On November 19, 2008, I hosted a meeting at my home with Stephen Sparn and one of his assistants. Members of our Board were present at all three public workshops and the Open House hosted by the City. I personally have spoken with Mr. Sparn and several representatives of Pearl Senior Living at these events, as have other Board members. The allegations in the letters in Attachment F that we refuse to meet are simply not true.

Our position is that Pearl Senior Living is neither an owner of the property nor an applicant for the Area Plan. In the public workshops, we repeatedly asked Pearl Senior Living to show us their plans. Without anything tangible to look at, a meeting is inappropriate.

Our focus has been on the issues before us tonight. We have told Mr.Sparn our position in writing, and received an acknowledgment.

We respect the intentions the City had in creating an Area Plan process for this site. However, we are concerned about several issues which we believe should be considered as this moves forward.

This is the first time the City has ever created an Area Plan for a single piece of property. How this is handled will create precedent for other important locations in the City. It will also create precedent for other parcels close to the Junior Academy site.

The “area” on 4th Street really begins at 4th and Mapleton with the Church and Memorial Hospital, and includes the medical building directly south of the site, which is currently for sale. We believe the outcome of this process could very well impact the future of those adjacent properties and the City should consider that now.

There has been continuous development pressure on this neighborhood for over 30 years. In response to this pressure, the City created the Mapleton Hill Historic District. The Junior Academy property was zoned residential by the City beginning in 1957, and designated in the 1970 Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan as low density residential.

Zoning to allow congregate care grants the developer a 3 to 1 density bonus. The bar for a development to qualify for congregate care is very low, only requiring a few common amenities for people 60 years and older. Developers are building luxury condos in Boulder and getting this density bonus, all allowed under the congregate care designation.

We question whether the 32-year old discrepancy between the City zoning and County land use maps justifies rezoning this property. If the discrepancy is untenable, bring the County land use map into compliance with the City zoning map.

What is most important now is that the western boundary of the City zoning map aligns with 3rd Street, and joins the public zone with the Sanitas Valley to the west. We believe there was intention to transition this property into the foothills via open space on the western edge of the site.

We also believe it is very relevant that the Comp Plan has never designated this property an “area of change”, and that a Comp Plan change would now be required for rezoning. We have heard very little about the Comp Plan piece of this in the public process to date.

The relevant provisions of the Comp Plan include:

Section 2.01: “The unique and powerful community identity and sense of place that is recognized by the citizens of the Boulder Valley and characterized by its setting and history shall be respected by policy decision makers”.

Section 2.11: “The City and County will foster the role of neighborhoods to establish community character…All neighborhoods, whether residential areas, business or mixed land use areas, should offer unique physical elements of neighborhood character and identity, such as distinctive development patterns or architecture, historic or cultural resources..”

Section 2.12: “In its community design planning, the city shall support and strengthen existing neighborhoods. The City shall seek appropriate building scale and compatible character of new development and redevelopment…”

Section 2.38: “The City will work with neighborhoods to protect and enhance neighborhood character and livability.”

These Comp Plan provisions are intended to preserve and enhance existing neighborhoods, and the Area Plan before you does not meet these Comp Plan goals.

The City Council considered the creation of an Area Plan for this site on January 13, 2008, and established the Area Plan process on January 13, 2009.

In a memo to City Council dated January 6, 2008, accompanying the first Council consideration, Stephen Sparn stated that “with only 1/3 of the site currently a Public Zone, the property does not have the critical mass necessary to create and sustain a Senior Residential Living Community. Therefore, the owner would request to increase the portions zoned Public on the site”.

In that same memo, Mr. Sparn also specifically requested “City Council authorize Staff to work with the applicant to initiate a formalized Area Plan for the property at 2641 4th Street for the purposes of identifying issues and concerns related to this property and provide guidance for Comp Plan designation, zoning, circulation, uses and provide guidelines for site development on this property.”

In other words, this has been a landowner-driven request to change City zoning and the Comp Plan from the very beginning of this process, and to have City policies and regulations put in place to facilitate the development objectives of this owner.

A consequence of this is that the normal planning process is being circumvented, denying the community the opportunity to review and respond to a concept plan and rezoning request at the same time. This is a bold and brash move by Mr.Sparn, but we question whether this is the precedent the City wants to set with this Area Plan. And we certainly are here to tell you that we do not see the public interest protected in this approach.

We ask why Pearl Senior Living was allowed to make a lengthy presentation at the second City-sponsored public workshop about the Area Plan. The message from the proponent consistently as been: “we are coming to your neighborhood.” It has been presented to us as a “done deal”, and we are very uncomfortable with that from both a process and neighborhood impact point of view.

Friends of Mt. Sanitas submitted a packet to Planning Board ahead of this meeting with several historical documents related to previous development proposals for this site. The comment packet will be available on our website, mt.sanitas.org.

Included are previous Planning staff comments and recommendations, many of which are site specific and not project specific - staff input that addresses the unique attributes of this particular site, and the problems inherent in any large scale development proposal. We submit that all this input is still entirely relevant.

The endpoint of the last two rounds was first the rejection of a 26 house proposal, and secondly the rejection of a 42 unit proposal and rezoning request. Now, we are presented with the possibility of an undefined “flex zone”, which sounds like a developer’s dream and a neighborhood’s nightmare.

These previous rejections reflect the challenges and problems inherent in the site. This is a critical edge site, and not a typical infill site. There is no vehicular access to this site from three sides, and very problematic access from the eastern side. The site is adjacent to two established neighborhoods, Mapleton Hill Historic District and Newlands, and the very popular and heavily used Mt. Sanitas Open Space trail system.

The reality of traffic on this western edge is that most of the streets are old and narrow. We believe that the traffic analyses for this area of town cannot be done accurately from typical traffic models. We also believe that the construction traffic issue for any large scale development of this site must be addressed at the front end of the process, not at the back end. We need to see a plan for how large scale construction traffic would be managed through the existing neighborhoods. All of the traffic issues are relevant not only for those of us who live here, but also for the thousands of people who come to this edge of town to walk, bike, run, enjoy our neighborhood, and use the Sanitas Valley trail system.

The Area Plan Objectives specifically state that new development should “support and strengthen the surrounding neighborhood”. Let us tell you a few things about our neighborhood.

Planning staff determined that the average single family home size is 1737 sq. ft. The average single family FAR in the neighborhood is 0.24. And the overall neighborhood FAR, including all housing types, streets and alleys is 0.16.

Translating these existing neighborhood parameters to the site would result in development of 41,000 sq. ft. The current staff recommendation is for a FAR of 0.55. In fact, depending on how this parameter is applied, we could see upwards of 120,000 sq. ft. of development.

This far exceeds what exists, and what we believe could be remotely considered “compatible”. Just for perspective, the former school on the site was approximately 30,000 sq. ft.

Friends of Mt. Sanitas is not “anti-senior”, nor are we unrealistic or unreasonable – of course we know we don’t own the property. But we believe we have every right to preserve the unique character of our neighborhood. Is there some NIMBY in this – you bet there is. I have lived in this neighborhood since 1973, and I have worked hard to create and sustain an exceptional neighborhood. Many, many people have.

We have every right to expect a City process that is not skewed for a single landowner’s objectives. We are disturbed by the degree to which this land owner and his agents have shaped the process and attempted to pressure our Board.

In conclusion, in order to preserve and protect the neighborhood, comply with the Comp Plan, and be fair to all parties, Friends of Mt. Sanitas requests the following:

• A process that is independent of the landowner
• Any consideration of a rezoning request be accompanied by a concept plan
• All previous Planning Staff and Board direction be incorporated
• Existing FAR of 0.24 for single family homes be extended into the site
• Total neighborhood FAR of 0.16 be applied to the entire site
• Mapleton Hill Design Guidelines be applied to ensure architectural compatibility
• Zoning that would not allow density bonuses for the developer for the congregate care

In addition, we need to see specific regulation of potential mass and density; we need to see realistic traffic management mandates; we need to see specific viewshed protection; we need to see the light pollution issue addressed; and we need to see the impact on the Sanitas Valley mitigated in concrete ways.

Finally, we also want to say that Planning staff, and Susan Richstone in particular, have been open and cooperative with us throughout this process so far, and we sincerely appreciate that.

We believe that there is so much at stake here that the City should tread with caution, and err on the side of neighborhood preservation.

Thank you very much again for the opportunity to address you, and for your consideration.