HomeMy WebLinkAboutIV(e)_Additional Materials Received_MosherApril 30, 2024, GPAC Agenda Comments
The following comments on items on the Newport Beach General Plan Advisory Committee agenda are
submitted by: Jim Mosher (jimmosher@yahoo.com ), 2210 Private Road, Newport Beach 92660
(949-548-6229)
Item IV.a. Meeting Minutes of March 20, 2024
Note: It remains fortunate that the GPAC meetings are recorded, since the draft minutes contain
a number of passages whose meaning is difficult to interpret. In the present case, interpreting
them is particularly difficult because the audio in the official archived video is quite faint.
Additionally, it is easier to scroll through and reference the YouTube versions of the videos, but
none for the March 20 video has been posted.
That said, the passages shown in italics below are from the draft minutes with suggested
corrections shown in strikeout underline format.
Page 2 of 5, paragraph 2 from end: “In response to GPAC Member Scott Laidlaw’s concern
and inquiry for resource preservation in a commercial environment, Co-Chair Greer noted
that past DEIR DEIRs evaluated paleontological resources and the City has gone through
great lengths to preserve historical resources and involve tribal communities.” [The reference
was to the Co-chair’s experience reviewing draft environmental impact reports (plural) when
serving on EQAC.]
Page 3 of 5, paragraph 3: “Co-chair Greer noted a lot of availability in the sphere of
influence making it possible to find people to help with preservation.” [? The audio is too
difficult for me to follow. “Sphere of influence” has a specialized meaning in city planning. I
suspect the comment was about experts being available “in the surrounding area.”]
Page 3 of 5, paragraph 4: “A member of the public, Philip Bettencourt, offered to help with
helping to share historical resources and tribal cultural information related to Banning
Ranch.”
Page 4 of 5, full paragraph 4: “GPAC Member Baker noted the Newport Bay Water Shed
Watershed Committee, two sources of water pollution, improvement work done, and a
tremendous problem.” [The full name is the Newport Bay Watershed Executive Committee.]
Page 4 of 5, full paragraph 7, sentence 2: “Principal Planner Zdeba thought that there may
be a way to call out areas of an element as a single component within the Implementation
Program, so they do not get diluted.”
Page 4 of 5, full paragraph 9: “Ms. Anders-Ellmore relayed her involvement with the Water
Quality and Tidelands Committee, noted fire hazards along the cliffs and mitigation efforts
that created more plant growth along the cliff side and algae growth in the bay from the
rainwater, and described an amber ember reduction threat by replacing window screens on
homes with finer holes.” [Note: the correct name of the committee reference is the Water
Quality/Coastal Tidelands Committee.]
Page 5 of 5, paragraph 2, sentence 2: “She noted that the Outreach Subcommittee reviewed
the materials and directions will be provided by the library for the central library Central
Library event on April 22.”
General Plan Advisory Committee - April 30, 2024 Item No. IV.a, IV.b, IV.c, IV.d, IV. e - Additional Materials Received
April 30, 2024, GPAC agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 2 of 4
Page 5 of 5, paragraph 5, sentence 1: “Principal Planner Zdeba noted that the City’s IT
Division is available for City email account issues and reminded the GPAC that a file
repository for working drafts is posted on the GPAC webpage.”
[Comment: I could be missing it, but I am unable to find a link to this repository on the
GPAC webpage.
This is particularly confusing because, as for all boards, commissions and committees, in
addition to the webpage, there is a permanent archive of GPAC meeting materials.
However, that, too, is not where the archive of draft materials is.
Instead, as we have been informed by email, folders for the GPAC subcommittees were
created in the “Planning Docs” section of the City’s Laserfiche Document Center,
specifically, under PA2022-080, that apparently being the “planning activity” number for
the comprehensive General Plan Update.]
Page 5 of 5, Item V, paragraph 3: “GPAC Member Mosher provided directions on where to
find the General Plan Implementation Plan and suggested the implementation status
matrix for the Safety Subcommittee report be included in the repository. Principal
Planner Zdeba agreed to add it to the repository and noted a future agenda item to discuss
including the GPAC in the progress report process and materials for GPAC members.”
[Comment: Again, I could be missing it, but I am unable to find the previously-prepared
Safety Element Policy Implementation Matrix” document in the Safety Element
Subcommittee folder of the repository described in the previous comment.]
Item IV.b. Recreation/Natural Resources Subcommittee Recap
In the very thorough Action Minutes, to give a sense of how long the discussion took, it would
seem useful to add the approximate time at which the meeting adjourned. It would also seem
helpful to provide page numbers, so specific pages can be easily referred to.
On page 4 of the 147-page present agenda item enclosure (page 2 of the Action Minutes), I
believe the references to “Santiago creek” were intended to be to “San Diego Creek.”
On page 5, “crystal cove state part” was intended to be “Crystal Cove State Park” – and it
might be noted that part of it is already within the the City limits and part is not.
On page 6, the comment “County policy – cannot launch any vessels that are not hand
launched – no motor vessel”may be garbled, since motor vessels can be launched from the
County property at the Newport Dunes. The City policy of vessel launching is found in NBMC
Section 17.20.010.
On page 6, “BMV” should be “BMW”.
On page 7: “Southern California Water Research Project” should be “Southern California
Coastal Water Research Project”.
On page 7: the Action Minutes conclude: “Action: GPAC Recreation and Natural Subcommittee
members supported moving forward with recommending the Natural Resources and Recreation
General Plan Advisory Committee - April 30, 2024 Item No. IV.a, IV.b, IV.c, IV.d, IV. e - Additional Materials Received
April 30, 2024, GPAC agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 3 of 4
Element Existing Conditions and Background Analysis Reports, as amended,and these action
minutes for the larger GPAC to consider moving forward at the April 30, 2024, meeting.”
Comment: In contrast to the Arts and Cultural Resources Existing Conditions and Background
Analysis document found in the enclosure to Item IV.d on the present agenda, I do not see any
underlined or deleted passages indicating changes have been made to either of the reports
reviewed by the Recreation/Natural Resources Subcommittee.
Are there any recommended amendments to these reports?
Also, I do not believe it was discussed on April 10, but as I later heard Subcommittee Chair
Charles Klobe mention, there seems to be a serious inconsistency between the
recently-adopted Housing Element and the population growth estimates on which the
consultant’s Recreation Element recommendations have been based.
As explained starting on page 73 of the agenda enclosure (Section 3.11.3, Needs Assessment,
page 41 of the Recreation Report), the Southern California Association of Governments, when
giving Newport Beach its RHNA goals, expected the city to grow to a population of 92,000 by
2045. However, the consultant’s subconsultant, Pro Forma Advisors, LLC, relies on more recent
estimates from the state Department of Finance which, as tabulated on City website, show a
population peaking at 86,383 in 2013 and since generally declining to an estimated at 83,411 in
2023. Using these and other numbers, the subconsultant estimates 88,650 people in 2045, less
than 2,300 above the 2013 peak.
Unless future housing units are expected to be largely empty, it seems difficult to reconcile even
the higher estimate (increasing population by 5,600 people from the 2013 peak) with the
Housing Element’s promise to increase housing capacity by 8,174 units (not including bonus
units) by 2029, alone.
If General Plans need to be internally consistent, it would seem the GPAC needs to know what it
is planning for.
Item IV.c. Noise Subcommittee Recap
As may be evident from the Action Minutes, the Noise Element Subcommittee operates without
consultant support, although we do hope questions about noise concerns will be included in the
outreach.
As the subcommittee’s newly-appointed chair, I expect to report further on it at the April 30
GPAC meeting.
Item IV.d. Arts and Cultural/Historical Resources Subcommittee Recap
I notice the Background Analysis and subcommittee recommendations lean heavily on the
Master Arts and Culture Plan prepared in 2014. It is less clear if the consultant and
subcommittee understand the document of that name
1 was paid for and considered by the City
Council, but never adopted or endorsed by them.
1 The odd word order of this name appears to stem from the title of the contract,C-5829. One might hope
that if such a thing is recommended for official adoption, the order will be changed in the General Plan to
the more natural sounding, and originally intended, “Arts and Culture Master Plan.”
General Plan Advisory Committee - April 30, 2024 Item No. IV.a, IV.b, IV.c, IV.d, IV. e - Additional Materials Received
April 30, 2024, GPAC agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 4 of 4
The idea of preparing a master plan seems to have been broached as Item SS2 at the Council’s
April 8, 2014, study session, with direction to draft one. The draft plan was discussed as Item
SS3 at a November 25, 2014, study session, which ended with a suggestion formal action might
be taken in January or February 2015. With a change in Council, it instead came back for more
study session discussion as Item SS6 on April 14, 2015, resulting in a request for further
revision by the City Arts Commission. To the best of my knowledge it was last heard of by the
Council as part of a funding discussion,Item SS4, on May 10, 2016. As indicated by the
minutes, the plan, by then, seems to have become subordinated to proposals for funding, with
neither, as far as I know, getting resolved or getting beyond the draft stage.
Regarding the proper location for arts and culture policies in the General Plan, it might be noted
that our neighboring city of Costa Mesa, which bills itself as “the City of the Arts,” places its arts
and culture policies in a single section at the end of the Open Space and Recreation element of
their 2015-2035 General Plan.
Regarding the proposed goal of building a 1,200-seat performing arts center, that seems quite
ambitious considering the present Council’s recent very narrow approval of partnering to build a
299-seat facility.
Regarding the agenda enclosure, I notice it includes the consultant’s revised Background
Analysis report but omits Arts and Cultural Economic Analysis (Appendix A) from subconsultant
Pro Forma Advisors, LLC, which can be in the March draft in the subcommittee’s document
repository. In reading that in preparation for the April 23 subcommittee meeting (which I was
unable to attend because it was scheduled simultaneous with the City Council meeting), I was
struck by a number of anomalies which diminished my confidence in their conclusions. One was
the detailed profile, on pages 9 through 11 of the subconsultant’s memo, of visitors to the City’s
ExplorOcean attraction from November 2022 through October 2023. The problem with that is
ExplorOcean was acquired by the Discovery Cube and became Ocean Quest in 2017, which
itself ceased operations in 2021. The other was Pro Forma Advisors, LLC’s “Appendix Table 1:
Newport Beach Arts and Culture Business Overview (2023)” on pages 16-18, which, among
other things, places the Lyon Air Museum on Highland Drive, in the heart of the Dover
Shores/Westcliff residential community.
Even after the subcommittee’s revisions, there are anomalies in Dudek’s main report, as well.
For example, in Section 3.2.2 (Adopted Historical Resources Element), on page 27 of the
52-page enclosure, it describes the Newport Harbor Nautical Museum as if it were still a going
concern. Similarly, in Section 4.2.4 (City of Newport Beach Capital Improvement Program) it
misses the anticipated $23 million total cost of the new Lecture Hall by about $10 million
(possibly quoting the City contribution and forgetting that from the Library Foundation?).
Item IV.e. Presentation: Overview of Upcoming Deliverables and
Objectives
If the consultants’ presentations become available prior to the meeting, it would seem useful to
post them, so more intelligent questions can be asked.
General Plan Advisory Committee - April 30, 2024 Item No. IV.a, IV.b, IV.c, IV.d, IV. e - Additional Materials Received