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Supervisors Sweeney and Nutting recommending an amendment be made to the 2004 General Plan as follows:
(1) Remove Camino/Pollock Pines from the Community Region list (General Plan Policy 2.1.1.1, page 12);
(2) Add the communities of Camino, Cedar Grove and Pollock Pines to the Rural Centers list (General Plan Policy 2.1.2.1, page 13)
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Background:
When the Board of Supervisors adopted the 2004 General Plan, the area that includes Pollock Pines and Camino and all areas in between were placed in a Community region. If we look at the land uses surrounding these communities we see a significant amount of agricultural and open space land use.
When we look at the intensity of development allowed (or called for) in a Community Region the difference between that designation and that of rural Centers becomes obvious: A Community Region is an area set to absorb great amounts of high density residential and retail and a Rural Center is only set to create a service area for the adjacent land uses. It should be expected that a Community Region would be served by community sewer and water systems and be a well planned road system. A Rural Center could be served by combinations of individual water and sewer systems or community systems and the roads would only serve the local community as opposed to being part of a major thoroughfare system.
Other than for the Highway 50 connection these communities precisely fit the Rural Center description. They MUST never be brought to the land use intensities of the Community Regions. Hence, they deserve the Rural Center designations.
Since this amendment would provide a significant reduction in impacts, we see no cause for a lengthy adoption process.