fall 2008 - sdapa.org
TRANSCRIPT
FALL 2008The 2008 SD APA Awards Banquet & Gala Had Attendees Singing the Blues...in a good way!By Elizabeth Shoemaker, Awards Co-Chair
The 2008 San Diego American Planning Association Annual Awards Banquet took place on Thursday, June 5, 2008 at the House of Blues in downtown San Diego. This unique music venue has had Britney Spears, BB King, and the legendary Eric Clapton grace its stage, which made it the perfect award’s location for this year’s theme, “San Diego’s Hidden Trea-sures.”
This year’s award ceremony treasures included an honorary champagne toast to SANDAG’s Bob Leiter, FAICP who was recently inducted into the American Planning Association Col-lege of Fellows, a special guest appearance by John Nolan, the famous City Planner who drafted one of the primary plans for the City of San Diego back in 1908, NIMBY acronym jokes, person on the street interviews, our guest comedian/host, Tod Oliver, of Mission Im-provable, and eight awards for extraordinary planning. This year’s awards ceremony could not have been possible without the help of all the volunteers, award submissions, jury members, the wonderful people who attended the event, and all the sponsors.
IN THIS ISSUE:
SDAPA AWARDSPage 1
WHAT’S GOING ON?Page 2
PRESIDENT’S MESSAGEPage 3
PLANNING TOPICS
Legislative CornerPage 8
APA MembershipPage 9
Planning in the News Page 12
ANNOUNCEMENTSPage 6
1©2008 APA, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Jury Members:
Betsy McCullough, AICP – Asst. to the Director, City of San Diego, City Planning & Community Investment DepartmentEric Gibson – Interim Director, County of San Diego, Dept. of Planning and Land UseJacob Armstrong – Chief, Development Review Branch, CALTRANSJeff Barfield, AICP – Vice President, RBF ConsultingJoe Monaco – Principal, DUDEK
Award Level Sponsors:
Diamond Sponsors: ICF Jones & Stokes and EDAW/AECOMSapphire Sponsors: URS, DUDEK, WRT, Helix, and Latitude 33Quartz Sponsors: RECON, SANDAG, and KTU+AIn-Kind Sponsors: RBF, RECON, House of Blues, and La Strada
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SDAPA Density Symposium: “Making Density Work” - October 10, 2008
Higher densities are an important tool for smart growth. But, as every planner knows, resident’s fears of traffic gridlock, parking meltdown, and destruction of community character can derail or compromise even modest plans and projects. Join us for a stimulating, full-day symposium as we explore the subject of density as it relates to a variety of urban issues, including city form, placemaking, develop-ment economics, transportation, design, infrastructure, gentrification and more.
Guest speakers include: Form-Based Code Institute Founding President, Peter Katz; Great Cities Alliance co-founder Steve Belmont, AIA author of the book, Cities in Full: Recognizing and Realizing the Great Potential of Urban America; and a distinguished panel of planning experts and practitioners.
Six (6) CM credits approved! Register Here
Arizona APA & Arizona Floodplain Man-agement Association Joint ConferenceNovember 5-7Yuma, ArizonaFor more information, click here.
San Diego Section Board MembersSection Director, Bill Chopyk, [email protected]
Director Elect, Brooke Peterson, AICP 858.336.0938
Treasurer, Carey Fernandes, [email protected]
Secretary, Sara Lyons, AICP 619.236.6368
Membership Director, Elisa [email protected]
Webmaster, Greg Konar, AICP 619.881.3265
Newsletter Editor, Kiley Lyons, AICP, LEED [email protected]
Professional Development (AICP), Stan Donn, AICP619.409.5953
Professional Development (Workshops), Nancy Graham, [email protected]
Legislative Chair, Jennifer Cordeau619.294.9400
Marketing Director, Sarah Lozano, [email protected]
Programs Co-Chair, Dan Wery, AICP 858.614.5081
Program Co-Chair, Patrick [email protected]
Membership Inclusion Director, Connery Cepeda 619.688.6968
Academic Liaison/Mentor Programs, Kevin [email protected]
Awards Co-Chair, Elizabeth [email protected]
Student Representative - UCSD Damon [email protected]
Student Representative - SDSU, OPEN
Imperial Valley RAC, OPEN
What’s Going On?
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Congratulations New AICP Members! The following individuals passed the May 2008 AICP certification exam and are now eligible AICP members.
Jodie Brown Sara LyonsDiane Catalano Kiley Lyons
Stephanie Cheng Camille PassonSusan Davison Wendy TinsleyKathleen Ferrier Bruce Shaffer
Jennifer Hirsch
For those of you who hadn’t heard, the AICP testing group was in the process of testing new questions and thus had not scaled the questions yet. So these poor souls had to wait until August to hear that they passed! Well worth the wait and good luck to those of you who are taking the exam in November!
Please join me in welcoming our newest Board Members, Connery Cepeda and Damon Jor-dan who were recently appointed to serve on the SDAPA Board of Directors. Connery Cepe-da will serve as the Membership Inclusion Director for the San Diego Section APA. Connery is a transportation planner with CalTrans District 11. Connery has been very active with the Latinos and Planning Division of APA and we are truly looking forward to working with him on diversity and inclusion goals. Damon Jordan will serve as the Student Representative for the San Diego Section APA. Damon attends SDSU in his second year in the Public Adminis-tration program and works at the US Geological Survey as an office automation assistant.
I would like to acknowledge former SDAPA board members Chantelle Swaby, Lisa Lind and Neda Shoushtari. Chantelle Swaby did a fabulous job as the Awards Chair and Membership Inclusion Director, and now she is living in London and employed within the telecommuni-cations side of planning in a consultancy. Lisa Lind and Neda Shoushtari were the Student Representatives for the San Diego Section APA. They both graduated from SDSU in Urban Planning and have become professional planners.
With this year’s inauguration of APA’s new AICP/Certification Maintenance (CM) Program, the San Diego APA Board has made it a goal to create local, low-cost professional develop-ment and continuing education opportunities for AICP members to accumulate the required AICP/CM credits (32 for the two-year period ending December 31, 2009). The goal recog-nizes that —especially during challenging fiscal/economic times—many planners cannot afford to attend (or their employers often cannot afford to send them) to State or National APA Conferences. And by offering ongoing professional development and continuing edu-cation to all planners, not just those with AICP certification, the Board recognizes its obliga-tion to provide good services and benefits for all of our 600 San Diego Section APA members. I would like to personally thank John Hamilton, AICP who has been very successful in getting CM credit approved for our workshops and programs. John Hamilton is an Environmental Planner for the City of Vista and he has been working closely with Stan Donn, AICP from the City of Chula Vista who is our AICP Professional Development Chair for the San Diego Sec-tion APA.
Sincerely,
Bill Chopyk, AICP
President’s Message
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Planning Project Award Winner
Revelle and Muir Colleges Neighborhoods Planning Study for University of California, San Diego
The Revelle and Muir Colleges Neighborhoods Planning Study addresses 105-acres of the 1,200-acre University of Cali-fornia, San Diego (UCSD) campus. The Study will guide anticipated growth in enrollment and facility space within these two neighborhoods, which are the two oldest colleges at UCSD. The study had to balance the goal of providing 1,075 housing beds as well as double the current academic space to 1 million square feet at Revelle College while maintaining the quality of life at the Muir College Community.
The 2008 SD APA jury was very impressed with the comprehensiveness of this planning study. The Planning project award was accepted on behalf of the project team by Brad Werdick, the Project Manager and the Acting Director of UCSD Physical Planning.
Planning Project Award of Merit
San Marcos Creek Specific Plan
The San Marcos Creek Specific Plan establishes the redevelopment, growth, and conservation of 214-acres along San Marcos Creek in central San Marcos. The Specific Plan provides a strategy for transforming an underutilized and flood-prone area of suburban strip commercial development into a vibrant new mixed-use town center that derives its unique identity and character from the riparian open space corridor. Thus, the Specific Plan breathes new life into the City that takes into consideration environmental concerns and urban redevelopment.
The jury commented that this project should be commended because it was such a daunting task! They found it to be creative and well-written, definitely deserving of an award for an all-around outstanding plan. The award was accepted on behalf of the project team by Jerry Backoff, who is the Planning Division Director for the City of San Marcos and Ste-phen Hammond, Principal at Wallace, Roberts & Todd, the Planning Team Leader.
Above is a of portion of the Revelle and Muir Colleges Neighborhood Planning Study.
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Focused Issue Planning Award Winner
Camp Lockett Framework Management Plan
The County of San Diego has been actively working with local stakeholders in advocating the develop-ment of an historic park at Camp Lockett. Since the late 1990’s the County has worked to memorialize the park’s significance as a Buffalo Soldier installation and the last mounted cavalry base to be constructed in the United States. In 2004, the County submitted a nomination package to the National Register of Historic Places and a framework management plan to guide initial devel-opment of a historically focused county park. The Camp Lockett Plan examined historical significance, public in-put, recreational opportunities, site constraints, access, future park plans, and guidelines.
The jury felt that this project was fabulous and couldn’t believe that it was accomplished with only $150,000. The award was accepted on behalf of the project team by Mark Carpenter, who is a Senior Associate with KTU+A.
Planning Implementation Award Winner
San Dieguito Wetlands Restoration Project Final Res-toration Plan
The San Dieguito Wetlands Restoration Plan is an $86 million dollar nature preserve, which will be an anchor for San Diego County’s Coast to Crest Trail system. It will have 55 miles of trails for recreational access span-ning the mountains in Escondido to the beach in Del Mar. Southern California Edison Company has been in planning and permitting the project for over 15 years
with construction estimated to be completed by the end of 2009.
Currently, 250,000 plants are being grown in the Tijuana Riv-er Valley to re-vegetate the new eco-systems. Over the next several months the land will be graded and seeded with nat-ural vegetation to act as upland habitat for other species.
The jury had high praise for this project. They saw this proj-ect as changing the landscape of San Diego in a truly posi-tive way and were impressed with the high level of technical analysis. Accepting this award on behalf of the project team was Aquatic Biologist Patrick Tennant of Southern California
John Nolen surprised the crowd with a special appearance!
City of San Diego Council President Scott Peters accepting the Bird Rock award.
Edison. Grassroots Initiative Award of Merit
Bird Rock Coastal Traffic Flow Improvement Project
The Bird Rock Coastal Traffic Flow Improvement Project be-gan with the idea to increase visibility of merchants in this seaside commercial area, which is along La Jolla Boulevard through the Bird Rock neighborhood. The project expanded the traditional planning process to include all of the commu-nity, including the merchants and the residents.
After over four years of intense community meetings and educational talks, a comprise was struck. What resulted was a never tried before use of five roundabouts in a row. Ben-efits to the project included improved pedestrian safety and the conversion of 60,000 square feet of asphalt into land-scaping designed to capture rainfall rather than allowing urban runoff. Unprecedented planning and coordination between City Departments resulted in the concept plan sail-ing through the community review process and approval by the City Council.
The jury was unanimous that this was a great example of a grassroots initiative and highly deserving of recognition. Accepting the award on behalf of the project team was San Diego City Council President Scott Peters.
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Planning Civil Engineering Fiscal Services Coastal
Corporate Office:3152 Lionshead Avenue
Carlsbad, CA 92010Tel: (760) 692-4100Fax: (760) 692-4105
• www.hofmanplanning.com •
SDAPA Support for Student Internships - The SDAPA supports students who are preparing to pursue careers in the planning field. As part of our supportive efforts, we are providing an active employment/internship assistance program which functions as an intermediary between the students and the planning business community at large.
While SDAPA does not guarantee employment, every pos-sible effort is made to assist students in pursuing work experience in the diverse planning profession. SDAPA will accept and post internship opportunities for undergradu-ates and/or graduate students who are actively engaged in the pursuit of a career in the field with a planning empha-sis. Intern positions will be posted on our jobs page at no charge.
We encourage you to participate in our efforts. Please download, complete, and submit the form below to Kevin Grant at [email protected]. Download Form
SDAPA Academic Liaison Mentor Program - Did you know that SDAPA has a Mentor Program that matches planning students with planning professionals? Students and faculty members are encouraged to utilize our SDAPA Board liaison to communicate and network between the Planning/Geography/Urban Studies Departments of the San Diego region universities and the professional plan-ning community. The liaison is also tasked with assisting student representatives in organizing interested students in becoming more involved in the planning community prior to commencement. For more information, please contact Kevin Grant at [email protected] or 858-342-8808.
Mail-List - Receive the latest SDAPA news and job announcements by subscribing to our e-mail list at no charge. Subscribe
Jobs Available - Check here for the latest San Diego Planning jobs. Go to jobs page
SDAPA Planning Library - Download PowerPoint presen-tations and workshop materials from SDAPA sponsored workshops and luncheons. Download Presentations
Request for Proposals - SDAPA is now accepting RFP documents in downloadable PDF format for posting on our jobs announcements page. Go to jobs page
Announcement Requests - Please submit announce-ment requests by e-mail to [email protected]. Announcements should be relevant to the San Diego planning community. Please see sample announcement request. Download sample announcement request
Announcements
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Best Practice Award Winner
County of San Diego CEQA Guidelines for Determin-ing Significance and Report Format and Content Guidelines
The County of San Diego Department of Planning and Land Use processes over 300 applications for discre-tionary planning projects subject to CEQA per year. In a visionary effort to streamline the overall planning review process, the DPLU has developed a clear set of standards and guidelines. These Report Formats are de-signed to ensure the quality, accuracy, and complete-ness of technical reports.
Over the past five years, less than 1 percent of the first it-erations for any study have been accepted as complete. Prior to these Guidelines and Report Formats, technical studies typically took two or four iterations before re-views were approved; so far this year 45 percent of proj-ects have been accepted at the first iteration with only minor comments, saving an average of 10 staff hours per project.
The jury felt that this more streamlined approach has high potential for transferability and brings more cer-tainty to the planning process.
Best Practice Honorable Mention Award
San Diego County’s Low Impact Development Hand-book: Stormwater Management Strategies
Urban runoff pollution is considered the nation’s num-ber one water quality problem. The goal of the County of San Diego’s Low Impact Development Program, LID for short, is to protect water quality. The County of San Diego’s Low Impact Development Handbook: Storm-water Management Strategies, provides a comprehen-
sive list of LID planning and stormwater management tech-niques. It will assist jurisdictions in addressing stormwater runoff and serve as a model for other programs in California and the Southwest United States. Through extraordinary ef-fort, the LID Handbook was signed by the County DCAO and finalized on January 9, 2008.
The jury believed that this plan was a very useful tool and appreciated the organization of the manual, viewing it as a document that will simplify a complex problem.
Innovation in Green Community Planning Award of Merit
Solara
Solara is a 56-unit affordable apartment community, which was a joint effort of Community Housing Works and the City of Poway. The development was completed in May 2007. So-lara has pioneered green building practices in multi-family housing construction, including providing 90% of the total apartment unit and common area electricity through on-site solar panels.
Solara has been recognized as the greenest affordable multi-family housing projects in California, in terms of air, water, and energy efficiency and the use of recycled materials. The California Energy Commission has called Solara “innovative.” Global Green USA, the US affiliate for Green Cross International, has said So-lara is “a break in integrating solar in multi-family housing and establishes a new standard in sustain-able design.” What impressed the jury about this project was the fact that it offered affordable green multi-family living.
All-in-all, it was a night filled with surprises, laugh-ter, and bigger winners. And in the end this night showed that the San Diego area is the real winner. Win or lose, everyone was singin’ the Blues!
Jennifer Cordeau (SDAPA Legislative Chair) picks the big raffle winners!
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Due to the State of California budget stalemate, Gover-nor Schwarzenegger was sent hundreds of bills at the same time for approval. Many of these were passed, but a lot were vetoed. Below is a summation of some the planning related bills that did not pass, were ve-toed, or were signed.
DID NOT PASS:
AB2219 (Parra) - Approval of Subdividers’ Voluntary Water Savings Measures
SB303 (Ducheny) - BIA Alternative to SB 375
SB 1500 (Kehoe) - Restrictions and Fees on Projects in State Fire Responsibility Areas
VETOED:
AB 842 - Regional Plans and VMT Reduction for Infra-structure Bond Criteria
This bill requires the Department of Housing and Com-munity Development (HCD) to give priority to projects that are located in areas where the local or regional entity has adopted a general plan, transportation plan, or regional blueprint that will reduce the growth of vehicle miles travelled (VMT) by at 10 percent and is consistent with the plan. These projects would be re-viewed if they sought funding under the Infill Incentive Grant (Infill) Program and the Transit Oriented Devel-opment (TOD) Program.
AB 1017 - Timelines for CEQA Appeal
This bill established a timeline process for bringing an appeal of a CEQA action to the elected body. The bill mandated a 30-day appeal period rather than match-ing the appeal period specified by a local ordinance.
AB 1221 - Transit Village District Changes
This bill expands the definition of transit village plan-ning districts from 1/4 mile to 1/2 mile around a transit facility and requires Infrastructure Financing Districts to set-aside 20 percent of the tax increment revenues for affordable housing.
AB 2447 - Restrictions on Development in High Fire Areas
This bill requires a county to deny approval of a tenta-tive map or parcel if the proposed map will cause
increased development in a very high-fire hazard severity zone.
SB 1237 - Map Act Changes
This bill makes minor changes to the Subdivision Map Act regarding remainder parcels, property dedications, and deadlines for lot line adjustments.
SIGNED:
AB 2280 - Density Bonus Clarifications
This bill was co-sponsored by APA California and the League. The bill makes changes to the density bonus law to clarify the substantial changes the law has undergone over the years. Some of the features of the bill include extend-ing the time to five years that a local government has to expend its share of funds for the sale of a moderate-income density bonus unit, clarified that the density bonus for senior housing is 20 percent of the number of senior units in the housing development, and authorizes cities and counties to grant higher bonuses than provided for in the density bonus law if permitted by local ordinance.
AB 3005 - Lower Fees for Infill Projects Near Transit
This requires a local agency, when imposing a fee for the purpose of mitigating vehicular traffic impacts on a hous-ing development located near a transit station and meeting other specified characteristics, to set the fee at a rate that reflects reduced automobile trip generation, unless the lo-cal agency finds that the development would not signifi-cantly reduce automobile trip generation.
SB 375 - Regional Transportation Planning, Housing, CEQA and Global Warming Emission Reduction Strategies
Supported by APA California, this bill sets up a new regional GHG transportation planning process and Sustainable Communities Strategy (SCS), adopted by MPOs in conjunc-tion with the Regional Transportation Plan, enacts new CEQA benefits for infill and projects consistent with the SCS ,and requires RHNA alignment with the RTP process for cit-ies and counties within the MPO.
SB 1185 - Map Act Extension
This bill extends the life of existing tentative maps by one year, but allows cities and counties to extend tentative maps by one additional year.
For more information, click here.
Legislative Corner
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APA Membership
Becoming an American Planning Association member is easy! The APA website, www.planning.org, offers online
membership services. To sign up go to www.planning.org/joinapa/. You may also reactivate your membership, change your contact information and join up for additional services on the national website.
As a Planner, there are many benefits by becoming involved in the American Planning Association (APA). Whether you are interested in staying on top of current industry events, discussing planning issues, or just looking for a new job, APA is there to help facilitate it. As a professional organiza-tion, APA brings together people who share an interest in working towards better-planned communities.
APA aims to improve your career by providing opportunities to become more engaged in your profession. As a national professional organization, APA is highly recognized by pri-vate, public and academic entities as being on the forefront of the planning profession.
APA creates an opportunity to expand your career. As a member,
• UseAPAresourcestostayuptodateonpolicyissues
• YouareencouragedtobecomeAICPcertified.American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP) is a designation for those who choose to take their profession one step further. AICP allows you to become a credible planner and show that you are trained as a certified planner. In addition, our local San Diego APA section offers professional develop-ment workshops and luncheons to keep profes-sionals up to date on local planning issues.
• Getrecognized.Annualconferencesandawardceremonies for national, state and local sections offer a way to exchange ideas and for projects and hard work to be recognized by your professional peers.
To keep members up-to-date on national trends, local news and innovative ideas APA provides a number of publica-tions. National, state and special interest divisions produce monthly periodicals and the San Diego local section issues a regular newsletter.
For students, becoming a member of APA is an incredible tool in learning to navigate the professional world of plan-ning. The organization award for local students.
The most helpful resource and simplest way to stay involved with what’s with happening locally and around the world is to sign up for email notices on the APA websites. (National: www.planning.org and locally, www.sdapa.org).
To become a member visit APA’s website:http://www.planning.org/joinapa/.
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Smart Growth Bill is All About ChoicesNorth County TimesOctober 08, 2008
Cut the Sprawl, Cut the WarmingNew York TimesOctober 06, 2008
SB 375 is Now Law, But What Will it Do?Bill Fulton Explains the BillCalifornia Planning & Development ReportOctober 01, 2008
What Water Rationing Will Look LikeVoice of San Diego October 09, 2008
Foreclosure AlleyKCETSeptember 23, 2008<Great Video!>
East Los Angeles Seeks to Become a City of its OwnNewsweekSeptember 30, 2008
Planning in the News
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