Northwest ag land OK'd for homes and businesses
| Wednesday, Dec 16 2009 08:10 PM
Last Updated Wednesday, Dec 16 2009 08:11 PM
The city council approved a pre-zoning request to convert more than three-and-a-half square miles of agricultural land in northwest Bakersfield to residential and commercial use.
The 6-0 vote was made without discussion even though two public speakers asked councilmembers for a public hearing.
Carol Bender, who lives in the sparsely populated area west of Santa Fe Way, told councilmembers the first she heard of the plan was when she woke up Wednesday morning and read about it in the paper.
Because the area is so isolated, she said, "there is always a problem with notifications."
City planning staff typically send notification letters to property owners within several hundred feet of a project.
Bender said she'd spent all day studying maps and reports. She asked councilmembers to postpone a vote or take the item off consent.
"I'm here today because that's the right thing to do," she said.
Gordon Nipp, a local Sierra Club representative, also asked the council for a public hearing. He wanted councilmembers to wait until the update of the metro-area general plan was finished.
The zoning changes approved Wednesday night impact nearly 2,400 acres between 7th Standard and Reina roads, mostly west of Santa Fe and west of the future Rosedale Ranch development. Developers want to annex the acreage into the city; the commission that approves annexations prefers land be pre-zoned for a least two years prior to inclusion in city limits.
In other business, the council approved including the Indian city of Amritsar as a sister city and bid farewell to retiring City Clerk Pam McCarthy, who will be headed up to Crescent City in the new year.
Councilmember Harold Hanson was absent.
