Los Gatos Weekly-Times

Photograph by George Sakkestad

Paul Bruno presents the results of the General Plan Task Force to the Town Council.

Task Force outlines issues for the future

Report raises questions rather than answers

By Jeff Kearns

Presenting the results of the General Plan Task Force final report to the Town Council Jan. 26, spokesperson Paul Bruno made it clear that the group worked to come up not with answers, but with questions.

And the report raised plenty.

The task force began by surveying more than 1,300 residents about their vision for the town, and from those results came up with a list of issues that had emerged from the data as the most pressing on people's minds and important to the town's future.

This report comes at the end of the first of three phases for the task force. This first phase was intended to consider which policies needed to be singled out for consideration. The next two will focus on proposals with policy decisions.

"We merely identified issues for comprehensive study," Bruno said.

The task force also came up with a framework for identifying and analyzing issues that will later be used to revise the general plan, the comprehensive document that outlines policies for the town's future development. Though the state requires towns to update their general plans every decade, this latest round of revisions is intended to give guidelines for a vision of the town in 2020. The current plan was adopted in 1985.

The report identified short-term issues as well as broader issues that will require further study.

"We divided the issues into 'hows' and 'shoulds,' " Bruno said. "The 'hows' were items we identified that were already addressed by the general plan or specific plans but needed refinement, and the 'shoulds' were items that were discussed with the most enthusiasm. These identified the issues but not the implementation of solutions."

Among the 13 short-term issues--the "hows"--the task force recommended studying how to preserve the town's character, improve traffic circulation, maintain quality public schools and facilities, preserve and protect commercial zones and support recreation for kids.

The first priority among the 16 issues identified for future study--the "shoulds"--was whether the town should adopt a low-growth policy. Much of the survey dealt with growth-related issues, including high-density housing, public transportation and new development. Responding to a survey question about the amount of new development in town, more than 51 percent of residents said there was too much, while almost 40 percent said it was about right.

Compared with the rest of the county, however, Los Gatos isn't exactly a hub of construction: With a growth rate of about one-half of 1 percent over the last 10 years, the town lags far behind the county's rate of almost 16 percent.

Issues that were hotly contested, Bruno said, were maintaining the small shop/merchant orientation of commercial zones, which turned into a discussion on chain stores, and whether the cost of hillside development should be shouldered by the whole town or just those living in the hills.

Other issues included developing a downtown parking program, encouraging low-to moderate-income housing, acquiring and maintaining open space and encouraging alternate modes of transportation.

On the topic of development, the task force singled out for further discussion clustering residential development; restricting development to the capacity of existing roads and utilities; and restricting development in favor of environmental concerns such as noise, pollution and erosion.

Representatives from the town, including two councilmembers, three planning department staff and the town manager, attended each meeting to help task force members understand and sort out the laws and processes involved in running a town.

Also working with the task force was Dani Hamilton, an outside planning consultant hired to help the task force assimilate mountains of information and then start selecting issues. Starting with vague topics like the vision of the community, she helped the task force reduce those ideas to actual issues for discussion.

"She had to herd cats and give sips from the firehose," Bruno said.

Now that councilmembers have been briefed on the results of the survey, the next step will be to choose from among four options on how to keep the momentum of the task force going by continuing to involve the 33 enthusiastic residents that made up its membership, many of whom are hungry for more involvement and want to continue working to bring Town Hall and the community closer together.

The council will pick from one of the following four options--or select a modified version--at an upcoming meeting:

* Alternative A: Set up a "Consultative Council" consisting of up to 75 people who would work with the General Plan Committee. This group would include representatives from different areas and backgrounds, and meet bimonthly to discuss goals, issues and implementation.

* Alternative B: Form a committee of General Plan Committee and task force members that would meet bimonthly to discuss a single issue at each meeting. Members could form subcommittees to meet with residents. Meetings would be open to the public.

* Alternative C: Hold community forums on the task force's recommendations to the Town Council.

* Alternative D: Hold community forums and survey residents. Task force members would form an advisory subcommittee of the General Plan Committee.

The council will discuss these options at upcoming study sessions and reintroduce the matter for a vote at one of its March meetings.

A copy of the task force's final report is available in the library.

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