Monday, June 04, 2007

Coastal's and Northwest's Stances on Ponte Vista

To find out what both the Coastal San Pedro and Northwest San Pedro Neighborhood Councils thought of the current Ponte Vista at San Pedro plans, we have to go back to the year, 2005

In researching the facts and basis for the publication of this post, I found a few surprising thing, most notably how long ago both N.C.s actually revealed publicly their opposition to the current plans, but how I had access to the information by using their Web sites and how well, compared to a third N.C., their records and Board meeting minutes are kept.

Starting back as far as I read, shows that Coastal San Pedro made two announcements about how their board considered the Ponte Vista at San Pedro development and what their stance became.

In the Monday, October 15, 2005 copy of the Board meeting of the Coastal San Pedro Neighborhood Council, and contained on page three of the .pdf copy, is the following:

Under Agenda Item VI, Consent Calendar, "Item 10:

"Whereas the propose (sp) Ponte Vista development would severely impact all areas of San Pedro with regard to traffic, air pollution, schools, and other elements of the civic infrastructure; the Coastal San Pedro Neighboryood Council opposes the project as proposed, as well as any modification of the existing R1-1XL, zoning in the area of the proposed project."

The Consent Calendar passed 13 Aye 0 Nay 1 Abstained.

In the November 21, 2005 meeting minutes this item can be found:

"Consideration of a motion to oppose Ponte Vista development as proposed and any change in existing R1-1XK (sp) zoning"

That "consideration passed 14 Aye 0 Nay.

If the above portions of two meeting minutes doesn't describe Coastal San Pedro Neighborhood Council's position on the Ponte Vista development, I invite you to conduct further information gathering. For me, two votes by their board opposing Bob's current plans and calling for no change in the existing zoning is enough.


Now, moving on to Northwest San Pedro Neighborhood Council's position by its Board, concerning the Ponte Vista at San Pedro development, I need to direct you to an address on the Internet where you can read two documents totaling seven .pdf pages of information and comment. This document was submitted and approved of, by the Board of that Neighborhood Council on November 14, 2005.

Please visit: http://www.nwsanpedro.org/pdfs/BisnoScoping01Dec05.pdf. This address will get you to the comments to the scoping of the project and includes the following on the first page:

"oppose any change in the zoning"

The approval of the comments to the scoping was unanimous.

Whether the information is created in a "resolution" or by some other means, documented correctly by the secretaries of Neighborhood Councils, or provided to the community by minutes, the three positions by the three councils have now appeared on this blog, to the extent I could provide with limited time to look up the information.

Actually I have had Northwest's position on file for quite a long time, but I didn't feel I should have published it earlier until I also had Coastal's position, which has been sitting in the files of their Web site for about 1-1/2 years!

4 comments:

Tom said...

Mr. Wells,

Comments to a Draft Environmental Impact Report are not the same as a Resolution adopting a stance.

Only someone completely ignorant in parlimentary procedure would claim this.

A comment could be just one person's opinion. Adopting it as part of all the comments sent on DOES NOT qualify as a Resolution by the Council.

Care to run it by DONE or the City Attorney to verify it?

You are purposely and maliciously misleading people.

Tom said...

Mr. Wells,

A. There was no motion about Ponte Vista passed by Northwest.

Going back through their minutes to the beginning of 2005, there were resolutions passed for funding of the hiring of consultants, to devote an entire newsletter to Ponte Vista, for sending comments on the DEIR into the Planning Department.

At the January 9, 2006 meeting, John Greenwood stated "Our position as a Neighborhood Council is that we have real concerns about the density of the project."

1. This was a procedurally incorrect and unauthorized statement, since the full Neighborhood Council had not made a motion or passed a resolution that this was their position.

2. A statement by an officer, giving his own opinions during the course of an oral report cannot be construed a properly passed resolution by the entire Council.

3. Even in light of the foregoing, "...real concerns about the density of the project..." cannot be construed as a comprehensive statement regarding the entire development.


B. Should the Coastal Council produce a resolution, it is in complete violation of their own long-standing policy of not endorsing or opposing any development projects. Over the last few years, they have steadfastly stuck to their policy. Why would they suddenly violate it for Ponte Vista?

C. To the best of my knowledge, besides the Central San Pedro Neighborhood Council, only the Wilmington Neighborhood Council has passed a Resolution regarding Ponte Vista. The wording of the Resolution was to support the findings and recommendations of Janice Hahn's Ponte Vista Citizen's Advisory Committee.

M Richards said...

Folks,

I copied wording directly from the Web sites from both Coastal and Northwest.

I would ask everyone to do their own research to see if what I copied is actually on the sites as I specified them to be.

If anyone chooses not to believe the Boards of both Northwest and Coastal oppose Bob's current plans and have not called for keeping the zoning as it currently is, they are welcome to do whatever research they choose to do.

If Board members of these organizations tell me that their respective Boards oppose Bisno's current plans and seek to keep the concerning as it currently is, AND I can find wording that support what those Board members are stating to be factual, then I need to stand by this original post.

I would be willing to look up any position taken by either Board, and any resolution endorsing the Ponte Vista development by Central, that anyone would wish to point me towards.

I think that is fair, don't you?

I don't know if the "Tom" commenting on this post and others, recently on this blog, is the same "Tom Field" I have repeatedly kindly request that he discontinue commenting on this blog, well what does that say about his true character?

I will continue to not read his blog as much as possible and may only visit it when his attacks on my and this blog become as mean as he has been, recently.

I continue to try and end an unpopular war by disinvolving me in it. Unfortunately it seems that there are more individuals who simply won't end wars for their own personal gain.
MW

Tom said...

Anonymous said...
Reads Northwest council's comments here:
This was sent to the Mayor, Janice Hahn, and Bisno Development Corp.

June 4, 2007 10:24 PM


Tom said...
Anonymous 10:24pm

Please obtain a copy of Robert's Rules of Order and become familiar with parlimentary procedure. What you are quoting IS NOT a resolution. It is a comment to the City Planning Department about the DEIR. It does not matter who was cc'd on it. It was not a resolution. Adopting comments is much different than passing a resolution.

But don't believe me. Ask DONE, or the City Attorney.

More of your typical garbage. Make an outrageous statement and believe if you repeat it enough times it will make it true. Sorry, no such luck. Northwest dropped the ball and this is just a weak attempt to put a bandaid on it.

June 4, 2007 10:57 PM