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Community Plans
Community Plan Alliance asks Marin Supervisors to restore the integrity of Community Plans
On March 31, 2023, the Community Plan Alliance sent the attached letter to the Marin County Board of Supervisors. The letter requests the Board to agendize a public hearing and reverse the Countywide Plan amendments pertaining to community plans.
Background:
On January 24th, the Marin County Board of Supervisors adopted the 2023-2031 Marin County Housing Element Update and various Countywide Plan amendments related to the housing plan. Among other consequences, the amendments eviscerate community plans by rendering huge portions of them unenforceable, leaving areas open to development with minimal controls.
Most importantly, there is no requirement by the state that community plans be weakened in order to achieve a compliant housing element, according to legal counsel. The supervisors can still reverse their mistake.
Community plans are vital to guide the Marin County Planning Department because each community has different physical aspects, goals, and desires. These plans were meticulously studied and drafted by local residents over many years. They are extremely valued documents that state community goals, objectives, policies and implementation programs relative to the current and foreseeable future conservation and development issues facing each community.
If you care about preserving the environment, habitat and wildlife; protecting public health and safety; maintaining views; controlling traffic congestion; carefully planning for development; keeping our small-town/semi-rural/rural neighborhood character; and safeguarding a host of other treasured aspects of living in Marin, then you will also care about saving community plans.
Since the adoption of the Countywide Plan amendments, Marin community and environmental leaders and residents have been working together to regain the integrity of the community plans. Part of their effort involved creating the online petition entitled; “Reverse the Needless Destruction of Community Plans in Marin County.” As of now, 18 Marin organizations and close to 1500 people have signed the petition. The numbers show that this is an issue that many residents care about.
A subset of the signatories of the petition formed an organization called the Community Plan Alliance (CPA). The purpose of CPA is to achieve the stated goals of the petition, reverse the Countywide Plan amendments and regain the integrity of 24 community plans in unincorporated Marin.
Accordingly, on March 31, 2023, the Community Plan Alliance sent the attached letter to the Marin County Board of Supervisors. The letter requests the Board to agendize a public hearing and reverse the Countywide Plan (CWP) amendments pertaining to community plans. The letter was reviewed by an expert land use attorney to ensure that it is accurate. It explains exactly how the CWP amendments eviscerate community plans and why they were unnecessary to achieve a compliant Housing Element. It also details the exact changes to the language of the Countywide Plan that are needed to regain the integrity of the community plans.
Representatives of the Community Plan Alliance will soon be contacting each of the Supervisors to set up a meeting to discuss the request and the information in the attached letter.
If this issue resonates with you, then please sign the online petition to save community plans at change.org/SaveCommunityPlans ; Send related emails to the Marin County Supervisors at bos@marincounty.org and spread the news.