Debate over whether to expand separators or leave them as-is
For 20 years, greenbelts have bordered Sonoma County’s nine cities, keeping urban growth contained and preventing sprawl into open space fields and ranches.
But the 1996 ballot measure that created these community separators will expire next year, unless it’s refreshed by a new ballot measure.
The issue will come before county supervisors on Dec. 15, when they will decide whether to simply renew existing separators or to add new ones to protect additional towns, and to ask staff to develop a ballot measure work plan.
Public hearings and additional supervisors’ meetings will follow, with a view to putting the measure on the November 2016 ballot.
Supervisors and community groups generally agree that the current separators have done a good job of preserving community identity, preventing sprawl into open space and protecting Sonoma County’s rural heritage. But there’s considerable controversy about adding more.
The environmental community wants additional community separators and added protection for significant natural resources within the community separators, such as groundwater recharge areas and riparian corridors – streams and stream banks essential to fish and wildlife.
“Lands at the urban edges are at risk of development. The Open Space District, as well as it may be funded, isn’t able to buy them all. It’s imperative we revisit and enhance these community separators for the next 20 years – or longer,” said Teri Shore, Santa Rosa regional director of Greenbelt Alliance, a nonprofit specializing in land use issues.
The North Bay Association of Realtors and the Sonoma County Farm Bureau disagree. They support renewing existing separators, but say that if more land is to be protected, the county Open Space District should purchase the development rights from individual land owners.
Realtors say there’s no need to add community separators because the development pressure that triggered the 1996 ballot measure has eased – the county is growing at the moderate rate of 3,500 people a year.
“The electeds and the people of Sonoma County want to keep community separators and are pretty committed to city centered growth. The threat of development within the unincorporated county doesn’t exist,” said Daniel Sanchez, government affairs director of the Santa Rosa-based North Bay Association of Realtors.
The Farm Bureau would consider additional separators, but wants to see exactly which properties might be involved before making a decision. “There are lots of areas where we agree with Greenbelt Alliance, but the devil will be in the details,” said John Azevedo, Farm Bureau president and owner of the A-Bar Ranch in Healdsburg. “It’s very important to us that we don’t devalue agricultural lands through a community separator overlay when it’s the Open Space District’s job to establish open space easements.”
Community separators now comprise about 1.7 percent of the county’s land area – 17,000 acres bordering Healdsburg, Windsor, Santa Rosa, Rohnert Park, Cotati, Petaluma, Glen Ellen and Sebastopol. Fifth District Supervisor Efren Carrillo, who represents western Sonoma County, said he supports adding community separators as well as renewing current ones.
“I’m a strong supporter of greenbelts and community separators for many reasons. I believe there is merit to having our planning agency explore establishing greenbelts around our unincorporated communities as well,” Carrillo said.
But supervisors could split the difference: prepare a November 2016 ballot measure to renew current separators while asking staff to research other areas where separators might be beneficial. Then supervisors could add separators just by voting on them, without the need of a second ballot measure, said Fourth District Supervisor James Gore, who represents the north county.
“I’m highly supportive of renewing existing separators, and I’m very open to expanding them into appropriate areas,” Gore said. “But you can’t do that with a swipe of the pen. You have to identify the areas, there has to be outreach to landowners and others and you have to put staff to work on it. I want to take time to do things right.”
The 1996 ballot measure was a companion measure to the growth-limiting Urban Growth Boundaries adopted by eight of the county’s nine cities (Cloverdale adopted its Urban Growth Boundary in 2010). It said the county could not intensify development within community separators or reduce their size without a vote of the people. Supervisors can, however, increase development density without a public vote if the project provides “permanent open space preservation and other overriding, substantial additional public benefits.”
“These are not radical policies,” said Shore of the Greenbelt Alliance.
In the past 20 years, the exemption has allowed construction of a few schools, fire departments and other public interest developments, as well as LaCampagna/Sonoma Country Inn in Kenwood and John Ash & Co. Vintners Inn in Santa Rosa.
Public enthusiasm for community separators remains high. Some 70 percent of voters approved the 1996 ballot measure, while about 75 percent would vote to renew and enhance them in 2016, according to an October survey of 400 likely voters commissioned by Greenbelt Alliance and conducted by Oakland-based Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Associates.
