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CC RES 2021-057 RESOLUTION NO. 2021-57 A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF RANCHO PALOS VERDES, CALIFORNIA, ADOPTING THE CITY'S 2022 LEGISLATIVE PLATFORM WHEREAS, the City Council has an interest in weighing in on state, federal, and regional legislative issues that impact the City and its residents; and WHEREAS, the Council annually takes action on numerous legislative proposals brought forward throughout the year; and WHEREAS, the City of Rancho Palos Verdes is committed to maintaining and enhancing a high quality of life and safety for all residents; and WHEREAS, on August 4, 2020, the City of Rancho Palos Verdes adopted Resolution No. 2020-46, expressing opposition to proposed planning and zoning legislation that usurps local control and imposes unfunded mandates, and expressing support for actions to further strengthen local democracy, authority and control; and WHEREAS, on July 6, 2021, the City of Rancho Palos Verdes adopted Resolution No. 2021-31, adopting the City's Housing and Local Land Use Legislative Platform; and WHEREAS, the City Council continues to take an active advocacy role on a variety of topics, including housing and local land use legislative policies, proposed by the State Legislature. NOW, THEREFORE, the City Council of the City of Rancho Palos Verdes does hereby resolve as follows: Section 1: The foregoing recitals are true and correct and are incorporated herein by reference. Section 2: The City Council hereby adopts and approves the City's 2022 Legislative Platform attached and incorporated herein by this reference, as the official legislative policy of the City of Rancho Palos Verdes. Section 3: The 2022 Legislative Platform will be used to guide legislative advocacy including position letters on proposed legislation. Section 4: The City Clerk shall certify to the passage, approval, and adoption of this resolution, and shall cause this resolution and its certification to be entered in the Book of Resolutions of the City Council of the City. PASSED, APPROVED AND ADOPTED THE 2nd DAY OF NOVEMBER 2021. • ik Eric Alegria, ayor ATTEST: eresa - aoka, City Clerk State of California ) County of Los Angeles ) ss City of Rancho Palos Verdes ) I, Teresa Takaoka, City Clerk of the City of Rancho Palos Verdes, hereby certify that the above Resolution No. 2021-57 was duly and regularly passed and adopted by the said City Council at a regular meeting thereof held on November 2, 2021. eresa Ta aoka, City Clerk Resolution No. 2021-57 Page 2 of 2 r T'� Yo',• f ���`�l�l•J S� W` CITY OF RANCHO PALOS VERDES CITY OF RANCHO PALOS VERDES 2022 LEGISLATIVE PLATFORM ATTACHMENT 1 DATE ADOPTED: Resolution No. 2021-57 on November 2, 2021. PURPOSE The City of Rancho Palos Verdes' 2022 Legislative Platform (Platform) outlines the policy positions of the City Council on current issues which directly or indirectly impact the City. This Platform serves as a guideline to actively pursue pending legislation through monitoring and communications activities and is primarily based upon positions previously adopted by the City Council. The City looks forward to working with regional, state, and federal partners to best serve residents. The statements outlined in the Platform represent the City's general position on legislative and regulatory issues of interest and concern. 1. HOUSING AND LOCAL LAND USE A. Oppose legislation that usurps local control and erodes the City's authority to control its own affairs. Support actions which further strengthen local democracy, authority, and control. The City's Housing and Local Land Use Legislative Platform is incorporated herein by reference (see Appendix A). B. Support policies or programs that allow city and state collaboration on housing production, alongside sustainable transportation, broadband deployment, and other key infrastructure areas to support our communities. Support state grants or programs which provide funds to cities and/or developers to encourage affordable housing development. C. Oppose legislation that penalizes a city or local government if the units identified in the Regional Housing, Needs Allocation (RHNA) are not constructed. Oppose legislation that proposes to convert RHNA from a planning process to a production standard. D. Support legislation that preserves local authority to manage public rights-of-way including the appearance and aesthetics of equipment placed within them. E. Support legislation that preserves local authority to zone and plan for the deployment of telecommunications infrastructure in public rights-of-way. 2022 Legislative Platform Resolution No. 2021-57 Attachment 1 Page 2 F. Oppose legislation that diminishes the authority of local jurisdictions to process permits and enforce building codes or mandates the manner of enforcement. G. Oppose legislation that seeks to limit or eliminate municipal authority to regulate street or sidewalk vendors. H. Support legislation and administrative actions that protect the ability for a local jurisdiction to preserve open space in and around a local government's jurisdiction. I. Support legislation and administrative actions that provide state and federal funding for major public works projects such as the Portuguese. Bend Landslide Remediation Project. 2. PUBLIC SAFETY A. Support legislation that enhances emergency preparedness, resiliency and public safety. B. Support legislation that strengthens and enforces legal protections for all individuals who are victims of crimes. C. Support measures that provide funding to local agencies for training, effective disaster preparedness, sheriffs station infrastructure, fire department infrastructure, and emergency planning. D. Support legislation, regulations, or administrative actions ensuring all cities, including contract cities, have equal access to public safety funding. E. Support legislation which maintains law enforcement's ability to utilize automatic license plate reading (ALPR) cameras as an investigatory tool. F. Support legislation to accelerate the development and implementation of enhanced electrical utility infrastructure, including undergrounding of utility equipment that ensures reliable utility service and public safety and prevents the use of public safety power shutoffs. 3. COMMUNITY SERVICES A. Support legislation and local, state and federal programs that employ evidence- based best practice strategies to reduce the number of people experiencing homelessness by preventing homelessness for those at risk; providing emergency and transitional housing; expanding permanent affordable housing; and promoting self-empowerment through counseling, job training, and other supportive services. 2022 Legislative Platform Resolution No. 2021-57 Attachment 1 Page 3 B. Support legislation and local, state, and federal programs that reduce the number of people experiencing homelessness by promoting mental health and substance abuse services; providing emergency and transitional housing; expanding permanent affordable/supportive housing; and promoting self-empowerment through counseling,job training, and other supportive services for those who suffer from mental health issues and/or substance abuse. 4. ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY A. Support legislation, regulations, or administrative actions to remediate the harmful effects of dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) and other chemicals in coastal waters, especially near Santa Catalina Island and the Palos Verdes Peninsula. B. Support legislation that provides rebate programs, tax credits, and other financial incentives that encourage property owners to invest in water efficient systems and landscaping and energy efficiency and renewable energy systems. 5. GOVERNMENT TRANSPARENCY AND EFFECTIVENESS A. Support legislation that grants full cost reimbursement to local agencies by the state and federal government for all mandated programs. B. Support legislation that ensures the retention of existing local revenue sources, including the City's share of property taxes, sales and use taxes, transient occupancy taxes, etc. C. Support legislation that will enhance revenue for cities. D. Support legislation that allows for the continued use of teleconferencing platforms to continue holding hybrid public meetings outside of a declared state of emergency. Hybrid meetings increase access to public meetings and encourage greater transparency. E. Support legislation or public health orders that consider regional factors when determining public health needs within Los Angeles County. F. Oppose legislation that would prohibit or limit local governments' ability to contract out for the provision of services. 2022 Legislative Platform Page A-1 APPENDIX A: CITY OF RANCHO PALOS VERDES HOUSING AND LOCAL LAND USE LEGISLATIVE PLATFORM DATE ADOPTED: Resolution No. 2021-31 on July 6, 2021. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In response to the housing crisis and recent legislation proposed by the California Legislature: • The City of Rancho Palos Verdes opposes proposed planning and zoning legislation that usurps local control and imposes unfunded mandates. • The City supports actions to further strengthen local democracy, authority, and control. • The City would support housing policies which include funded mandates or create funded programs such as Local Early Action Planning (LEAP) and Regional Early Action Planning (REAP) to assist local planning efforts. • The City would support policies that provide incentives to cities such as additional tax revenue or tax breaks and policies which grant concessions to existing policies for adoption of pro-housing policies. • The City would support policies or grants directed toward developers to incentivize the creation of affordable housing. • The City would support policies which expand programs such as Project Homekey, which repurpose existing buildings into an affordable housing option. • The City would support policies and programs which provide social services and mental health services to help unhoused persons be eligible for, acquire, and maintain affordable housing. • The City would support policies or programs that allow city and state collaboration on housing production, alongside sustainable transportation, broadband deployment, and other key infrastructure areas to support our communities. BACKGROUND The City of Rancho Palos Verdes is located on the Palos Verdes Peninsula in Los Angeles County, California, and incorporated in 1973. The City is primarily comprised of residential zones and open space, is nearly entirely located within a Cal Fire-designated Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone (VHFHSZ), and is partially located in the state- 2022 Legislative Platform Page A-2 designated coastal zone. Moreover, approximately 1,200 acres of the City is within the Portuguese Bend Landslide complex, the largest and fastest moving landslide in North America. The City of Rancho Palos Verdes recognizes that California is in the middle of a housing crisis. Housing stock cannot meet present demand and lack of affordable housing makes existing stock cost prohibitive. The Legislature has an apparent focus on passing laws which aim to mitigate the housing crisis through rescission of local land use authority and oversight to streamline the process of constructing additional units. These laws create a one-size-fits-all approach that fail to consider local authority and essential local oversight, including constraints faced by local agencies such as infrastructure limitations. The City is committed to maintaining and enhancing a high quality of life and safety for all residents as reflected in its General Plan, updated as of 2018. Local land use authority is essential to ensuring that all new developments are suitable and safe for our community, and to allow the City and developers to work together to find the most mutually beneficial arrangement for all residents in the City. Development within the City faces a number of unique challenges. Despite this, the City has a vibrant and well-planned mix of residential, commercial, and industrial uses. There are 8,274 acres of land within the City of Rancho Palos Verdes. The City has determined that 1,710 acres (or 20%) of land are not suitable for development. These include Natural Environment/Hazard Areas which are lands designated as "Hazard," "Open Space Hillside" and "Open Space Preserve" by the Land Use Element. The areas designated "Hazard" possess extreme physical constraints, such as active landslide', sea cliff erosion hazard, and extreme slopes of 35 percent and greater. The areas designated "Open Space Hillside" are subject to extreme physical constraints and are maintained as open space, with very light-intensity uses permitted, such as landscaping, agriculture, passive recreational activities, and very minor structures, for the protection of the public health, safety, and welfare. The areas designated "Open Space Preserve"encompass the City's Palos Verdes Nature Preserve, which is approximately 1,400 acres of permanent open space. The City's Preserve is enrolled in the State's Natural Communities Conservation Plan and the Federal Habitat Conservation Plan (NCCP/HCP) and is encumbered with restrictions, held in perpetuity, for the preservation and protection of natural resources and habitat. 1 The Portuguese Bend Landslide is one of the largest and most active landslides in the country and encompasses over two of the City's roughly 14 square miles, moves at a rate between hundredths of an inch per year and tens of feet per year. This movement is especially noticed by motorists, cyclists and pedestrians who travel along Palos Verdes Drive South. The City continuously maintains a safe roadway through the area at a cost of about a half million dollars per year. An above-ground sewer trunk line is in jeopardy of failing with land movement that has the potential to cause a significant environmental catastrophe due to its close proximity to the Pacific Ocean. 2022 Legislative Platform Page A-3 Residential activities are the major land use in the City, with existing and proposed111 residential uses encompassing approximately 5,500 acres (66.5% of the total land area). The predominance of residential use and related density ranges is based on several factors: the ability of residential activity to produce low environmental stress, the geographic location of the community with no major transportation facilities, the geology of the site, lack of market potential for any major commercial development, and need for support facilities to meet the community's demand. As such, it is vital that local control be maintained to ensure public health and safety. One- size-fits-all legislation with ministerial review requirements cannot take into account the unique geographic, geologic, and infrastructure constraints required for a project to be successful and to maintain or enhance public safety. RECENT LEGISLATIVE POSITIONS On August 4, 2020, the City Council adopted Resolution No. 2020-46 expressing opposition to proposed planning and zoning legislation that usurps local control and imposes unfunded mandates and expressing support for actions to further strengthen local democracy, authority, and control. It furthermore declares that, should the state continue to pass legislation that attacks local municipal authority, control and revenue, the City of Rancho Palos Verdes will support actions such as a ballot measure that would limit the state's ability to control local activities and strengthen local democracy and authority. The City has registered its strong opposition to the current practice of the Legislature of proposing and passing multitudes of bills that directly impact and interfere with the ability of cities to control their own destiny through use of zoning authority that has been granted to them. While the City appreciates the work of the Legislature to propose policies intended to mitigate the housing crisis, sweeping and ministerial measures cannot properly assess their impact on individual communities and their general plans. Streamlined ministerial approval may be a preferred housing solution for the Legislature, but such development, may have significantly detrimental effects on public health and safety. The City is concerned that increasing density by-right will not allow sufficient oversight of infrastructure to ensure that capacities can meet increased residential populations. In local land use planning and zoning, many factors must be considered. The City must maintain its local land use authority to ensure that all developments meet all safety standards and that related traffic changes do not have undue influence on egress paths in the event of an evacuation, particularly within the VHFHSZ and the Portuguese Bend Landslide complex, and with considerations for limitations on existing infrastructure. 2022 Legislative Platform Page A-4 II In general, the City has supported housing legislation which seeks to increase local oversight and flexibility, such as Assemblymember Muratsuchi's Assembly Constitutional Amendment No. 7 which would amend the State Constitution to require certain local land use controls and zoning regulations remain within incorporated communities when in conflict with general laws. The City has opposed legislation that erodes local land use authority, such as Senator Atkins' SB 9, which would require ministerial approval of lot splits and duplexes in single- family residential zoned areas. The City is deeply concerned that bills such as SB 9, which would potentially quadruple density in single-family zoning by-right would have detrimental effects on the City's infrastructure capacity, particularly in the event of an emergency. Increasing density without the ability for the City to properly plan for it will negatively impact public safety in a community like Rancho Palos Verdes, and its residents' quality of life. One-size-fits all laws inherently fail to consider the needs of individual communities and their general plans. Furthermore, the current practice of mandating streamlined local processes does nothing to address encouraging actual affordable development of those properties. The Legislature should consider bills that incentivize affordable developments and provide local agencies the ability to zone for such developments. The tone of recent bills, such as making it easier to build an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) on a property, does not guarantee that it will be sold below market rate, thereby affordable. In fact, it 111 appears ADU's are being rented above market rates throughout Los Angeles or being used for other uses than housing (i.e. gyms, studios, pool cabanas, etc. because of State- mandated relaxed zoning laws). Upzoning parcels is likely to increase the value of the underlying land, which then makes new construction unnecessarily more expensive and over time, raises the values and rents throughout the neighborhoods, making affordable housing even less likely to be built. The current legislative preference for by-right approvals in favor of increasing density, fails to consider the nuances in individual communities, potentially risking public safety, and does nothing to inherently promote affordable housing, which is vital to recover from the housing crisis and is the purported aim of this approach. POTENTIAL LEGISLATIVE SOLUTIONS The City is supportive of legislation which seeks to preserve local land use authority and flexibility, giving choices and incentives to cities. Ultimately, the City would support legislation which would allow local governments to adopt proposed legislation if the requirements are suitable in their individual jurisdictions. Local planning departments have the knowledge and skills to prepare creative solutions to the housing crisis that best serve their communities. By-right zoning legislation undermines their ability to exercise the city's local land use authority and problem-solve based on their city's unique geographic, geologic, and infrastructure constraints, but with state support, they have the capacity to help alleviate the housing crisis. 2022 Legislative Platform Page A-5 The City would additionally continue to support legislation that provides financial assistance to implement new directives, or programs similar to Local Early Action Planning (LEAP) and Regional Early Action Planning (REAP) that provide funding to help cities accelerate housing production. The City would also support legislation that provides incentives to cities, such as additional tax revenue or tax breaks. Unfunded mandates are a financial burden to cities which make them difficult to implement successfully. The Legislature may also consider adopting policies which grant concessions to cities based on adoption of pro-housing policies. For example, if a city were to utilize their local land use authority to upzone a certain amount of land in a commercial corridor, they could be exempt from policies such as requiring ministerial approval of ADUs. This will further local land use flexibility and grants additional incentives to local governments to adopt pro-housing policies. The City is supportive of legislation that increases land use flexibility such as regional trust and/or trade policies, similar to Senator Allen's SB 809. The City would also support legislation aimed at developers to encourage sustainable, cost-effective development of affordable housing in safe locations across the state. Legislation which seeks to expand existing programs such as Project Homekey, or similar programs that repurpose existing buildings or underutilized commercial property (i.e. surface parking lots or single-story shopping centers) into affordable housing are also viable solutions. Additionally, the Legislature should consider policies and programs which provide social services and mental health resources to help unhoused persons be eligible for, acquire, and maintain affordable housing. Cities have the tools, knowledge, and policies in place to continue to plan and develop innovative solutions to mitigate the housing crisis: solutions that best serve the city and the residents. If, for example, a city observes that there seems to be a surplus of parking spaces in shopping centers, they could re-zone the land to be mixed-use residential. The city may also determine that they could lower their parking requirements in certain areas due to traffic patterns and/or location of transit. When cities are allowed to keep their local land use authority, they will continue to plan and develop new solutions that address their specific constraints, and the state could reward cities for taking such actions with additional tax revenue or tax breaks or policy concessions. Regional housing needs and legislation increasing density must be balanced by local capacity assessments including traffic conditions, sewer conditions, school district capacity, ingress/egress capacity, and water supply, among others. Legislation should re- focus efforts toward developing programs for cities and state collaboration on housing production, alongside sustainable transportation, broadband deployment, and other key infrastructure areas that can support our communities. CONCLUSION During recent legislative sessions, the City has opposed planning and zoning legislation that usurps local control and imposes unfunded mandates. The City was founded to protect local authority and to preserve the character of Rancho Palos Verdes. Local 2022 Legislative Platform Page A-6 oversight of planning and zoning is essential to ensure that every development is suitable and safe for the community, to protect the health and safety of all residents. The City is supportive of policies which strengthen local democracy, authority, and control. The City would additionally consider supporting policies which include funded mandates, legislation aimed at developers to encourage creation of affordable housing, the expansion of programs such as Project Homekey, and the creation of programs to improve social and mental health services for unhoused persons. The City of Rancho Palos Verdes looks forward to working with the Legislature to have an open dialogue about viable solutions to the state's housing crisis, while maintaining all residents' high quality of life.