Doug McKee Discusses The Arroyo Grande Annexation Process

Doug McKee is Chairman of the Oro Valley Planning & Zoning Commission. Doug has responded to a number of questions in an attempt to clarify the process involved in the potential Oro Valley annexation of Arroyo Grande. As Doug notes, at the Aug 25 Neighborhood meeting and the Sept 4 Planning and Zoning Hearing, many of these issues will be discussed and further clarified. (Please see "Upcoming Events" on the left column of blog for details.) We appreciate Doug allowing our readers to share his knowledge of this very important issue.

Art ************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************"The "The annexation process is a very simple process, although there are a lot of steps that are called out by State and local statutes. For a more detailed listing of the steps, click here. Since there is only one land owner, much of this listing regarding the soliciting of petition signatures will not apply.

The difficult part is creating a situation where it is a win-win for both the town doing the annexation and the parties being annexed. Along with this is the economic evaluation by both sets of parties. For the Town, the economic evaluation process is well documented. And it works well for smaller annexations such as the Oracle Crossing area where the detailed development planning was complete. But for huge areas such as Arroyo Grande with no detailed development plans, it will be much less precise simply due to the many variables and assumptions which must be made.

Most annexations also have a corresponding Pre-Annexation agreement which can apply to almost anything that the parties may wish to include. If there is a weak link, this is it. In some cases, verbal promises and/or letters written to the parties being annexed by Town officials have been construed to be a pre-annexation agreement. But for this annexation it will be a large formal legal document. The contents of this agreement will be just as important, if not more so than the General Plan Amendment. And it will probably be in force for a long time, perhaps up to 40 years if this agreement is anything like the Town of Mammoth's Pre-annexation agreement with State Lands.

Recognizing the critical importance of the pre-annexation agreement, the Town has hired Scott Ruby, a lawyer who has had some experience negotiating and writing these agreements. Like most important contracts, the negotiating will be done by a small group of people on both sides with a great deal of secrecy until the final agreement is hammered out. For the town, the negotiating team consists of this lawyer, the Town Attorney Tobin Rosen & Sarah More. In addition there is a 12 member Negotiation Support Team consisting of the negotiating team plus two council persons (Salette Latas & Barry Gillaspie) and a number of staff people (David Andrews, Jerene Watson, Craig Civalier, Philip Saletta, Mary Davis, Scot Nelson & Tory Schlievert).

After the Negotiation Group settles on a final agreement which is determined to be satisfactory to the State Lands Commissioner, it will go to a P&Z Hearing, followed by a Town Council Hearing. If approved, the County zoning is then translated into the equivalent Town zoning. Subsequently as the land is sold, Developers will request re-zoning/PAD approval which is in conformance with the General Plan. In the Mammoth case, the General Plan and Pre-Annexation agreement were required by State Lands to be approved simultaneously by the Town Council. However for Arroyo Grande, the Pre-Annexation agreement will be finalized months after the General Plan Amendment.

The question as to how long we are committed to this General Plan is a key one. If the Arroyo Grande Pre-Annexation agreement is anything like the Mammoth agreement, the only changes that could be made are ones that the State Lands Commissioner agrees with. And the agreement runs for 20 years plus another 20 years if there are any unsold or unleased lands at the end of the first 20 years. And based on what I heard today from a State Lands person, the agreement could even contain provisions which over ride the General Plan amendment.

It is clear that a revised land usage plan will be presented at the Aug 25 Neighborhood meeting which approximates the wild life corridor recommendations and goes a long way toward clearing up the definition of open space. However this revised plan is not actually being proposed by State Lands. The State Lands Commissioner has not yet seen this plan, so we will hear that there is a good probability of getting his approval, but it is not yet a plan that is fully supported by State Lands.

The question as to what happens if Oro Valley declines to annex or the changes that we make in the conceptual plan are such as to cause State Lands to decline to be annexed, is a good one. It would appear that State Lands would then ask the County to amend their General Plan next year to match the conceptual plan or perhaps a plan which you will see on Aug 25. Failing that, their next fallback would be to go to Marana or come back to Oro Valley for another try.

The other question: how strong is our position of negotiation with state land is also a key one. I don't think anyone really knows. But I also think we tend to underestimate our own strengths. Based upon past history, it seems clear that State Lands favors having their lands developed in a City or Town rather than in a County jurisdiction. We can only speculate on the reasons.

In our case, I think we have some special strengths with our CAP water capability. Development in the County or Marana would not have the advantage of being able to use CAP water.

The most successful negotiators are adept at evaluating the strengths, weaknesses and motivations of all parties to the agreement. I have no knowledge of what has been done or is planned in this area, which is as it should be, to keep this information confidential. We can only hope that our negotiating team will have the skills and toughness to work out an agreement which allows Oro Valley to actually manage the development and which requires State Lands to transfer sufficient of their CAP allocations to serve the needs of the development.

One other thing - Carolyn Campbell is optimistic that the court will allow the State Lands Proposition to be put on the ballot. Apparently the signature problem is not quite as simple as was reported in the newspapers. We should know the court decision before the P&Z hearing on Sept 4.

Hopefully some of this helps. However, there are no simple or easy answers.

Doug