Californians for Property Rights

June 7, 2005

SAN MATEO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS
Hall of Justice and Records
400 County Center
Redwood City, CA 94063

SUBJECT: STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLES TO GUIDE MIDCOAST GROWTH

Honorable Supervisors:

For your convenience, CPR has condensed its April 26th, March 29th and March 8th MidCoast LCP Update recommendations into a single-page, at-a-glance bullet format.
The 1978 Community Plan offers a treasure trove of visionary policy direction:

• Infill already subdivided and partially developed areas
• Conform infrastructure capacity to legislated growth limits, not vice versa
• Redraw utility district boundaries to exclude rural areas
• Convert Montara Treatment Plant property to public use
• Consolidate Coastside utility districts
• Upgrade Pillar Point Harbor as a visitor-serving center

On April 26th, CPR emphasized three proposed amendments to your Statement:

• Address the affordable housing crisis by encouraging development of urban substandard lots
• Acknowledge that rural residential areas proposed for redesignation are not served by water lines solely because of the utility’s historic negligence in providing water supply, and therefore should not be redesignated
• Do not prohibit new urban wells until water utilities can provide new water connections

In the March submissions, CPR also made these policy recommendations:

• Adopt the ‘Historic Growth Rate Alternative,’ amended to average 52 units/year
• Do not prohibit single-family residences in the COSC district
• Do not forcibly merge any urban, rural residential, or rural parcels

Please refer to the original documents for a full treatment of CPR’s recommendations. The complete texts are available at c4pr.org; we are also happy to provide additional physical copies. Thank you very much for your careful consideration.

Respectfully submitted,

Terrence D. Gossett for
Californians for Property Rights