The Sunnyvale Sun
News
Church objects to new zone because it will stop sale
By JASON GOLDMAN-HALL
What one council watcher predicted to be a "slam-dunk" turned into more than an hour and a half of public discussion and testimony regarding the zoning of public-use space in Sunnyvale.
On March 21, the Sunnyvale City Council met to discuss items that included a rezoning study. The hitch came with the city's plan to rezone churches and similar buildings in residential areas as "public facilities," which would prevent them from being turned in to anything else if sold.
Trinity Church board members, staff and congregation members adamantly opposed that section because the church is currently negotiating to sell its land to a housing developer and hopes to move into larger industrial space in Sunnyvale--the very act city staff is hoping to discourage through zoning.
"There's no hiding the intent," said Community Development director Robert Paternoster. "The intent is to protect land in the city for these uses."
The city has not formally acted to create new zoning districts, and the meeting was just to give the go-ahead for a rezoning study to be conducted in the next few months. Zoning laws exist to help the city separate incompatible uses--such as hazardous chemical manufacturers and day-care centers.
Many churches move out of residential areas because they need to expand, and the high resale price they get for residential land enables them to buy large space in industrial zones where space is cheaper.
But Sunnyvale leaders have routinely said they are concerned about this flight because it could mean that industry would not relocate to Sunnyvale due to lack of space.
If the city did rezone property into a public facilities zone, it could only be sold to groups who would preserve that use, a far less-lucrative venture than turning church property into for-sale homes.
"It prevents us from reselling our land at the full cost we can get for it today," said Trinity Board of Elders member Jim Thayer.
In the end, the seven council members--with Vice Mayor Otto Lee and Councilman Tony Spitaleri teleconferencing in from Argentina and Washington, D.C., respectively--voted 5-2 to go forward with a rezoning study. Lee and Councilman Dean Chu were the only dissenting votes.
On March 28, the council expects to extend the moratorium on applications for recreational uses in industrial and commercial zones to give the city time to properly study the new zoning areas.
But because the church has been in negotiations for almost a year and has invested time and money into its sale, the council exempted it from any future rezoning that could come out of an ordinance.
When the rezoning studies formally begin, planning officer Trudi Ryan said, any affected property owners will be notified and brought into the discussion.
