Newport may set up Greenlight committee

Mathis Winkler

NEWPORT BEACH -- The city may set up a committee to recommend

guidelines for the implementation of the slow-growth Greenlight measure.

Mayor John Noyes could appoint the committee’s members at the Nov. 28

council meeting. Council members are expected to ask City Atty. Bob

Burnham at tonight’s City Council meeting to prepare a list of sections

in the measure that could be open to interpretation by the council.

Measure S, which voters overwhelmingly approved in the Nov. 7

election, will put before a citywide vote any development that allows an

increase of more than 100 peak-hour car trips or dwelling units or 40,000

square feet over the general plan allowance.

Supporters of the so-called Greenlight initiative said that forming

such a committee would be appropriate.

“Actually, the committee’s job is pretty easy,” said Allan Beek, who

helped create the measure. “It’s pretty clear what should be done.”

Sections that could be interpreted by council members include a clause

that would involve general plan amendments from the previous 10 years to

calculate whether a project requires a citywide vote. Council members

could also decide whether to grant developers credit for reducing car

trips caused by their project.

While Greenlight critics like Councilman Gary Adams have said in the

past that ignoring the 10-year reach-back provision could expose the city

to lawsuits, city officials said that council members might not adopt any

guidelines at all.

“Greenlight encourages ... but does not require the City Council to

adopt guidelines,” said Burnham, adding that six of the seven council

members would have to vote for any interpretations of the initiative.

City Manager Homer Bludau cautioned that no decision had been made on

how the process would work.

“The formation of an ad hoc committee isn’t set in stone,” he said.

While the city’s leaders will have to figure out Greenlight’s

implementation, officials for three projects likely to trigger a citywide

vote said they’d wait on any plans until they had a better idea of how

Greenlight would actually work.

Scott Allen, a spokesman for Conexant Systems, Inc., said the chip

maker might move elsewhere with its 566,000-square-foot expansion

project.

“Clearly, once Greenlight becomes law, it is going to be more

difficult for companies like Conexant to expand in Newport Beach,” said

Allen, adding that company officials had begun to talk to council members

about their plans for putting the initiative in place. “I think we

absolutely have to consider our options to expand elsewhere ... If we

can’t do it in Newport Beach, we’ll do it in a nearby area.”

Koll Center officials, who have plans for a 250,000-square-foot

expansion, said they would ask the city to postpone hearings before the

Planning Commission until council members had made a decision on how the

initiative would be applied.

“The prudent thing to do is to let this thing settle down based on the

vote of the people,” said Tim Strader, one of the partners in the Koll

Center project.

And Newport Dunes officials said they hadn’t had time to even think

about what they would do.

Developers for the Dunes hotel project, a planned resort with 470

rooms and 31,000 square feet of conference space, would have to eliminate

about 26,000 square feet of the 581,000-square-foot project in order to

avoid a citywide vote.

While the Dunes and Conexant projects have been removed from the

city’s calendar, the Dunes hotel has not been withdrawn entirely.

“We haven’t had an opportunity to look at the options yet,” said Dunes

project manager Tim Quinn, adding that a recent groundbreaking for

another hotel project had drawn his attention elsewhere.

While reducing the Dunes project to fall below Greenlight’s election

threshold was one of the options under consideration, Quinn said that

building on existing entitlements was another possibility.

“We’re going to sit down and look at all the options available to us,”

Quinn said.

FYI

The Newport Beach City Council meets at 7 p.m. tonight at City Hall,

3300 Newport Blvd.