New policy allows Council to 'call up' planning decisions

By Nathan R. Huff

Final decisions by the Planning Commission may be a little less final in the future. The Town Council plans to broaden its authority over Planning Commission decisions, recommending that town codes be amended to allow council members to call up for review any Planning Commission action.

The idea came from Planning Commission Chairwoman Laura Nachison at a September Mayor's meeting. As policy stands, council members may appeal a commission decision, but they are then unable to discuss and vote on the matter. On at least one occasion, this has led a council member to push a citizen to appeal the commission's decision.

"If the council felt that strongly about it, there had to be some mechanism where they could do that without putting a citizen on the spot," Nachison said. "It removes the specter of behind-the-scenes maneuvering I'm so against."

The concept of calling up Planning Commission decisions for review is borrowed from other cities, including Saratoga, which allow a review of any decision, as long as two council members make the request. The item would then make its way onto the public hearing section of the meeting, and all five council members would be able to discuss and vote on the matter.

"We're correcting what we see as a flaw in the system," Councilman Jan Hutchins said, explaining that council members were the only ones in town unable to request a review of Planning Commission decisions. He added that this would keep the appeal process from becoming "smarmy."

However, some commission members disagreed with the code change. Commissioner Lee Quintana, emphasizing that she was speaking only for herself, said the new policy compromised the commission's position as a neutral body between "professional politicians and professional planners."

"My opinion is that the council already overturns quite a few [Planning Commission] decisions on appeal," she said. "One would begin to wonder why we have a planning commission if the council is so concerned about decisions we make."

Commissioner Paul Bruno, however, said the point of the code change was to allow the council to pull items that have greater policy or precedent-making aspects to them.

He said the change was also necessary to curb "collusive" and "feigned" appeals made on behalf of concerned council members. It allows council members to put something on the agenda without appearing as though they're trying to fix a Planning Commission error, Bruno said.

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