Letter About the Jiffy Mart

I am continuing to harass the local city government. Here is what I sent about a little Jiffy Mart down the street:

Since the zoning is being implemented to match the La Habra General Plan, I thought I would draw your attention to one lot where rezoning would make sense. The lot is 426 Walnut street It was a Jiffy Mart until a few months ago when it closed. Now it is preparing to reopen as a another similar store.

As about the only business in La Habra which is dependent on customers who walk up, rather than drive, the present use of this lot fits into the spirit of the 2035 general plan. The 2035 general plan encourages mixed use neighborhoods, so it should preserve existing commercial sites in residential neighborhoods.

The lot however is zoned low density residential. This means that the owner is unlikely to make any significant upgrades to the building since anything like a major fire would shut it down and replace it with low density residential housing.

While the location for the store is good, the actual building is ugly, and need of serious renovations or even demolishing to create a nicer building. Rezoning to allow a two story live/work loft would be ideal. This sort of mixed use zoning would encourage the owner to invest more into improving the property. Because of that, I urge you to rezone the lot. Due to overly restrictive FAR requirements in the lower density mixed use zoning, I suggest "Mixed-Use Center 3" as the only zoning which might be high density enough to actually result in a nicer building being constructed.