Historic design review change

Only one member of the general public commented Tuesday night on the sweeping revisions to the city’s design review process that will affect anyone with renovation or building plans or who lives near anyone with plans.

The City Council unanimously approved the amendments to the Design Review Ordinance with some modifications ? which include limiting reviews to two meetings unless the Design Review Board approves a third hearing and revising appeal hearings to specific grounds cited in the appeal.

“This was the most important change in the history of design review in Laguna Beach,” said Gene Gratz, vice chair of the Design Review Task Force, which proposed many of the changes. “I am astonished that no member of the public was here to speak.”

Task force chair Matt Lawson said that public participation was so broad in the nearly two years of work on the revisions that no one felt the need to attend.

“Many of the changes recommended by the task force came from the public,” Lawson said. “But there is no question that this will affect everyone who lives in Laguna.”

Lawson said the task force broadly supported the provisions of the agenda bill as presented Tuesday.

Recommendations presented Tuesday included a six-month waiting period before projects could be resubmitted after a denial and a year-long waiting period after two denials of a project within one year.

Applicants will have at most three board hearings, with one continuance per side, to convince the board to approve a project. The specificity of appeals means that every neighbor with a different objection must file a separate appeal, at a cost of $620 each.

However, the council reduced the waiting period between applications to two months, because a longer wait would be costly.

“Six months would create a tremendous financial burden for people I know,” Councilwoman Toni Iseman said. “I also am concerned about getting it [decisions] done in three hearings.”

Council did uphold a Planning Commission recommendation to keep all commercial, non-residential, design review in its purview, which the Design Review Board opposed.

“I think the DRB should continue to review [commercial projects] outside of the downtown,” board member Eve Plumb said. “The commission may have more experience in commercial, but the board has more experience in design review.”

Resident Rik Lawrence spoke up in favor of Plumb’s position.

City Council candidate Verna Rollinger expressed concern that appeals would not longer be de novo ? covering all aspects of a proposed project from scratch, as if it were being heard for the first time.

Other changes in the process include requiring the board to make specific findings ? legal justifications ? for their decisions. Staff reports are expected to clarify issues and resolve the kinds of conflicts that have marred the process.

Board meetings will be televised.

The city also will produce a professionally designed manual laying out the styles and neighborhood compatibility the city wants to see and quantifying size.

Fees increases, paid by the applicant, will pay for additional staff hired to work out the kinks in projects before the public hearings.

The proposed ordinance can be reviewed on line at www.lagunabeachcity.org or in the City Clerk’s Office in City Hall, 505 Forest Ave. For more information, call (949) 497-0705.