At its Aug. 13 meeting, the Lake County Planning Commission certified the plan's final environmental impact report.
Community Development Director Rick Coel said the plan is set to go to the board at 1:30 p.m. Sept. 15.
During the meeting, commissioners considered two requested zoning changes in the plan.
One request came from real estate professional Steve Merchen, who requested that a property he owns at 6045 Second Ave. in Lucerne that's currently zoned for commercial highway be zoned community commercial or “C2,” rather than single family residential, as the plan proposes.
Clearlake Oaks resident Holly Harris, who sat on the committee that drafted the plan, made the second request, asking the commission to not change the zoning in an older subdivision in the Bartlett Springs area as the owner had requested.
Commission Chair Gary Briggs, who represents District 2, asked Coel if a zoning grandfather clause would allow it to be commercial unless that use lapsed for a year.
Coel said yes, adding, “The circumstances here are a little bit unusual.”
He said he and his staff are awaiting the outcome of a Board of Supervisors discussion on whether to adopt an ordinance to allow uses in certain zones, such as medical marijuana collectives and cooperatives. Coel said the board wants to allow such uses, but on which parcels isn't yet clear.
Merchen's property currently houses a marijuana collective, and as a result the site is now caught in the middle of the county process, said Coel.
The commercial highway zoning Merchen's property currently has is very restrictive, said Coel, and allows real estate and lodging and not much else. The property formerly housed Merchen's real estate office.
District 4 Commissioner Cliff Swetnam asked if the decision the commission was contemplating would be affected if the supervisors decided that the parcel's location wasn't a suitable one for a dispensary.
Coel said currently the medical marijuana use is “just flat out not allowed,” and he said the situation is convoluted.
Briggs said as far as he was concerned the medical marijuana question had nothing to do with the question about the property's zoning. It didn't matter if it was a topless bar or a Bible study group to Briggs – the only issue was if it should be commercially zoned.
Deputy County Counsel Bob Bridges noted, “I think the chair is on the right track,” and he suggested the commission focus generally on the commercial issues.
Lower Lake attorney Ron Green spoke to the commission on Merchen's behalf, explaining that the property has been commercial for about 30 years.
“It's not appropriate for a residence,” he said, explaining it has a 460-square-foot building on it that's perfect for an office, and which Merchen used himself before going to work for another real estate company.
“We just ask that you keep it at its traditional, historical use,” said Green.
He said Merchen bought the property in 2005 based on his ability to use it commercially.
During the discussion it was noted that a large commercial property at 5860 E Highway 20 that currently houses the Kour Thai restaurant is being zoned multi family residential in the plan. Coel said that's because planners are trying to establish more of a commercial, downtown area on 13th Avenue.
But forming that downtown area won't work out very well if there continues to be a mile-long stretch of commercial zoning along the highway, said Coel.
Similarly, planners have minimized commercial zoning along Highway 20 in Clearlake Oaks, he added.
In Lucerne, if properties along the highway aren't located near 13th Avenue or the post office on Third Avenue they're proposed for the multi family residential zoning, said Coel. Existing businesses would then simply become legal nonconforming uses if the commission and Board of Supervisors approved the final plan.
“This area has been a real challenge in terms of trying to help implement the redevelopment efforts through zoning,” Coel said.
Green said Merchen was seeking the C2 zoning designation, although C1, local commercial district, was preferable to residential.
District 5 Commissioner Gil Schoux said he would support changing the zoning to C1, and questioned whether the county could change a commercial property to residential zoning.
District 3 Commissioner Clelia Baur said a lot of people on the Northshore are seeing land zoning changes, and Merchen wasn't being singled out. She suggested that changing the zoning to commercial would run contrary to what the shoreline plan is trying to do in that area.
Pointing out that the buildings have a life span, Baur asked if Merchen would have to add to the structure to make it legally conform as a residence should the commercial use lapse.
Coel said he would need to pull a remodel permit to include a kitchen, but they wouldn't make him bring it up to 720 square feet in size.
“So it would be a tiny cottage?” Baur asked.
“Yeah,” Coel said.
Briggs said if business owners had approached the commission about changing their proposed zoning from residential to commercial he would have backed them 100 percent. He said when people buy property and it's zoned a certain way, they have the right to expect that zoning in the future.
He called such zoning changes a “taking of property.”
Like Schoux, Briggs supported C1 zoning, noting that it might not be “the perfect answer.” Coel noted that C1 fits better with single-family residential. “C1 is the best compromise you've got here,” he said.
District 1 Commissioner Michael van der Boon agreed with Briggs' concerns about zoning losses, noting that people spend more for commercial properties, and he's in favor of keeping them commercial.
Baur said the committee “did a lot of work to come up with those recommendations.” Briggs agreed but said they shouldn't take the land's use.
Coel noted the meeting was the fourth hearing on the plan. “This has been a really difficult issue for Lucerne.”
Lucerne was one of the last areas planners mapped because of the complexity of the issue, Coel said. “It hasn't been done lightly,” he said. “We know things aren't going to change overnight either.”
The commission voted 4-1, with Baur voting no, on changing Merchen's zoning to C1.
Harris questions Bartlett Springs rezoning
Harris told the commission she was concerned about six parcels in a paper subdivision on Bartlett Springs Road above Nice which, at a previous meeting, the commission had agreed to rezone to commercial rezort at the request of owner, Ken Stiritz.
She said they don't know if the property can take septic or water, and whether it's flat enough for building. Harris said she had input from Redevelopment Deputy Director Eric Seely that Stiritz might not have the capital to complete a commercial resort project he wants to build in the area, which is in a landslide risk area and has no roads to it.
Harris urged the commission to adopt the shoreline committee's recommendation to zone the area “substandard older subdivision.”
Coel agreed with Harris, noting the land is steep and has landslide issues.
Briggs said it would be easier to rezone it now for Stiritz to work on the subdivision at a later date.
Harris said the committee spent a lot of time talking about the substandard older subdivision zoning, and added they didn't take it lightly when they applied it to that area. In some cases in the county's remote mountain areas, they might need 100 acres to build one house, and the idea is to manage the land.
Briggs asked how they were managing it. By not changing it and leaving it the same, what are they hoping for in the future?
Judy Barnes, another Clearlake Oaks resident who worked on the shoreline plan, agreed with Harris, comparing the commission's previous decision to change the designation to spot zoning.
“It undermines what the subcommittee was trying to do” by setting up the substandard older subdivision, Barnes said. She added that the property where she lives also has been changed to that designation. “I don't think it's appropriate to put a commercial zone on that at this time.”
Victoria Brandon, chair of the Sierra Club Lake Group, agreed that it sounded like spot zoning. “This sounds extremely premature.” Rezoning it because someone might have a project down the road didn't seem like an appropriate use to Brandon.
Unless the county can put together enough of the paper subdivision lots for a project, Briggs said he didn't see the use of the substandard older subdivision zoning.
Coel said the zoning was meant to help address the paper lots scattered across the Northshore. Many of those lots have repeatedly been auctioned off in tax sales over the years, and the substandard older subdivision zoning is meant to help get control over that, he said.
Many times after people buy the lots they call the county and get the unwelcome surprise of finding out what it would take to build on the parcels, many of which don't have sewer or water or roads.
With the substandard older subdivision zoning the county is codifying it requirements. Without it, there are no road building standards, Coel said. It requires the local fire district to sign off on a building project; roads would have to be built to the appropriate standards for safe fire access.
The six lots Stiritz wanted rezoned don't compose enough land to contain resort use, the septic system or water supply, said Coel. So the project will need more lots.
Briggs contended the substandard older subdivision zoning made land worthless.
“If that's the case, the land's worthless now,” Coel replied.
He said the 1920s subdivisions don't have proper roads, and he asked if the county wanted to continue with the substandard, narrow dirt roads that people have worked in over the years. There also are fire and stormwater issues to deal with, Coel said. The rules now will be in place before people go to buy the parcels at auction.
Briggs said he has “a lot of mixed emotions about this one.”
Baur said if Stiritz is committed to making his project work, it's in his best interest to keep working with the Community Development Department and acquiring property, and then he can bring to them a plan.
“If he really means it, he'll keep working on it,” she said, noting she liked the idea.
The commission agreed to leave the zoning as the shoreline plan committee had proposed.
In making the motion to approve the shoreline plan's final environmental impact report, Baur noted, “It represents a great coalition of public and private effort.”
Briggs noted a similar document is planned for Middletown. Swetnam noted that Lakeport is working on its plan, too.
The commission voted unanimously to send the shoreline plan on to the Board of Supervisors.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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