News
Saltworks plan dries up
By Michelle Durand, San Mateo Daily Journal
The controversial plan to build up to 12,000 homes on Bayfront salt ponds appears to be dead — at least for the foreseeable future — after the developer announced its formal withdrawal in response to a recommendation the Redwood City Council deny the application.
Two councilmembers are recommending the council at its Monday night meeting scrap the Saltworks “50-50 plan” because the application has sat for three years without an actual project description and the environmental review process has stalled. On Thursday, just hours after the city announced the recommendation, developer DMB Redwood City Saltworks announced its intention to formally pull the application.
“We believe it is important to make our intentions clear and to respect the City Council’s need for formal resolution on the 50/50 balanced plan,” said John Bruno, senior vice president and general manager for DMB Redwood City Saltworks, in a prepared statement.
On the city’s end, an ad hoc committee of Councilman Jeff Ira and Councilwoman Barbara Pierce is recommending the council forget asking the public for an advisory vote on the Saltworks project and instead deny the project application outright. Such a move wouldn’t prevent developer DMB from submitting a new application in the future but would free city staff from processing anything related to the project and possibly tamp down long-standing debate over the proposed project.
“We continue to get a barrage of emails and letters and are constantly responding to things in the community. It takes a lot of staff resources,” said City Manager Bob Bell.
Yesterday’s announcements, and the actions the last few weeks, on the proposal are “significant” because it shows a sea change in officials’ thinking, said David Lewis, executive director of nonprofit Save the Bay which has sounded the loudest opposition to the plan.
“For the first time, you see city officials actually standing up for the general plan and zoning designations. They should have done that a long time ago,” Lewis said.
Bell said the city prefers to move away from attention on Saltworks and instead focus on other needs such as the development of Depot Circle, the Stanford campus and downtown.
Bell said it is impossible to put a figure on the money and man hours spent on the project which, based on the now-defunct “50-50 plan” called for a mix of housing, retail and open space. The plan took years of time leading up to its application submission three years ago but developer DMB Associates — then rebranded as DMB Redwood City Saltworks — said in November it planned to revise and resubmit a plan. First, the city was told a new plan would come in late winter, then maybe spring, then summer, said Bell.
It seemed as if the company just didn’t know when it would resubmit the plan, Bell said. However, yesterday’s announcement offers some amount of clarity.
Last month, Councilwoman Rosanne Foust suggested seeking an advisory vote from the public on how the city should move forward or if it even should. But the ad hoc committee appointed by Mayor Alicia Aguirre said such a vote wouldn’t be prudent to waste city resources on a project for which a completed description and application doesn’t exist.
Another challenge is not knowing even what to ask the public to vote on, Bell said.
“There’s no description so it’s kind of hard to vote on something that doesn’t exist,” Bell said.
Prior to DMB’s withdrawal announcement, Councilman Ian Bain, who has publicly advocated for a vote, said he is open to other options but that if the city does want public opinion, a vote is a better choice than a poll.
Bain said some have asked what has changed in the time since the city began its review of the application — in other words, why even make the denial?
“What’s changed is that the developer has put its proposal on hold, but has not withdrawn it. In the meantime, this issue has dominated public conversation and has overshadowed everything else we are doing as a city,” Bain said.
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Dan Ponti, of Redwood City Neighbors United, the group that formed specifically to keep an eye on this project, applauded first the ad hoc committee’s recommendation and later the DMB plan to withdraw.
“I hope they don’t submit another development proposal. It’s not a place to put housing and people no matter how they scale it,” Ponti said.
Lewis hopes the City Council Monday night emphasizes it does not want development on the site and said DMB’s plan to someday return shows it is out of touch with the public outcry.
“I think they’re still not hearing it,” he said. “They just don’t get it.”
The Redwood City Council meets 7 p.m. Monday, May 7 at City Hall, 1017 Middlefield Road, Redwood City.
RCNU Urges Council to Adopt Ad-Hoc Committee Recommendation to Deny Saltworks Application
Press Statement
May 3, 2012
Redwood City Neighbors United Urges Council to Adopt Ad-Hoc Committee Recommendation to Deny Saltworks Application
Redwood City Neighbors United (RCNU) applauds the City Council’s Ad-Hoc Committee for recommending that Cargill/DMB’s irresponsible Saltworks project be denied. We encourage the City Council on Monday night to accept their committee's recommendation and cease any further consideration of developing the salt ponds.
Redwood City should be focused on implementing our Downtown Precise Plan and award-winning General Plan which meets our housing needs, revitalizes our downtown, and protects our environment. It is simply inappropriate and unnecessary to grow our City on the salt ponds.
RCNU hopes that Cargill and DMB will respect the community’s wishes and will refrain from submitting any additional development proposals for the site.
Redwood City Saltworks project could take a fateful turn Monday
By Bonnie Eslinger, Palo Alto Daily News
At its meeting Monday night, the Redwood City City Council will consider options that range from asking voters to weigh in on the massive development in the November election to doing a citywide survey to just waiting for a revised proposal to be submitted.
Or the council could resume the environmental review of the polarizing plan, first pitched three years ago by Arizona-based developer DMB Associates for the 1,400-acre Cargill salt flats east of Highway 101, just south of Seaport Boulevard.
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Last week, several Redwood City residents told The Daily News they were called and asked to participate in a telephone survey weighed heavily with questions about Saltworks. One question asked whether a "40/60" plan with more open space and less housing sounded like it would be worth supporting.
DMB spokesman Jay Reed would not confirm the company is behind the survey, saying in an email that "DMB frequently does polling on its projects to make sure our proposals are consistent with what the public wants. But we do not comment on the timing or the details of those polls."
With a revised proposal pending, the council will discuss the city's options Monday, including putting a non-binding advisory measure on the ballot.
Or the council may choose to do some sort of public survey, City Manager Bob Bell said in a telephone interview.
"The other options are to do polling, independent of what DMB is currently doing," Bell said. "Then there's the advisory vote option, and there's the do-nothing option, which is to let this thing continue and wait for a new proposal to be submitted."
Asked whether the city might end its evaluation of the project, Bell said that also is an option, then referred additional questions to City Attorney Pamela Thompson.
The city could deny the project, even at this stage, for a number of reasons, Thompson said.
"One would be, at this juncture the application is languishing and in light of the inaction in the part of the developer, the city could simply deny it, on the basis it's creating a lot of controversy and not moving forward," she said.
Thompson also confirmed that the city has long held the option to deny the application based on the fact it would require a general plan amendment because the Cargill property is not zoned for housing. Asked whether the council might discuss flatly denying the project, Thompson said: "I can't speak to that," she said.
Reed, likewise, wouldn't speculate on what the council might discuss, saying it would be "premature to comment on any hypothetical."
No date has been set to submit the revised plan, he said.
"It's more important that we get a revised plan right than get it done fast," Reed wrote.
David Lewis, executive director of the Oakland-based Save The Bay, a nonprofit that has long fought against the Saltworks plan, said even with more open space the development is not a good fit for the salt ponds site. The council shouldn't waste any more time on evaluating the plan, he said.
"What they're asking in the poll is really not a big change," Lewis said. "They're still trying to do massive development."
The council decided to review its options after Council Member Rosanne Foust made an impassioned plea in favor of an advisory ballot measure last month.
Polling Firm Calls Residents about Saltworks Development
Stacie Chan, Redwood City Patch
Got an opinion? A polling firm wants to hear it.
Resident Judy Kirk told Redwood City Patch that a polling firm has called her home several times asking questions about the proposed Cargill Saltworks development.
Though she personally declined to participate, she said neighbors shared with her the questions that were asked.
Jay Reed, a spokesperson from DMB, said that the company has conducted polls over the past six to seven years to make sure that the "proposals are consistent with what the public wants," but could not comment on the timing or details of the polls, including the current one.
On the Occupy Saltworks Facebook page, resident Karen Zamel also confirmed that she received a call from survey company, FMA, at 9 p.m. on Tuesday.
“The questions and implications [were] quite disconcerting,” she wrote. “Given how the questions were worded, the survey seemed to be funded by Cargill/DMB or the subsidiary company handling the development... We found questions to be purposefully vague and misleading -- like they were trying to trick us into saying we approve of this development when we don't.”
Questions from the polling firm:
How do you feel things are going in Redwood City?
right direction or wrong track
I’m going to read you a list of possible priorities for Redwood City ‐ which is the most important
Expand park and recreation facilities
Provide affordable housing
Reduce crime and gang‐related violence
Improve public schools
Reduce traffic congestion
Control growth and development
Attract new jobs and businesses
What would be your first priority and what would be your second choice?
Names of elected officials and groups. Please tell me if you believe each one is doing an excellent job, a good job, a fair job or a poor job.
The RWC Council
U.S. Congresswoman Anna Eshoo
RWC Councilmember Rosanne Foust
Jeff Ira
San Mateo County Board of Supervisors
Jackie Speier
Ian Bain
Barbara Pierce
Jeff Gee
John Seybert
Mayor Alicia Aguirre
Local taxes and fees in RWC taxes ‐ too high, too low or just right?
Do you support or oppose more growth and development in the city?
Names of organizations active in RWC: favorable or unfavorable ‐
Redwood City Industrial Saltworks
Save the Bay
Google
RWC Chamber of Commerce
Cargill Salt Company
Redwood City Neighbors United
Oracle
Sustainable Redwood City
Facebook
Occupy RWC
Silicon Valley Leadership Group
Facebook recently moved its headquarters to Menlo Park, planning to expand to 9000 employees. Is this a great idea, good idea, only a fair idea or a poor idea? How concerned are you about the traffic impact?
I’m going to read to you some different types of housing that are being discussed for RWC. Tell me whether you support or oppose.
Affordable housing for seniors on fixed incomes
Housing for working families
High density housing with connections to transit trains, busses and commuter ferries
Townhomes and condominiums
Housing for current and future employees of local technology companies
Affordable housing for teachers, nurses, police and firefighters
Have you seen or heard any information about the public outreach and planning effort to determine future uses for the RWC Industrial Saltworks? Where did you see or hear the information?
Would you say that you generally support or oppose it? Strongly, somewhat, etc.
RWC has conducted two years of meetings and studies on the 50/50 Balanced Plan for the 1,400 acre Industrial Saltworks site. The developer of the Saltworks site is revising that plan – a new plan will soon be filed. The new plan would preserve more than 60% of the site as open space. The remaining 40% of the site will be a mixed‐use of
housing for seniors, families and technology employees.
2 million square feet of commercial
a new hotel
23 acre sports park
53 acre water park
bayside park hiking and biking trails
land and funds to build new schools
funds to improve local streets and highways
The plan will pay for itself and generate surplus funds each year for RWC and local schools.
Does this plan sound like something you would support or oppose. Why?
Now I’m going to read you some more information about this potential new plan for the RWC Industrial Saltworks site. Does this additional information make you more likely to support or oppose.
pays for itself and generates millions each year for RWC schools.
includes 1800 homes for seniors and 3600 homes affordable to working families.
provides $100 million to meet affordable housing needs of local working families and seniors
creates hundreds of new local jobs and generate $100 million in new business spending
includes several miles of trails along the SF bay.
allows technology companies such as Facebook, Oracle to expand in RWC
provides funds to expand and improve the Woodside Road interchange 101.
includes a 23 acre sports park
permanently preserves 860 acres or more than 60% of the site.
provides land that RWC can use to reduce or eliminate storm water flooding
Now that you’ve heard more, does this sound like something you would support or oppose?
Please tell me if the following makes you more likely to support the plan or more likely to oppose it.
reduces the amount of housing proposed for this site by more than half
preserves an additional 360 acres
may include $500 million in additional private funds to meet other local needs.
Project planners are considering how to use these private funds and investment dollars. I’m going to read you some potential uses for the funds and after you hear each one please tell me if you would support or oppose it.
To provide affordable housing for working families, seniors
To pay for transit
To reduce flooding
To construct or expand levies
Next, which of the following statements comes closest to your opinion:
Saltworks development should be rejected because this was once part of the SF Bay and should be fully restored
Saltworks should be approved because it preserves 60% of the site, while providing a huge boost in local jobs and consumer spending, affordable housing, parks and trails, and private investment.
Which of the three following options do you prefer:
Restore the site back to the way it looked 100 years ago
Approve the new plan with smaller development that has been proposed
Continue salt harvesting operations at the site and keep it off limits to the public
Would you support or oppose a new homeowner tax of $150 per year for 20 years to purchase and restore the site?
Which of the following options would you prefer?
The new plan which creates jobs / housing, new parks and bayside trails, room for technology companies to expand and preservation of 60% of the site.
Or, full restoration of the site paid for by a new tax of $150 per year for 20 years on all RWC homes.
A list of who supports / opposes development of Saltworks ‐ which do you find more credible on the issue.
A coalition of environmental groups, led by Save the Bay, the Committee for Green Foothills, and the Loma Prieta chapter of the Sierra Club.
A coalition of business and labor leaders who support development, including downtown businesses, senior citizen and affordable housing leaders
RCNU Letter in Support of Redwood City’s General Plan
With all of the recent hubbub around the Saltworks project, conflicts-of-interest, and advisory votes, it's important not to lose sight of what Redwood City Neighbors United really stands for and why we have come out in opposition to the project.
We believe that the best solution to improving our quality of life in the future is to implement the vision for growth that is embodied in our recently updated General Plan. Born from our community's collective efforts, it really is a great plan. And - we hope - an award winning one.
Last month, the City submitted our General Plan to the American Planning Association for consideration for the 2012 Comprehensive Planning Award, and RCNU happily wrote in support of this award for our City staff's efforts. Check it out and learn why we think this plan is a blueprint to a great future:
