Meeting to Air Concerns on Housing

Residents who stormed a City Council meeting this week to protest a 525-unit apartment complex will have their concerns addressed at a special community meeting in November, city planning officials said Tuesday.

After hearing about 100 residents speak for nearly four hours Monday night against the project, planned for 19 acres at Puerto Real near Crown Valley Parkway, the council agreed to delay a decision on the apartment complex until Dec. 9 and schedule the community meeting.

Planning officials will discuss the project at the public session and explain how the city collected information on traffic and other issues. The date of the meeting has not been set.

“We’re trying to give these folks more of an opportunity to understand the [planning] process by giving them a more in-depth look” at the proposed development, Councilwoman Susan Withrow said Tuesday. “It was part of an effort on our part to address their fears.”

Residents living near the site are concerned about traffic, the possibility of low-income units being offered in the complex, and an influx of children from the development overcrowding neighboring schools.

The proposal before the council would change the commercial zoning on the property to allow high-density residential construction.

Planning staff said that an office complex would create almost three times as much daily traffic as apartments. Representatives of the Mission Viejo Co., which owns the site, told the council that only luxury apartments would be built.