Wednesday, January 22, 2014

La Habra City Council

I decided to show up to my first city council meeting last night. The La Habra city council was considering whether to approve their general plan for 2035.

They made a reasonable case that they would be at least improving the city. I am somewhat skeptical of their ability to actually implement these changes, but it was clear that at least they were less anti-development than most Southern Californian cities.

I thought about arguing less strict zoning was required, but decided to soften my comments. I gave a short speech encouraging them to continue with plans for walkable, mixed use, high density development and encouraging them to make improvements to La Habra Boulevard to make it more pedestrian friendly.

Apparently I was recorded on video somewhere near the three and a half hour mark. I decided I did not want to watch it though. It was not one of my more coherent speeches.

Turns out that I gave developers quite a gift by sending that letter to the city council. If anyone challenges the La Habra general plan in court they can only sue over issues that were brought to the city council in writing before the approval, or which were brought up last night. My letter is now on the public record, so any developer has justification to fight for higher density development.

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