Guest View-Shirl Lamonna: Your 7-I Guide

Tonight, the Oro Valley Town Council will not discuss item number 3; a request to amend the  Rancho Vistoso PAD Amendment for Parcel 7-I. It has been pulled from the agenda. The request has been withdrawn. The request was to amend the PAD to allow apartments. The town's Development Infrastructure Services Department and the town's Planning and Zoning Commission approved this request.The residents of the adjacent community were 100% opposed to it.

The following "Guest View" was prepared prior to the withdrawal. We felt that we should publish it anyway because we don't think that the "issue" of requests to change the use of this property will ever be settled until it is built upon.

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On January 12^th, approximately 50 to 75 Oro Valley homeowners attended the Venture West informational meeting at Town Hall concerning the proposed apartment development on Parcel 7-I.    

Fred Steiniger, one of the Venture West partners, persisted in a presentation - from a developer’s perspective – of why apartments are a more desirable option than unknown commercial development. 

Concerns were addressed as follows:

Why not build apartments on parcels already zoned for HDR? - “Just because a parcel is zoned for apartments, does not mean it’s a good location for them.”  But from a homeowner’s perspective: sometimes legitimate businesses are simply not appropriate use of a given parcel of land  – as in this case where the apartments would be located in close proximity to single family homes and situated on the scenic Tangerine Road corridor.

Steiniger cited data provided by OV Planning & Zoning staff: Oro Valley currently has 11.8% of its housing stock as multifamily while that number is 33.4% in Scottsdale.  Using the same US Census Bureau source, one will find vast differences in several other key factors that apparently were not analyzed:

	ORO VALLEY	SCOTTSDALE
POPULATION	41,011	217,385
# BUSINESS FIRMS	4,180	37,104

Perhaps Scottsdale’s greater need for apartments relates to a larger population & the higher volume of businesses that are 5.3 and 8.9 times greater (respectively) than that of Oro Valley??    

What about the increased traffic?  – Venture West proposed the apartments would be gated with an ADOT approved single entrance/exit onto Tangerine Road.   A bridge would be constructed over the protected wash area with a second exit (right turn only) onto Rancho Vistoso Blvd.  This would necessitate a traffic light on Rancho Vistoso Blvd in close proximity to the current one at the Tangerine Rd intersection.  One can only imagine the congestion that would be created when 200 or more apartment tenants began to exit for their morning commute!  Woodburne would not be impacted until the commercial section of 7-I was developed.  Wait!  Apartments and commercial on 7-I?  Wouldn’t that make this a Mixed Use parcel?  Didn’t the Zoning commission just vote in favor of a General Plan Amendment that will go before the Town Council for review?

Will the apartments overload schools? – The assistant superintendent of Amphi School District assured Michael Carlier, Venture West’s Broker, that elementary students living at the apartments would be provided with bus service directly to Copper Creek Elementary.  Therefore, the Painted Sky Elementary (with 32+ students in some classrooms) would not be overcrowded.  Both Carlier & Steiniger appeared surprised to learn that this solution may not be effective due to a 1994 Arizona state law that allows students to apply for admission to any public school, based on available classroom space.

Venture West made several attempts to enlist community members for committees designed to assist them in mitigating neighborhood concerns.   They asked to “reset the clock” and to have homeowners negotiate with HSL so that they could approach Town Council together on the 18th for another continuance.  This fell flat with the homeowners in attendance who were largely unresponsive to the pleas while united in their opposition to rezoning.

At the end of the night, it was apparent that the homeowners were firm in their conviction that apartments are not a good fit for 7-I; that the parcel should remain C-1 Neighborhood Commercial which will ultimately provide valuable community services. 

Of interest: Town Council came to the same conclusion in 2004 when they denied WLB Group’s request, on behalf of Vistoso Partners, to amend the 1996 General Plan to change a 14 acre portion of Parcel 7-I from Community Commercial to Medium High Density Residential.  Yet with the 2011 application, the Zoning Commission approved WLB/Venture West’s request for a PAD Text Amendment/Special Policy to clarify that apartments were already allowed?  Shouldn’t Staff & the Zoning Commission have reviewed past history and considered their “clarification” logic could be faulty?  Shouldn’t they have consulted with Legal Counsel prior to moving forward with this application? 

   

It is regrettable that a quality real estate developer such as Venture West – who has brought some good projects to our community – was so ill advised by Town Zoning Staff who neither understood the existing zoning laws nor grasped the pulse of the community earlier in the planning stages. 

The January 18^th Town Council meeting should prove interesting.  See you all at 6 pm in Town Council Chambers.    

Shirl Lamonna

January 16, 2012 

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