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The Pleasanton City Council voted 4-1 last week to rezone portions of Trinity Lutheran Church and Rock Bible Church in order to allow up to 10 residential units to be developed at each site.
While the decision doesn’t necessarily mean each of the churches will have to produce the housing â it just gives them and future developers the option to do so â none of the councilmembers appeared happy about their vote.
But, according to staff, if they didn’t approve the rezoning, the city ran the risk of getting into trouble with the California’s Department of Housing and Community Development, which made these types of rezoning a stipulation to certify the city’s Housing Element three years ago.
“If you pulled each one of the councilmembers up here, there’s not one of us that wants to have to do this,” Councilmember Craig Eicher said. “And I don’t think there’s probably many residents that would want this to happen. But, we’re in a position where we don’t have much choice.”
Three years ago, the city adopted its 2023-31 Housing Element, a document that lists occupied and vacant sites for the city to zone for housing in order to meet its Regional Housing Needs Allocation counts for new residential units. Pleasanton’s RHNA is 5,965 new units â 2,758 of which are targeted toward lower-income households.
But, after agreeing on the list of 19 sites to rezone under the new Housing Element, the state’s HCD sent the document back to the city to address some key issues and make additional revisions in order for the document to be certified.
One of those revisions included an agreement between the city and the state, which requires the city to implement a program that would rezone two sites to accommodate up to 10 units at each property, according to senior planner Shweta Bonn.Â
“The program was created in specific response to HCD’s comments,” Bonn said during the Sept. 1 meeting.
Community development director Ellen Clark further explained that the reason the city didn’t include these rezoning plans in the original Housing Element is because this specific rezoning item helped satisfy specific state housing laws.
“We’re fulfilling what we committed to do as part of that program and that’s why we’re here before you,” Clark told the council.
Bonn said if the council hadn’t approved the program, it would have possibly jeopardized the city’s certification of its Housing Element.
Staff originally identified five different sites as potential locations to be considered for rezoning. After reaching out and talking to the various property owners, staff ultimately landed on the two church sites, both of which received support for rezoning by the city’s Planning Commission earlier this summer.
According to last week’s presentation, 0.66 acres at the Trinity Lutheran Church, located at 1225 Hopyard Road, will be rezoned for high-density residential. About 0.70 acres of the Rock Bible Church, located at 4100 First St., will similarly be rezoned under the same land-use designation.
The council also approved an ordinance to rezone a portion of each property to “Planned Unit Development-High Density Residential”, which would allow for up to 10 residential units to be developed on each property.
Bonn said staff recommended the two church sites mostly because of the size of the empty space, their proximity to nearby amenities and because the Housing Element encourages housing on religious properties.
During the public comment portion of the meeting, Steve Wright, a treasurer at Trinity Lutheran Church, explained why he and the church were supportive of the rezoning. He said the church used to operate a preschool on site until it closed for financial reasons.
He said the modular classrooms were removed about a year ago, which has left the church wondering what it should do with the empty land. While they don’t have any current plans to develop, he said the rezoning now gives them more options for what to do with the empty space in the future.
However, Wright was the only voice in support of the proposal. Three neighbors who live near the Trinity Lutheran Church said they were opposed to the rezoning mostly because they were concerned with how future developments would fit in with the neighboring community and how they would impact things like traffic.
They said the community surrounding Trinity Lutheran Church, which is mostly a single-family residential area, would be more impacted than the Rock Bible site.
Mayor Jack Balch reiterated staff’s comments that design standards will still need to be established and reviewed for any future project at each site.
“If a project is proposed, they have to come forward and show us how it would be built,” Balch said.
Despite staff reiterating how important it was for the city to implement the program and how it does not guarantee any development will be built at each site, Councilmember Julie Testa maintained her long-held stance against what she called “draconian requirements” from the state.Â
She said she was surprised to see the rezoning program and that the city should have done more to fight against these sorts of stipulations from the state’s many housing laws.
“While we are being pressured by the state, we should be joining with other cities across the state in standing up because âĤ after 200 pieces of legislation, our cities have been set up to fail and it’s only going to get worse,” said Testa, who dissented in the final vote. “We should be fighting for our local control.”
Others on the council echoed similar sentiments and said while the sites at each property are small â and the churches will still be able to operate without any issues â they never wanted to carry out the decision.Â
But they also recognized that they didn’t have much of a choice unless they wanted HCD to de-certify the city’s Housing Element.
“It is an unfortunate series of events with where local control is at,” Balch said.
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