Wheeler, the Planning Commission and the council must hold hearings on any proposed zoning changes. She said she expects those hearings to be held July 21 before the Planning Commission and Aug. 8 before the council.

“There will be two public hearings and an election before anything gets rezoned,” she said. The earliest date for an election on zoning changes, she said, would be in December.

Sixty percent of the city is now zoned for single-family housing, another 19% is zoned for multifamily and the remaining 21% for commercial and manufacturing.