LAKEPORT– Community boundaries for Middletown, Hidden Valley Lake and Coyote Valley were the focal point of the Lake County Board of Supervisors” second discussion about its proposed General Plan update Tuesday.
As the Record-Bee was going to press Tuesday, the board had not voted on the whole document after more than four hours of discussion. Land owners, business owners and committee members for both the General Plan and for the Middletown Area Plan spoke to the board on opposing sides of the issue regarding where the community growth boundary should be drawn.
“A community boundary is a line that designates an area within that line where higher density residential development is encouraged. In other words, it”s easier to develop within community growth boundaries than outside community growth boundaries,” Dist. 1 Supervisor Ed Robey said.
Dist. 1 includes Middletown, Hidden Valley Lake and Coyote Valley.
Community Development Director Rick Coel presented to the board his staff”s recommendations for where the lines should be drawn.
The board voted to shrink the Hidden Valley Lake and Coyote Valley community boundary, in agreement with the recommendations from the advisory committee that drew the lines. Coel estimated the board voted to cut between 500 and 600 acres from the community”s growth area.
He said the committee will decide later whether to redraw the boundary to include land to the south of the current boundary.
In the case of the community of Middletown, Coel”s recommendation for where the community boundaries should be drawn differed from that of the advisory committee.
“I respectfully disagree with the advisory committee. Based on the planning principles we have used in the past, I think this was the hard thing to do, but it was the right thing to do,” Coel said.
He recommended including Vintage Fair, a subdivision including more than 140 parcels, in the community growth boundary.
Among the alternatives proposed by the committee was a 100-acre parcel to the west including a vineyard, agricultural land south of the southernmost tip of the existing boundary along Highway 29, and land to the west of the northwestern corner of the boundary.
“Before we prematurely convert prime ag land, we need to look at in the context of mapping. A lot of this area is in flood zones,” Coel said.
One of the factors considered as the county and committee recommended the community boundaries was how quickly the area is expected to grow.
The Sierra Club, Lake Group Chair Victoria Brandon told the board the community was currently growing at a rate of less than one-half percent. In 2007, Coel noted the community was growing at 3 percent, which he said was a growth spike.
Contact Tiffany Revelle at trevelle@record-bee.com or call her direct at 263-5636 ext. 37.
