IRVINE : Forum Tonight on Development Plans

With two growth-related measures on the Nov. 5 ballot, the Irvine Chamber of Commerce will hold a public forum tonight to discuss the city’s General Plan.

The forum will not be a debate about how growth should proceed in the city, said Jamie Trevor, the chamber’s senior vice president, but rather is being held to let residents and business owners know what the city’s blueprint for development is and how it has evolved since the city was formed in 1971.

Speaking at the 6 p.m. forum at Irvine City Hall will be Ray Watson, vice chairman and past president of the Irvine Co., and Paul O. Brady Jr., Irvine’s city manager.

Watson played a major role in designing the General Plan when the city was incorporating, Trevor said. The company, as the city’s major owner of undeveloped land, also has a large stake in the direction the plan takes.

The chamber decided to hold the forum because the two Nov. 5 ballot measures are tied to the philosophies behind the General Plan, Trevor said.

One ballot measure would allow voters to decide the fate of the Irvine Co.’s recently approved 3,850-home Westpark II project. The City Council approved the 350-acre project in December, but a residents group called Irvine Tomorrow gathered enough signatures to place the development question before voters.

The General Plan designates the 350 acres between Tustin Marine Corps Air Station and the huge Woodbridge planned community as a location for a residential “village.” The Irvine Co. proposed Westpark II for that area.

Some Irvine Tomorrow members have said they do not like the way Westpark II is designed, while others say they do not want the development at all.

After the council was forced to place Westpark II on the ballot, Councilman Bill Vardoulis led the drive to place the second issue on the ballot, an advisory measure to ask voters whether they still support the city’s open-space agreement with the Irvine Co.

The open-space agreement, a concept voters overwhelmingly endorsed in the June, 1988, election, revised the General Plan to allow the company to build more homes, offices and industrial buildings in flatter areas of the city in exchange for protecting sensitive areas that are mostly in the hills around the city.

Many residents signed the petition against Westpark II, and the open-space agreement specifically calls for the Irvine Co. to be allowed to build in certain areas, so the city should find out whether voters still support the agreement, Vardoulis said.

The open-space agreement calls for the Irvine Co. to give about 8,800 acres in and around Irvine to the public for use as permanent open space in exchange for rights to build on about 8,700 acres.