CP&DR

David Solaro

Aug 1, 2000

Paul Shigley, Q&A, Vol. 15 No. 08 Aug 2000

David Solaro is a first-term El Dorado County Supervisor representing the Lake Tahoe area. Solaro is a former police and fire chief for the City of South Lake Tahoe, and he holds a master's degree in organizational management from Cal Poly Pomona. In May, the Board of Supervisors unanimously endorsed Solaro's plan to begin a "stakeholder assessment" process, which includes creating an eight- to twelve-member steering committee and hiring a neutral facilitator. Solaro's goal is to work throug...

Mammoth Lakes: Resort Town Prepares for the Big Time

Aug 1, 2000

Local Watch, Mammoth, Paul Shigley, Vol. 15 No. 08 Aug 2000

Long seen as something of a second-tier resort area, Mammoth Mountain appears headed for the big time. Intrawest, a Canadian company with extensive resort development and operation experience, intends to build 2,300, mostly upper-end housing units and create a new town center in the City of Mammoth Lakes. The idea is to make Mammoth Lakes and the nearby Mammoth Mountain Ski Area competitive with premier all-season resorts such as those in Vail and Aspen, Colorado, Park City, Utah, and Whist...

Slow-Growth Ballot Measure Influences UCD Planning

Aug 1, 2000

Paul Shigley, Public Development, Vol. 15 No. 08 Aug 2000

The University of California is preparing to expand its Davis campus to accommodate more students during the next 10 years. Although Davis's expansion is not expected to be as large as at other campuses in the UC system, UCD's plans could conflict with a slow-growth initiative that city voters approved in March. At the very least, Measure J appears to have strained relations between university representatives and city officials. Although the planning process is just getting started, UC officials have ...

Increased Scrutiny Slows Dairies: Legal and Political Challenges Strike at Central Valley Expansion Plans

Aug 1, 2000

Featured Articles, Paul Shigley, Vol. 15 No. 08 Aug 2000

Although Wisconsin may be home to the "cheeseheads," California is actually the nation's largest dairy state. In fact, with annual production at $3.6 billion and rising, the dairy industry is the largest agricultural sector in California. But these are not the best of times for the industry. The Chino dairy preserve in San Bernardino County, the center of Southern California's dairy industry for decades, is pegged for urban development (see CP&DR Local Watch, March 2000). And building new fa...

San Diego Cargo Airport Plan Hits Local Turbulence

Jul 1, 2000

Economic Development, Paul Shigley, Vol. 15 No. 07 Jul 2000

A proposed $500 million cargo airport southeast of San Diego could bolster the area's manufacturing sector, but opposition to the airport is growing. With passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement and the economic expansion of the late 1990s, the San Diego-Tijuana metropolitan area has become a major manufacturing hub. Factories on either side of the border turn out clothes, televisions, appliances, parts and other items. However, distributing the products to markets, or to final ass...

Sacramento County Attempts to hold the Line on Urban Growth

Jul 1, 2000

Local Watch, Paul Shigley, Vol. 15 No. 07 Jul 2000

A recently adopted specific plan for nearly four square miles in southern Sacramento County represents the first time county officials have instituted a major farmland mitigation program. The East Franklin Specific Plan calls for developers of 2,475 acres to contribute $950 per acre to an account that will purchase agricultural easements or property in a nearby farming area. Whether farm owners will cooperate, however, is uncertain. The mitigation fee is intended to protect about 26,000 acres ...

Indian Casinos Sweep Across State: Locals Have No Jurisdiction, But Some Tribes Are Negotiating Anyway

Jul 1, 2000

Featured Articles, Paul Shigley, Vol. 17 No. 09 Sep 2002

With the approval last March of a statewide initiative and the signing of a pact between the governor's office and 63 Indian tribes, development of Indian casinos is taking off. Proposals for major new casinos are introduced seemingly every week, and tribes that operate many of the existing 39 casinos have expansion plans. The casino boom is passing by local government officials, who have no say over what happens on lands held in trust for Indian tribes. "If it's reservation land, they pretty much do ...

Michael Sweeney

Jul 1, 2000

Paul Shigley, Q&A, Vol. 15 No. 09 Sep 2000

Michael Sweeney is the undersecretary of the California Resources Agency, the umbrella entity for seven state departments that address natural resources. Prior to his appointment in 1999, Sweeney was an Democratic assemblyman from Alameda County for two terms. He also served as mayor of Hayward from 1990 to 1994, and as a Hayward city councilman from 1982 to 1990. A teacher before entering politics full-time, Sweeney has bachelors and masters degrees in political science from California State U...

County Finds ‘Smart Growth' Isn't Easy

Jul 1, 2000

Local Watch, Paul Shigley, Vol. 15 No. 07 Jul 2000

When they adopted a new general plan in 1993, Sacramento County supervisors approved what would now be called "smart growth" policies. The general plan established an urban growth boundary (called an urban services boundary), encouraged dense residential development, and designated a number of areas for transit-oriented development. Thus far, the county has blocked development outside the urban services boundary, despite attempts by developers to bust the boundary. But implementing higher densi...

Jobs are Plentiful, Homes are Not: Effects of Silicon Valley Housing Shortage Spread over Vast Region

Jun 1, 2000

Featured Articles, Paul Shigley, Vol. 15 No. 06 Jun 2000

A proposal from Cisco Systems to build a 6.6 million-square-foot campus for up to 20,000 workers in south San Jose has focused attention on the Silicon Valley's housing shortage. Cities and counties south of San Jose feel threatened by the continued industrial development in Silicon Valley because more and more technology employees are commuting from places like Hollister, Salinas and Santa Cruz. The City of San Jose, however, says it has long carried more than its fair share of the housing load...