Professional Accomplishments
Robert L. Borchard
Over the past twenty-plus years there have been several areas that I consider major professional accomplishments. The following is a summary list of these projects and what I feel is their significance.
Butte County CAA: My professional public administration career began in Butte County in the County Administrator’s Office. In 1975, the Butte County Community Action Agency, funded through OEO funds, was facing some major challenges. Under the CAO, I was assigned to the Butte County Community Action Agency, funded through OEO funds, was facing some major challenges. Funding was in jeopardy due to the inability of the program to meet OEO objectives. The County hired a new director and assigned me as his assistant through the County Administrative Office. Together, we reorganized the program to meet OEO guidelines. As program manager, my responsibilities included administration of all existing services and development of new program efforts including the supervision of four division heads with a total staffing of ultimately 110 employees and volunteers. I reported to the County Administrative Officer or one of his deputies. During my tenure at Butte County EOC, I was successful in raising the agency's funding level from $150,000 to over $3 million. I developed several innovative programs, including a home weatherization program that was adopted as a state OEO model program in 1976. Other projects ranged from a delinquency diversion program funded with CCCJ funds to CDBG funding for projects in South Oroville and Chapmantown on the outskirts of the City of Chico.
Mariposa County Planning Department: In 1977, I left the Butte County CAA to become the first Planning Director of Mariposa County. With my background in grantsmanship and planning, I was given the title of Planner-Grantsman. My assignments ranged from bringing the County into compliance with state planning law to reorganizing several major ongoing public works grant projects. During the first two years on the job, I managed to rewrite most of the County's planning and development codes, implement CEQA, update the County General Plan and establish a current planning process that met the requirements of state law. Additionally, as grantsman, I was successful in getting EPA funding for the Coulterville Sewer System and EDA funding for a parking lot project in Mariposa, along with EDA drought relief funds for updating the Yosemite West water system.
Upon my arrival in Mariposa County in 1977, the Merced County Council of Governments was completing a contract to update the Mariposa County General Plan. My first assignment was to complete this update process and get the plan adopted. Shortly after its adoption, the OPR and the State Attorney General's Office informed the County that the plan did not meet the requirements of State General Plan Law. As a result, I assisted the County in obtaining an "extension" from OPR and began an in-house program of updating the plan. The Board gave me $50,000 in extra help funds and OPR gave us one year to get the job done. The plan was updated within budget and in accordance with state law.
Our office orchestrated a complex public involvement program, researched background issues as required by law, prepared an EIR and managed to get the plan adopted one year from the date the state granted our extension. It should be kept in mind that this was before the days of word processors and that multiple draft revisions required extensive typing time to meet the various administrative and public review commitments. All of this work was accomplished with a small staff who also had other current planning responsibilities. At the same time that this update was underway, the planning department was also committed to administering several very large public facility grant programs.
In my eight and one-half years with Mariposa County, I reported directly to the Mariposa County Board of Supervisors. I administered a department with eight full-time staff and served as a department head at the pleasure of the Board.
California State Mining and Mineral Museum: If you visit Mariposa County and the foothill areas around Yosemite National Park, you will no doubt hear about the California State Mining and Mineral Exhibit located in the community of Mariposa. I take great pride in being one of the early participants in the effort to save this historic collection and move it to Mariposa County from its former home in the Ferry Building in San Francisco. The relocation of this exhibit initially involved convincing the state that Mariposa County could care for the state's collection. As time passed, however, the relocation of the exhibit became a major political struggle that was waged in the state legislature and several courtrooms in San Francisco. Through the early years of this struggle, until the new collection museum facility was opened in 1987, I was one of the principal organizers both as a county official (Planning Director) and as a private citizen. Although the process was long and frustrating, bringing the collection to Mariposa has benefited our community and preserved this valuable historical collection for future generations. I take special pride in the fact that this collection is still available for viewing in its entirety and that its future is no longer as vulnerable to the whims of the state budgetary process. Professionally, I benefited from this effort in that I gained a new appreciation of the political processes that must be used in completing this type of task.
The California Development Bulletin: In the mid-1980s, OPR was undergoing major reorganizations. Its newsletter was discontinued and as a result, a major information resource was lost to local government planners. In 1986 I decided to start the California Development Bulletin as a private planning and community development information service. Up to that time, I had done a considerable amount of writing for local newspapers and, as a result, I had some limited experience with the newspaper writing style. I did not consider myself a journalist.
To launch the CDB, it was not only necessary to learn a new writing style, I needed to become familiar with many other elements of the communication arts including layout and design, media management, and circulation. Most importantly, I learned about the role of the Editor in relationship to collecting, analyzing and writing "news." All of these new skills, I found, had many applications in other aspects of my planning career.
As a self-taught journalist, I felt that it was important to be more than a writer of planning and community development news. As a practicing professional, I could be more objective with respect to how this "news" was important to other professionals in the field. As editor of the CDB, I reviewed hundreds of planning and development "news" stories monthly for possible inclusion in our newsletter. I think that this pragmatic approach to journalism contributed to the quality of the CDB over the years and made it a valuable source of information for other professionals. This value was recognized by Cal-Chapter of the American Planning Association (APA) when it awarded its 1990 Award of Excellence in Journalism to the California Development Bulletin. As for myself, the exercise of organizing and publishing the CDB provided me with a more sophisticated appreciation of the media process and how this process can be applied in the planning profession.
Community Concepts Inc: Organizing and operating CCI has been, perhaps, one of my largest challenges. The concepts of planning as a profession and planning as a business are very different, although very closely related. As a business manager of a small company, I faced many of the same challenges as other small business-people in California. This has given me a different perspective into my role as a planner guiding a project through the state's permit system. The lessons I've learned, regarding being a "planning services provider," are important lessons that have applications in both the public and private sectors. The changing economy of this state, coupled with changes in planning technology, point to new directions for people in the planning and community development professions in coming years. My position with CCI provided me with access to innovations going on throughout the state and give me an opportunity for hands-on experiences with some of these changes. Professionally, I feel that I am a better planner as a result of having directed this company from 1986 through 1994.
The City of Merced Vision 2015 General Plan: In 1994, I was invited to become a member of the City of Merced’s Future Planning Team as a temporary assignment. My principal responsibilities were in the preparation of the General Plan Update’s EIR documentation. However, as we initiated the project I was given broader assignments in the preparation of the Plan itself. The plan represented a steep learning curve for the entire planning team in that the Plan was to be one of the first comprehensive city plans in the San Joaquin Valley to apply the “Urban Village” concepts of Peter Calthorpe. Our challenge was to move these planning concepts from the “conceptual plan” format into the format of a general plan that complied with California State Planning Law. Aside from the technical challenge of developing the Plan, there were several major political and administrative challenges that we faced in the crafting of the Plan. Neo-traditional development, with its transit friendly approach to designing infrastructure and establishing land use patterns, represented a fairly radical departure from the normal way of doing things. The building industry, business community, even the lending institutions, was uncomfortable with this planning approach which was un-tested in the market place.
Our success is largely due to the fact that the new 10th University of California campus decision to locate in Merced was made during the period that this plan was being developed. The advance planning concepts being pursued by the City was one of the principal factors influencing the U. C. Regents’ decision regarding the location of the campus near Lake Yosemite north east of the present City boundaries. This decision, by the University of California, provided additional incentives for the pursuance of planning concepts that would meet the transportation needs of a new millennium. The American Planning Association has recognized the quality of the plan itself, both from the standpoint of its format and content, by an Award of Excellence from its Central Valley Division of the California Chapter-APA. The Plan was further recognized with Cal-Chapter APA Small City Comprehensive Planning Award in 1997 and nominated for a National APA Award.
Merced-Atwater Highway 99 Corridor MIS: Following completion of the Merced General Plan, and prior to its final adoption, I was given a unique planning opportunity by the Merced County Association of Governments (MCAG). The task was to prepare a Major Investment Study (MIS) in accordance with the requirements of the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA). Over the years, having worked with transportation planners and traffic engineers, I had gained a fairly good working knowledge of how the transportation planning process was supposed to work. The assignment by MCAG included planning the circulation system that served the entire Merced-Atwater urban areas, the Highway 99 Corridor and the new University of California campus at Lake Yosemite. The plan had been in the conceptual stages for many years and the challenge of the MIS was to bring the concepts to some form of closure; the adoption of a public financing policy by all participating local government units and the State of California. The need for closure was being driven by the finalization of the Merced General Plan Update and the new U. C. campus that opened in 2005.
This project involved the refinement of complex circulation system models for the region, drafting of a detailed system development plan and project list, and working in coordination with the various state, federal and local agencies to assure acceptability of the final planning concepts. The most complicated element of the project was the drafting of an implementation strategy that matched projected need against expected future resources (money) to meet those needs. The plan, if it were to serve the new campus area, had to be buildable in an environment of limited financial resources. Adoption of the MIS, by the MCAG Governing Board in early 1997 is an indication of its political acceptability. The fact that elements of the MIS are being moved through the funding process is an indication of its usefulness as a planning tool.
The new Mission Avenue Interchange is nearing completion in 2007. The City of Merced followed through with implementation of its Street and Road Improvement Fee Program and the re-design and designation of its street system to reduce congestion on Highway 99. Based on the success of this program, I was given assignments by MCAG to work with Los Banos on their Highway 152 By-Pass planning and the community of Hilmar in refining their circulation planning around Highway 165.
City of Newman: A small but well managed community located on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley near the Interstate 5 Corridor was suffering from the economic downturn in the mi-1990s. The City had a “moth-balled” development from the booming early 90’s and a newly adopted General Plan. The assignment, as “Interim” Planning Director, was to “implement” this new plan and process current planning development applications. This assignment was complicated by the fact that the City’s Housing Element had not been “certified” by the State Housing and Community Development Department (HCD) and the “bust” to “boom” housing market of the late 1990s.
I was successful in getting updates to the Housing Element that met HCDs requirements and completing a comprehensive update to the City’s Zoning Code. Additionally, several other major programs were initiated in the City, through the team effort of my one man Department, the City Manager and the City Finance Officer including a “Downtown Improvement Program” and a rewrite of the “Urban Forest & Street Tree Plan” both of which received awards from the American Planning Association, California Chapter, Central Section.
With the turn-around in the housing market, implementation of the General Plan became a significant effort to annex new territory into the City to accommodate several major development proposals. We found ourselves with the need to implement the state Williamson Act Program to manage newly annexed WA Contract lands. We also implemented the Mills Act in support of the City’s historic preservation program. With the improved economy, the City’s Planning Program required a full-time commitment and I moved on to continue my “support” roles with other cities and local agencies in the region.
Telecommunications: Electronic information system technology seems to take major leaps forward on a weekly basis. In 1992, I decided that the CDB should "go on-line" and become part of the cutting edge electronic publications business. The California Development BBS was undergoing development during a time of rapid technological advanced. I consider my early work in the area of telecommunications as a high point in my career. It challenged my abilities as a planner, and my knowledge of computers, communications and journalism. The preparation of Web friendly HTML presentations is a new dimension in dynamic inter-active communications. The use of multi-media techniques makes this information dissemination vehicle very powerful and effective in reaching certain types of audiences. It is my belief that this form of communications will become an important part of how we as planners interact with the public. In applying this belief to the practical world, I prepared a Web site for the City of Newman that is presently accessible on the Internet at http://www.cityofnewman.com/.
City of Waterford: Upon leaving the City of Newman in November of 2002, I began working with the City of Waterford. Waterford was a city with a long history of problems dating back to its incorporation in 1969. At the verge of bankruptcy in 1990s, Chuck Deschenes was hired as its City Administrator. The City Attorney was an old friend harking back to the Mariposa County days in the 1970s and 80s Bill Gnass. The City Council and Planning Commission were progressive and committed to moving the community forward. Among their top priorities was an update to their General Plan and expand their Sphere of Influence (SOI).
I became the part-time City’s Planning Director in November 2002. It took four years but in November 2006 the City of Waterford Vision 2025 General Plan was adopted by the City Council. The Plan was based on “New Urbanist” concepts from the City of Merced’s APA Award winning planning program. The concepts were integrated into the “Urban Expansion”, “Land Use”, “Circulation” Chapters and further defined in the “Urban Design” and “Sustainable Development” chapters of the Plan. In July 2007, the Waterford Vision 2025 General Plan was awarded and “Award of Merit” by the Central Section of the California Chapter of the American Planning Association.
The City’ Sphere of Influence, as defined by the “Urban Expansion” chapter of the General Plan, was narrowly approved by the Stanislaus Local Agency Formation Commission in August of 2007 on a 3 to 2 vote. There is a growing “no-growth” movement in Stanislaus County and the City of Waterford wants to grow.
Like the General Plan, and its Program Environmental Report, the SOI update and Municipal Service Review were done “in-house”. As principal author of the Plan and EIR, I and the City, were able to direct the development of this Plan to reflect local community interests closely connected to its on-going development program.
One of the big issues confronting the City in this undertaking was the lack of funds. It is normal for a comprehensive General Plan update, with an Environmental Impact Report to cost over $1 million dollars. The City was could allocate around $100,000 towards this effort. After about of year of community meetings, a developer the Grupe Company began acquiring development rights in some of the area we had designated for future growth. The company stepped forward and asked if they could support our GP update program to speed up the process.
With the Planning effort well underway, we felt that a missing link in the effort was the need for comprehensive infrastructure (sewer, wastewater treatment, water, storm-water, circulation) plans and the mandatory water availability studies for the new Waterford water system.
We developed a comprehensive budget for this effort, including the infrastructure studies and established a per-acre fee estimate for all lands within our proposed growth area. The Grupe Company advanced $400,000 towards the special studies as part of a pre-Pre-annexation Agreement with the City, some of which was to be reimbursed as the growth area built out in future years. Overall, the total GP Update and SOI program costs were around $600,000 and the City of Waterford has established a benchmark for other small cities in the region to shoot for. The Plan’s growth and development strategies provide various options for the City’s present and future leadership in the manner that the Plan’s Goals, Policies and Implementation Strategies are written.
Robert L. Borchard
Over the past twenty-plus years there have been several areas that I consider major professional accomplishments. The following is a summary list of these projects and what I feel is their significance.
Butte County CAA: My professional public administration career began in Butte County in the County Administrator’s Office. In 1975, the Butte County Community Action Agency, funded through OEO funds, was facing some major challenges. Under the CAO, I was assigned to the Butte County Community Action Agency, funded through OEO funds, was facing some major challenges. Funding was in jeopardy due to the inability of the program to meet OEO objectives. The County hired a new director and assigned me as his assistant through the County Administrative Office. Together, we reorganized the program to meet OEO guidelines. As program manager, my responsibilities included administration of all existing services and development of new program efforts including the supervision of four division heads with a total staffing of ultimately 110 employees and volunteers. I reported to the County Administrative Officer or one of his deputies. During my tenure at Butte County EOC, I was successful in raising the agency's funding level from $150,000 to over $3 million. I developed several innovative programs, including a home weatherization program that was adopted as a state OEO model program in 1976. Other projects ranged from a delinquency diversion program funded with CCCJ funds to CDBG funding for projects in South Oroville and Chapmantown on the outskirts of the City of Chico.
Mariposa County Planning Department: In 1977, I left the Butte County CAA to become the first Planning Director of Mariposa County. With my background in grantsmanship and planning, I was given the title of Planner-Grantsman. My assignments ranged from bringing the County into compliance with state planning law to reorganizing several major ongoing public works grant projects. During the first two years on the job, I managed to rewrite most of the County's planning and development codes, implement CEQA, update the County General Plan and establish a current planning process that met the requirements of state law. Additionally, as grantsman, I was successful in getting EPA funding for the Coulterville Sewer System and EDA funding for a parking lot project in Mariposa, along with EDA drought relief funds for updating the Yosemite West water system.
Upon my arrival in Mariposa County in 1977, the Merced County Council of Governments was completing a contract to update the Mariposa County General Plan. My first assignment was to complete this update process and get the plan adopted. Shortly after its adoption, the OPR and the State Attorney General's Office informed the County that the plan did not meet the requirements of State General Plan Law. As a result, I assisted the County in obtaining an "extension" from OPR and began an in-house program of updating the plan. The Board gave me $50,000 in extra help funds and OPR gave us one year to get the job done. The plan was updated within budget and in accordance with state law.
Our office orchestrated a complex public involvement program, researched background issues as required by law, prepared an EIR and managed to get the plan adopted one year from the date the state granted our extension. It should be kept in mind that this was before the days of word processors and that multiple draft revisions required extensive typing time to meet the various administrative and public review commitments. All of this work was accomplished with a small staff who also had other current planning responsibilities. At the same time that this update was underway, the planning department was also committed to administering several very large public facility grant programs.
In my eight and one-half years with Mariposa County, I reported directly to the Mariposa County Board of Supervisors. I administered a department with eight full-time staff and served as a department head at the pleasure of the Board.
California State Mining and Mineral Museum: If you visit Mariposa County and the foothill areas around Yosemite National Park, you will no doubt hear about the California State Mining and Mineral Exhibit located in the community of Mariposa. I take great pride in being one of the early participants in the effort to save this historic collection and move it to Mariposa County from its former home in the Ferry Building in San Francisco. The relocation of this exhibit initially involved convincing the state that Mariposa County could care for the state's collection. As time passed, however, the relocation of the exhibit became a major political struggle that was waged in the state legislature and several courtrooms in San Francisco. Through the early years of this struggle, until the new collection museum facility was opened in 1987, I was one of the principal organizers both as a county official (Planning Director) and as a private citizen. Although the process was long and frustrating, bringing the collection to Mariposa has benefited our community and preserved this valuable historical collection for future generations. I take special pride in the fact that this collection is still available for viewing in its entirety and that its future is no longer as vulnerable to the whims of the state budgetary process. Professionally, I benefited from this effort in that I gained a new appreciation of the political processes that must be used in completing this type of task.
The California Development Bulletin: In the mid-1980s, OPR was undergoing major reorganizations. Its newsletter was discontinued and as a result, a major information resource was lost to local government planners. In 1986 I decided to start the California Development Bulletin as a private planning and community development information service. Up to that time, I had done a considerable amount of writing for local newspapers and, as a result, I had some limited experience with the newspaper writing style. I did not consider myself a journalist.
To launch the CDB, it was not only necessary to learn a new writing style, I needed to become familiar with many other elements of the communication arts including layout and design, media management, and circulation. Most importantly, I learned about the role of the Editor in relationship to collecting, analyzing and writing "news." All of these new skills, I found, had many applications in other aspects of my planning career.
As a self-taught journalist, I felt that it was important to be more than a writer of planning and community development news. As a practicing professional, I could be more objective with respect to how this "news" was important to other professionals in the field. As editor of the CDB, I reviewed hundreds of planning and development "news" stories monthly for possible inclusion in our newsletter. I think that this pragmatic approach to journalism contributed to the quality of the CDB over the years and made it a valuable source of information for other professionals. This value was recognized by Cal-Chapter of the American Planning Association (APA) when it awarded its 1990 Award of Excellence in Journalism to the California Development Bulletin. As for myself, the exercise of organizing and publishing the CDB provided me with a more sophisticated appreciation of the media process and how this process can be applied in the planning profession.
Community Concepts Inc: Organizing and operating CCI has been, perhaps, one of my largest challenges. The concepts of planning as a profession and planning as a business are very different, although very closely related. As a business manager of a small company, I faced many of the same challenges as other small business-people in California. This has given me a different perspective into my role as a planner guiding a project through the state's permit system. The lessons I've learned, regarding being a "planning services provider," are important lessons that have applications in both the public and private sectors. The changing economy of this state, coupled with changes in planning technology, point to new directions for people in the planning and community development professions in coming years. My position with CCI provided me with access to innovations going on throughout the state and give me an opportunity for hands-on experiences with some of these changes. Professionally, I feel that I am a better planner as a result of having directed this company from 1986 through 1994.
The City of Merced Vision 2015 General Plan: In 1994, I was invited to become a member of the City of Merced’s Future Planning Team as a temporary assignment. My principal responsibilities were in the preparation of the General Plan Update’s EIR documentation. However, as we initiated the project I was given broader assignments in the preparation of the Plan itself. The plan represented a steep learning curve for the entire planning team in that the Plan was to be one of the first comprehensive city plans in the San Joaquin Valley to apply the “Urban Village” concepts of Peter Calthorpe. Our challenge was to move these planning concepts from the “conceptual plan” format into the format of a general plan that complied with California State Planning Law. Aside from the technical challenge of developing the Plan, there were several major political and administrative challenges that we faced in the crafting of the Plan. Neo-traditional development, with its transit friendly approach to designing infrastructure and establishing land use patterns, represented a fairly radical departure from the normal way of doing things. The building industry, business community, even the lending institutions, was uncomfortable with this planning approach which was un-tested in the market place.
Our success is largely due to the fact that the new 10th University of California campus decision to locate in Merced was made during the period that this plan was being developed. The advance planning concepts being pursued by the City was one of the principal factors influencing the U. C. Regents’ decision regarding the location of the campus near Lake Yosemite north east of the present City boundaries. This decision, by the University of California, provided additional incentives for the pursuance of planning concepts that would meet the transportation needs of a new millennium. The American Planning Association has recognized the quality of the plan itself, both from the standpoint of its format and content, by an Award of Excellence from its Central Valley Division of the California Chapter-APA. The Plan was further recognized with Cal-Chapter APA Small City Comprehensive Planning Award in 1997 and nominated for a National APA Award.
Merced-Atwater Highway 99 Corridor MIS: Following completion of the Merced General Plan, and prior to its final adoption, I was given a unique planning opportunity by the Merced County Association of Governments (MCAG). The task was to prepare a Major Investment Study (MIS) in accordance with the requirements of the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA). Over the years, having worked with transportation planners and traffic engineers, I had gained a fairly good working knowledge of how the transportation planning process was supposed to work. The assignment by MCAG included planning the circulation system that served the entire Merced-Atwater urban areas, the Highway 99 Corridor and the new University of California campus at Lake Yosemite. The plan had been in the conceptual stages for many years and the challenge of the MIS was to bring the concepts to some form of closure; the adoption of a public financing policy by all participating local government units and the State of California. The need for closure was being driven by the finalization of the Merced General Plan Update and the new U. C. campus that opened in 2005.
This project involved the refinement of complex circulation system models for the region, drafting of a detailed system development plan and project list, and working in coordination with the various state, federal and local agencies to assure acceptability of the final planning concepts. The most complicated element of the project was the drafting of an implementation strategy that matched projected need against expected future resources (money) to meet those needs. The plan, if it were to serve the new campus area, had to be buildable in an environment of limited financial resources. Adoption of the MIS, by the MCAG Governing Board in early 1997 is an indication of its political acceptability. The fact that elements of the MIS are being moved through the funding process is an indication of its usefulness as a planning tool.
The new Mission Avenue Interchange is nearing completion in 2007. The City of Merced followed through with implementation of its Street and Road Improvement Fee Program and the re-design and designation of its street system to reduce congestion on Highway 99. Based on the success of this program, I was given assignments by MCAG to work with Los Banos on their Highway 152 By-Pass planning and the community of Hilmar in refining their circulation planning around Highway 165.
City of Newman: A small but well managed community located on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley near the Interstate 5 Corridor was suffering from the economic downturn in the mi-1990s. The City had a “moth-balled” development from the booming early 90’s and a newly adopted General Plan. The assignment, as “Interim” Planning Director, was to “implement” this new plan and process current planning development applications. This assignment was complicated by the fact that the City’s Housing Element had not been “certified” by the State Housing and Community Development Department (HCD) and the “bust” to “boom” housing market of the late 1990s.
I was successful in getting updates to the Housing Element that met HCDs requirements and completing a comprehensive update to the City’s Zoning Code. Additionally, several other major programs were initiated in the City, through the team effort of my one man Department, the City Manager and the City Finance Officer including a “Downtown Improvement Program” and a rewrite of the “Urban Forest & Street Tree Plan” both of which received awards from the American Planning Association, California Chapter, Central Section.
With the turn-around in the housing market, implementation of the General Plan became a significant effort to annex new territory into the City to accommodate several major development proposals. We found ourselves with the need to implement the state Williamson Act Program to manage newly annexed WA Contract lands. We also implemented the Mills Act in support of the City’s historic preservation program. With the improved economy, the City’s Planning Program required a full-time commitment and I moved on to continue my “support” roles with other cities and local agencies in the region.
Telecommunications: Electronic information system technology seems to take major leaps forward on a weekly basis. In 1992, I decided that the CDB should "go on-line" and become part of the cutting edge electronic publications business. The California Development BBS was undergoing development during a time of rapid technological advanced. I consider my early work in the area of telecommunications as a high point in my career. It challenged my abilities as a planner, and my knowledge of computers, communications and journalism. The preparation of Web friendly HTML presentations is a new dimension in dynamic inter-active communications. The use of multi-media techniques makes this information dissemination vehicle very powerful and effective in reaching certain types of audiences. It is my belief that this form of communications will become an important part of how we as planners interact with the public. In applying this belief to the practical world, I prepared a Web site for the City of Newman that is presently accessible on the Internet at http://www.cityofnewman.com/.
City of Waterford: Upon leaving the City of Newman in November of 2002, I began working with the City of Waterford. Waterford was a city with a long history of problems dating back to its incorporation in 1969. At the verge of bankruptcy in 1990s, Chuck Deschenes was hired as its City Administrator. The City Attorney was an old friend harking back to the Mariposa County days in the 1970s and 80s Bill Gnass. The City Council and Planning Commission were progressive and committed to moving the community forward. Among their top priorities was an update to their General Plan and expand their Sphere of Influence (SOI).
I became the part-time City’s Planning Director in November 2002. It took four years but in November 2006 the City of Waterford Vision 2025 General Plan was adopted by the City Council. The Plan was based on “New Urbanist” concepts from the City of Merced’s APA Award winning planning program. The concepts were integrated into the “Urban Expansion”, “Land Use”, “Circulation” Chapters and further defined in the “Urban Design” and “Sustainable Development” chapters of the Plan. In July 2007, the Waterford Vision 2025 General Plan was awarded and “Award of Merit” by the Central Section of the California Chapter of the American Planning Association.
The City’ Sphere of Influence, as defined by the “Urban Expansion” chapter of the General Plan, was narrowly approved by the Stanislaus Local Agency Formation Commission in August of 2007 on a 3 to 2 vote. There is a growing “no-growth” movement in Stanislaus County and the City of Waterford wants to grow.
Like the General Plan, and its Program Environmental Report, the SOI update and Municipal Service Review were done “in-house”. As principal author of the Plan and EIR, I and the City, were able to direct the development of this Plan to reflect local community interests closely connected to its on-going development program.
One of the big issues confronting the City in this undertaking was the lack of funds. It is normal for a comprehensive General Plan update, with an Environmental Impact Report to cost over $1 million dollars. The City was could allocate around $100,000 towards this effort. After about of year of community meetings, a developer the Grupe Company began acquiring development rights in some of the area we had designated for future growth. The company stepped forward and asked if they could support our GP update program to speed up the process.
With the Planning effort well underway, we felt that a missing link in the effort was the need for comprehensive infrastructure (sewer, wastewater treatment, water, storm-water, circulation) plans and the mandatory water availability studies for the new Waterford water system.
We developed a comprehensive budget for this effort, including the infrastructure studies and established a per-acre fee estimate for all lands within our proposed growth area. The Grupe Company advanced $400,000 towards the special studies as part of a pre-Pre-annexation Agreement with the City, some of which was to be reimbursed as the growth area built out in future years. Overall, the total GP Update and SOI program costs were around $600,000 and the City of Waterford has established a benchmark for other small cities in the region to shoot for. The Plan’s growth and development strategies provide various options for the City’s present and future leadership in the manner that the Plan’s Goals, Policies and Implementation Strategies are written.
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