Marin supervisors” consideration of the draft housing element has already generated an online petition of protest that boasts more than 1,200 signatures.
That”s not surprising. Over the past couple of years, we”ve seen battlegrounds form in Novato, San Rafael, Strawberry and Larkspur when plans to build affordable housing have been debated.
The county Planning Commission”s recent approval of a seven-year plan for building 419 housing units on sites in unincorporated areas has drawn battle lines between those who say Marin needs more workforce housing and those who say new developments would be too dense for Marin and worsen local problems such as water supply, traffic and overcrowded public schools.
Critics of the plan speak out as if those units actually will be built, when historically most housing detailed in local housing elements is never constructed.
Still, there is legitimate concern that the housing element process, meeting state-mandated regional housing quotas, short-cuts an open and thorough environmental and design review process.
Supervisors would be wise to build a commitment into the plan that such public review will not be bypassed. Sacramento lawmakers may have inserted those shortcuts in the housing law, but supervisors should find ways to guarantee that public concerns and questions won”t be circumvented.
That process will increase pre-development costs for projects, but following it should help answer critics that planning procedures are unfairly stacked against them and that their concerns will be ignored.
