Council Must Offer a Growth Plan : Don’t let developers, who have a proposal on the ballot, set city policy

Once again, the San Diego City Council is set to develop a comprehensive growth-management package designed to preserve the character that attracts so many to this city.

Times have changed since 1988, when four city and county growth-cap measures were defeated at the polls. When the council takes up the latest restrictions Monday, it will be considering regulations for a city facing an economic slowdown, not the crest of a development boom.

Dragged into a shotgun wedding with growth controls after housing starts peaked at 19,180 in 1986, the council this year has the luxury of a construction bust. Only 6,235 building permits were issued in 1989.

That doesn’t mean that San Diego can do without growth management. The cyclical nature of the construction industry guarantees that the city will relive its past.

Looming over this year’s debate is the growth-management plan put on the Nov. 6 ballot by developers. The council must act, if only to keep the builders from setting city growth policy.

The newest growth plan has merit. It calls for the establishment of standards governing the construction of roads, parks, fire stations and other critical community needs. New growth would be phased according to the capacity of the system to absorb it and still maintain those standards.

That is wise policy. But in some places, the standards are unreasonable. Downtown streets, for example, will always be overcrowded. Standards should be generally strict, but tailored to reality.

Widening and building roads is not the only way to keep pace with growth--though traffic standards are important. We would like to see more emphasis on development of public transit, and more than an obligatory nod toward reducing smog.

The city also would establish an exhaustive list of facilities it needs and set about building them according to a 20-year plan. In the newer parts of the city, developer fees would pay for the projects.

But we are baffled by the absence of a plan to fund the hundreds of millions of dollars worth of facilities missing in the urbanized part of the city, where new growth cannot be required to pay for most of the need. Why bother to draw up a list, and tie development to it, if there is no money for the projects?

The concept of an environmental tier is a sound one. By definitively outlining where and how open space will be preserved, the city can target areas where development will be off-limits, instead of fighting the battle parcel by parcel. Of course, it will take money, or ingenuity, to acquire that land.

Citywide impact fees--the controversial assessments that the council intends to impose to build facilities used by people throughout San Diego--are an idea whose time has arrived. Without the fees, certain roads and parks, and a new central library, may never be built.

But because of our uncertain economic future, the city would be wise to chart a slow course on impact fees. When the construction boom returns, the fees can be ratcheted up.

The planned road projects, some of which appear anachronistic, should be reviewed. It would be counterproductive to charge new businesses for projects that will never be built.

With the pressure to build subsided, now is the time to develop intelligent growth-management policy. If the council can take advantage of this opportunity, San Diego may stave off some of the urban ills that have made some cities so unlivable.