There’s hope for our historic districts with ‘Approach B’
It is said that Advent, the weeks leading up to Christmas, is a season of hope. Well, this year preservationists and the tireless citizens who fought the good fight against Senate Bill 79 have been given a glimmer of hope in a recently released report by the Planning Department prepared for the City Council’s Planning and Land Use Management (PLUM) Committee. The report offers a way to delay implementation of SB79 over a wide variety of sites affected by the bill until 2030 and even a hint of a plan to last until 2037.
During a meeting of the PLUM Committee on Nov. 17, the Planning Department presented a set of options with regards to the implementation of SB79. These ranged from complete adoption of the new law to the adoption of an alternate plan for Los Angeles. Planning recommended Approach B: Partial Delayed Effectuation, which it defined as “…a delayed effectuation ordinance, the city can postpone SB79 until approximately 2030 on certain sites and station areas.” Among the “certain sites” near stations identified by the law are Fire Hazard Zones, Historic Preservation Overlay Zones, and Low Opportunity Zones.
During the discussions at PLUM, the ultimate goal was determined to get to Approach C: Delayed Effectuation + Upzoning, which would allow a pause on the sites described but also specific locally tailored upzoning around stations to meet density thresholds and thereby exempt the station from SB79 until 2030. To achieve this goal, the department was requesting additional software and technical support to do the analysis needed to take action on Approach B and C. The department also warned that regardless of the approach, “significant increases on R1, R2, RD, (single family and low density residential) and some R3 (multifamily residential) sites in TOD zones will occur.” (Transit Oriented Districts are within a half-mile of major transit stations.)
The upshot of this for preservation is the exclusion of HPOZs (sadly not National or California Historic Districts) and Historic Cultural Monuments from use as SB79 sites until 2030. The push for “delayed effectuation” also allows the city to have more time to explore Approach D, a local alternative plan to SB79 which, if enacted, would be in effect until 2037. All this means is that the city is buying much needed time while mitigating the worst effects of SB79. This also allows time for the mobilization of communities for a state legislative remedy. With the bill’s main supporters, State Sen. Scott Weiner and Gov. Gavin Newsom, moving on to pursue higher office, the potential for state level assistance increases.
Like many I will be anxiously awaiting the drop early next year of the key piece of information missing from these discussions: the official maps from SCAG (Southern California Association of Governments) of parcels affected by SB79. Then the work begins to analyze and strategize for the approaches described above.
So this Advent season, seeing how my neighbors and the city are marshalling their resources to meet the challenge we face, I am hopeful that having lost the battle to prevent SB79 from passing, we have not lost the war over local control.
Category: Real Estate
