HomeMy WebLinkAbout03/29/17 Minutes - Jt. Mtg with Planning CommissionMINUTES OF THE CITY OF DIAMOND BAR
GENERAL PLAN UPDATE JOINT MEETING #2 OF THE
CITY COUNCIL AND PLANNING COMMISSION
MARCH 29, 2017
CALL TO ORDER: Mayor Lin called the Special General Plan Update Joint
Meeting No. 2 of the City Council and Planning Commission to order at 6:33 p.m. in the
City Hall Windmill Community Room, 21810 Copley Drive, Diamond Bar, CA 9176
Present:
Council Members: Carol Herrera, Nancy Lyons, Steve Tye, Mayor
Pro Tem Ruth Low, and Mayor Jimmy Lin.
Commissioners: Naila Barlas, Frank Farago, Jennifer "Fred"
Mahlke, Vice Chair Ken Mok, and Chair
Raymond Wolfe
Also present: James DeStefano, City Manager; Ryan
McLean, Assistant City Manager; Greg Gubman, Community Development
Director; James Eggart, Assistant City Attorney; Grace Lee, Senior Planner;
Mayuko Nakajima, Associate Planner; Natalie T. Espinoza, Assistant Planner;
David Liu, Public Works Director; Marsha Roa, Public Information Manager;
Alfredo Estevez, Help Desk Support Technician; and Tommye Cribbins, City Clerk.
Consultants present: Sophie Martin, AICP, Project Manager and Eric
Simundza, Dyett & Bhatia, Urban and Regional Planners; Yesenia Arias, Arellano
Associates
A) GENERAL PLAN UPDATE MEETING #2:
CDD/Gubman stated that this is the second joint meeting. The first joint meeting
was held nearly eight months ago when the City Council and Planning Commission
convened on August 10, 2016, to receive staffs introduction of the General Plan
Update Project and soon to follow First Phase (including reconnaissance, fact-
finding, scoping of the community) to identify opportunities, constraints, areas of
interest, and areas the community would like for the City to focus on as it moves
forward on this process. The purpose of tonight's meeting is to provide a recap of
the tasks that were completed during the past eight months.
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PAGE 2 . GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
Project Manager Sophie Martin, Dyett & Bhatia, Urban and Regional Planners,
assisting the Citywith the update to its General Plan presented the following report.
1. PROJECT OVERVIEW:
The General Plan can be thought of as a "constitution" for the City's growth and
development. It is a long-range document that looks out over a 20 -year period,
sometimes longer. At its heart, it is an expression of the community's vision for its
future and it outlines specific steps in the form of Goals, Objectives and Policies in
order to achieve that vision. The City's current General Plan dates back to 1995
and was prepared shortly after the City incorporated. Many who have lived in the
City since that time know that while many things have remained the same, things
have changed from 1995 to now and it is important that the City's General Plan
reflect current conditions, as well as the current community's aspirations for the
future. In short, this process is intended to update the document, make it relevant,
keep it active and make sure it reflects the future that Diamond Bar wants to see
for itself as it looks forward to the year 2040. This is a multi -phased process which
will take a few years to get through. To date, the first phase has been completed
which included Project Initiation, going through an extensive period of issue
identification and reaching out to the community to hear from them about what their
goals and priorities are and, at the same time, conducting quite a bit of technical
background research to ascertain what conditions are like in the City today so that
there is a good understanding of the baseline from which to move forward.
REVIEW OF GPAC FORMATION AND MEETINGS:
The GPAC is a 15 -member committee appointed by the City Council which plays
a very important role of shepherding this process along. It reviews key project
documents, provides input, helps guide the public outreach strategy and ultimately
makes recommendations to the Planning Commission and the City Council at key
milestones. Another important function of the GPAC members is to act as
ambassadors for the project to the community at large and help the City in its
efforts to hear not just from them, Councilmembers and Planning Commissioners,
but from everybody in Diamond Bar — to spread the word and share with staff what
they hear and help build enthusiasm and interest in the project. There have been
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two meetings with the GPAC to date. The first, in October 2016 provided the
opportunity for the GPAC to talk with them about their vision, their understanding
of the City's opportunities and challenges and helped identify some issues the
General Plan should address. The second meeting was held in January 2017
where staff shared with them the results of the background research, as well as a
report back on the first community workshop that was held in November 2016.
Staff has conducted a number of outreach efforts to hear from people what their
ideas and concerns are and what they want this plan to focus on. Sophie Martin
introduced Yesenia Arias of Arellano Associates, based in Chino Hills, who
specializes in community outreach and has been playing a critical role in the
process of helping to organize, host and publicize public events.
Ms. Arias explained that the outreach strategies thus far included three interactive
opportunities for community participation. She implemented a community
workshop, held five pop-up workshops, as well as a very successful online survey.
The community workshop was held on November 9, 2016 with about eighty (80)
community members participating. It was a very dynamic opportunity to meet one-
on-one with residents to try and understand what their vision of the City is now and
what they would like it to be in the future by identifying some of the opportunities
and challenges that they see. Sophie Martin led the workshop which included two
major activities, the first being nine different questions that focused on traffic, land
use, development, and open space. Attendees were asked to put answers on
Post -it notes and paste them on posters for each question. As people were able
to put their Post -it notes around the room based on their perceptions or answers
to questions Sophie asked, they were able to view what their peers were saying in
response to the same questions which helped to develop ideas and thoughts that
could be pushed forward to what their neighbors are thinking as well. Activity #2
was slightly more interactive. Attendees were provided blank covers to a
magazine and were asked if this were the year 2040 and Diamond Bar was going
to be featured on the cover of a magazine, what would it say and what would they
want to highlight about Diamond Bar — what makes Diamond Bar the City that
should be on the cover of a magazine? With this exercise, staff received a lot of
good feedback. Many residents feel that Diamond Bar is a beautiful city that has
beautiful scenery and a good history. Everyone seemed to be very proud to be a
part of the City and a part of the update as well. Scenery came up over and over
again as a matter of pride in living in Diamond Bar. Headlines included "Diamond
MARCH 29, 2017 PAGE 4 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
Bar — The True Jewel of Los Angeles,`' "It's a Small Town Feel," "The Great
Schools in the City of Diamond Bar" — the Single Family Living," "The Trees and
The Scenery," as well as several references to the different trails that are available
to residents.
Some of the common themes that came out of the workshop and surveys included:
• Traffic vs. Development — While about 70 percent of the people who have
participated in the different workshops want commercial uses and a town center
so they can stop shopping in Chino Hills and instead shop in Diamond Bar,
common concerns is the traffic residents are dealing with now and were not in
favor of development that would impact open space. People love the open
space and feel the City needs more fields. There is a lot of support for
commercial uses but participants wanted to make sure that traffic impacts was
something that would be taken seriously.
• Aesthetics — This subject came up frequently and residents wanted to highlight
how many years ago when the City was beginning to grow, homes had a
different feel. There are many original homeowners living in the City that like
to see their homes kept the same way. The talk about renters coming in and
the upkeep associated with that is important to residents and they want to be
sure that the City continues to keep that beautiful face that it has had, continue
to improve shopping centers and beautify the City as a whole.
• Elderly —Many commented that they would like to see senior housing, senior
center availability, better public transportation and walkability which was a very
important topic. They would love a pedestrian path and feel safe when they
are walking.
• Youth — Likewise for youth, mobility is very important, sports fields, a teen
center and every opportunity people had they talked about the high quality in
standards that the schools in Diamond Bar have. School districts unification
also came up as part of the conversation.
The five pop-up workshops included participation at the Barktober Festival on
October 15, 2016; Eco Expo Recycles Day, November 12, 2016; Quail Summit
Elementary Carnival, October 28, 2016; Chaparral Middle School Concert,
December 14, 2016 and Diamond Bar High School Food Festival, February 1,
2017. Ms. Arias said she was extremely proud of the five pop -ups because there
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was a really good cross-section of people throughout City that participated,
including seniors, adults, elementary and middle school and high schools. High
schoolers will be living in Diamond Bar in the future and she feels the General Plan
should really speak to their needs. There were approximately 300 visitors at the
pop -ups and about 200 surveys were completed during those events.
Questions from the pop-up workshops: People are starting to see changes in the
City so there were questions about what happened to the Honda dealership and
what is going to happen in that area; what is going to happen at the golf course,
and if Diamond Bar can have shopping opportunities similar to the Chino Hills
Shoppes. They saw that Kmart is empty and wanted to know what was happening
there. And, the issue of traffic along the SR57/60 freeway came up frequently.
A total of 501 surveys were completed, consisting of 488 in English and 13 in
Chinese, which is very good. Korean was offered as well, but there were no takers.
The survey was promoted through the City's Newsletter, Social Media (Facebook,
Twitter, Instragram), Pop-up Workshops, Community Workshops, Church
extended outreach and the City's General Plan website.
The survey consisted of 16 questions. In retrospect, it may have been a little too
long but people did complete the survey. The questions were multiple choice and
open-ended and everyone was given an opportunity to give feedback under an
"Other" option as well.
Sophie Martin said the survey results were really fascinating and would really help
as the process moves forward. For the open ended questions it can be a little
difficult to sort through all of the complex comments that people provide. Some
write quite a bit and even when people are asked to define Diamond Bar in one
word they provide a paragraph. Overwhelmingly words people use to describe
Diamond Bar are very positive — safe, home, peaceful, clean, community, are all
great things and it is good that this starts from such a positive place of how people
feel about their City. That being said, there are a few words that sneak in that are
not quite as positive such as bland, congested, and boring. The survey asked
what place people like most in Diamond Bar and it is incredibly telling that people
are so connected to and feel so strongly about the natural features, open space,
parks, trails, nature, etc. This is a real theme. The survey then asked people more
MARCH 29, 2017
PAGE 6 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
specific questions about different land uses. First, what types of housing people
wanted to see in Diamond Bar and the survey also gave them the opportunity to
say they did not want to see any more housing. Slightly more than 50 percent of
the respondents provided that answer. Of those who did want to see more
housing, the survey asked "what type?" About a third of the respondents said
"more single-family detached homes" but also some support for senior housing,
townhouses, condominiums, and apartments. The survey asked if the City were
to see additional housing, where should it be built and there was not as strong of
a consensus on this particular topic. There was a fairly equal spread between
areas that are currently outside of the City limits but still within its planning area,
potential redevelopment of other older'parts of town and taking a look at some of
the vacant land between Diamond Bar and Chino Hills (Tres Hermanos). The
survey then asked about what types of employment and commercial uses are
needed in Diamond Bar. The most popular response (over two-thirds) was
restaurants, and beyond that, entertainment and family -friendly activities were the
most popular responses. People were able to check multiple boxes here (up to 3)
which is why the percentages add up to more than 100 percent. The survey then
asked where these new commercial type uses should be located. And again, not
as strong of a consensus. People had a lot of different ideas and preferences for
where commercial development should be located. About a third or so talked
about near the freeway exits, near the Metrolink station and around some major
intersections such as Diamond Bar Boulevard and Grand Avenue which of course
is where much of that development is seen at this time. Other responses people
gave were potential growth areas potentially outside of the current City limits and
entertaining the idea of redevelopment of the golf course. The people were asked
whether they thought that Diamond Bar needed some kind of a downtown or town
center and this could be interpreted however they wished. People have various
ideas about what constitutes a town center or downtown. However people
interpreted whether they think Diamond Bar needed a town center or downtown,
about 70 percent of respondents said "yes." This same question was asked at the
workshop and in fact, all of the survey questions very closely mirror the questions
that went with the Post -it note activity so that it could be determined whether there
were different responses from different groups of people across multiple venues.
This was a question where the results of the workshop and the results on the
survey were virtually identical — about 70 percent of people in both of those settings
said they would like to see some kind of town center in Diamond Bar which leads
to a more in-depth question about what should be located at the town center.
These results mirror very closely the types of comments said on what types of
commercial uses they were interested in: Restaurants, entertainment activities
such as a movie theater, activities and programming for families, as well as arts
and cultural activities rounded out the top four choices. If Diamond Bar does need
a town center, where should it be? Again, not a strong consensus on location for
these different land uses. A very slight plurality of respondents said they thought
the area near Diamond Bar Boulevard and the SR57/60 (the old Kmart site) might
be a good location. There were similar amounts of support for around the
intersection of Grand Avenue and Diamond Bar Boulevard where one might think
of the City's town center currently. And just over 20 percent of people also
supported the idea of reusing the golf course for that town center.
Transportation was another area of discussion in which people were asked to pick
which top three transportation improvements they would most like to see. This
should come as no surprise that there was very strong support for improving
congestion, both on City streets and on the freeways. There was also a pretty
good amount of support for making it safer and easier to walk around. Safety and
comfort as a pedestrian is very important.
Parks, open space and recreational opportunities were the top three picks in
response to what they like about the City now. There was nearly an even split
between four different options: Creating new and improving existing trails; creating
a new "grand" park similar to the Irvine Regional Park (a large community park with
many amenities); creating new and improving existing picnic areas and
playgrounds (smaller parks); and creating new and improved existing outdoor
athletic fields. These are things that the General Plan can look into in more detail.
People were asked directly what they thought about the golf course. Interestingly,
about 30 percent of people said they would be okay with golf course being removed
or relocated and being reused in some way. Almost a similar number of people
said they had no opinion about the golf course. 22 percent said that it should be
upgraded or renovated and another 22 percent said it should be left exactly the
way it is.
When asked about their feelings regarding the Tres Hermanos property, over half
of the respondents said that the land should remain the way it is, about one-third
said that the land might be developed to serve the City's needs and the remaining
13 percent were not sure. This is obviously a tricky subject because the City has
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PAGE 8 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
limited control over what happens there, but it is still important to understand what
people's opinions about the property are.
Finally, the survey was concluded with a handful of additional open-ended
questions, providing an opportunity for people to provide a little bit more detail in
their own words on some of the responses they had given. People were asked
what other important priorities or issues the General Plan should address and
many people took the opportunity to again say that traffic was very important. Next
they were asked if they would like to provide any more detail or clarification on
an question or topic in response to a question asking what they would do to
most improve Diamond Bar over the next 20 years, again traffic emerged as a
major quality of life issue. Also, many of the same topics that came up through
other questions resurfaced in more detail, In the summary report that analyzes all
of the survey responses, there is a very long appendix that includes every single
free response to all of the survey questions.
4. EXISTING CONDITIONS REPORT SUMMARY:
This is an important task for consultants because while there is value in hearing a
lot of the anecdotal and personal experience people have from living in the
community, it is also important to get a thorough understanding of the data
regarding the existing conditions i.e. what is actually on the ground, before
beginning to plan for the future. There are a lot of topics to cover and the planners
decided to split this research into three different volumes: The first takes a look at
Land Use, Community Character & Design and Traffic and Transportation. The
second focuses on Economic, Market and Fiscal conditions and the third volume
focuses on our Environmental Resources and Constraints, as well as Public
Facilities, Services and Utilities.
The first volume focuses a lot of what planners think of as the bread and butter of
planning — how land is currently being used, what the existing General Plan says,
what types of land use designations, zoning districts it has, what development
proposals are coming along and, the urban design characteristics of the City. How
does it look and feel in its built form today and where are opportunities for future
land uses as Diamond Bar looks to the future. As part of that a handful of places
were identified where there is some opportunity for land use change, evolution, or
transformation over time. Keeping in mind what the planners had heard from
people about that interest in seeing some kind of a town center, they looked at
where realistically, something like that could be developed. Ms. Martin again
MARCH 29, 2017
emphasized that this is a long-range plan, a long-range policy document that
articulates a vision for a 20 -year timeframe. There are no specific development,
proposals associated with this plan. Nobody is coming in and developing any one
of these sites tomorrow as part of this process — it is about visioning and it is about
thinking long-term. In looking at these sites there was some spatial analysis done
to get a better sense of how they are currently developed and what their prospects
might be for the future — how likely are they to change and evolve over time, and
if they do change, how could they best meet the community's needs.
Diamond Bar does not really have a traditional downtown and if the community
decides this is something that this plan should pursue or look into if it is a high
priority, there are a lot of opportunity areas that can be looked at more closely.
What that looks like and what form it takes is going to be something that needs to
be studied closely and include a lot of options which will be an area of focus for the
next phase. The City really does have potential to offer residents more options for
local shopping, entertainment, dining and so on.
The next section focused on Circulation and Mobility and traffic, level of service,
and congestion, etc. which were studied in a holistic manner, as well as other
aspects of the transportation system including goods movement, general
transportation system performance, public transit and how easy it is to walk and
bike around. And, regional traffic and the congestion that it produces on the
freeways, as well as on the City's streets is a really significant problem. However,
the City's ability to actually influence and control traffic that is a result of regional
growth patterns is very limited, and will be a real challenge for this plan while
looking at how the City can position itself to alleviate some of those impacts on
residents while still making sure that regional traffic is able to move through the
entire system. There may be some opportunities to alleviate congestion by
strengthening some alternative modes of travel, by looking at traffic calming
strategies to improve safety and discourage cut -through traffic and also to keep
abreast of the future transportation projects that are occurring through Caltrans in
other jurisdictions that will have impacts on the highways and roadways.
The second volume focused on Economics, Market Conditions and various Fiscal
topics. This is an exercise that begins to take a look at long-term planning for
different uses, such as how many new residential units and new square footage of
various non-residential uses, is the City likely to see demand for over time. Even
if the City continues to grow at a relatively slow pace, there will be demand for
these various uses. This is a combination of taking a look at socioeconomic trends
MARCH 29, 2017 PAGE 10 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
and projections, as well as capacity of the City to support new uses over time.
Planners looked at the City's current fiscal conditions to understand where its
sources of revenue are coming from at this time. The City gets a pretty large
percentage of discretionary revenue from property taxes and sales taxes, and
while it has enjoyed a surplus in recent years, it is still subject to the fluctuations of
the regional and national economy as a whole. So taking a look at what land uses
mean for the City's fiscal bottom line is an important part of the next phase of
analysis.
The City needs to look forward to some new development opportunities in order to
maintain that long-term fiscal sustainability, to have a balanced mix of uses to
support services that contribute so much to the City's quality of life. Another key
finding that supports what is being discussed is that Diamond Bar does currently
experience some pretty significant leakage in retail sales to other jurisdictions. And
looking for ways that the City can capture where people that live here are spending
their retail dollars — to have them spend locally, will really position the City more
positively.
The third volume focused on various environmental topics, as well as Public
Facilities & Services. This covers the whole range of topics from Air Quality,
Greenhouse Gases, Biological Resources, Plants and Animals, Hydrology, Fire
Hazards and other types of hazards, as well as Noise. The issues that Diamond
Bar faces from an environmental standpoint are not unique. They are shared by
other communities nearby and by many communities throughout southern
California and the State as a whole. Generally in this area, issues pertaining to air
quality, wildfire hazards and water resources are the most pertinent and every one
of those has the potential to be further exacerbated by a change in climate. For
public facilities, planners. looked at parks, trails, recreational opportunities, schools,
public safety and utilities that are supplied to residences and businesses. What
has emerged from this research is that while residents so value the parks, the open
space, the recreational amenities that they have, the City is actually pretty under-
served from both a total acreage perspective, as well as an access perspective.
This looks notjust at the total amount of parks acreage as a ratio to the population,
but also how easy it is to get there and these areas around the parks show five
and 10 minute walking distances. And there are a lot of residential areas that are
not covered by these zones. There are a lot of neighborhoods where individuals
are not within a 10 -minute walk of a park. And while people can certainly drive
there, being able to take a family to a park in their neighborhood is something
people really value. So, the total amount and access of established parkland is
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currently not meeting the City's standard for meeting the needs of the resident
population, Along with the park space, there was a lot of interest in seeing more
facilities for more community groups — youth, teens, and seniors. There are a lot
of great facilities in Diamond Bar that people are fighting to get access to. They
are limited and they are very popular. So looking for ways to increase that will be
a high priority. Schools are a tremendous asset, a pride of the community and
something that brings a lot of people to and keeps them in the City.
Ms. Martin said that the next steps in this process involve starting to move beyond
the base understanding of what is currently existing and to begin planning for the
future by coming up with a couple of different land use alternatives and diagrams
that illustrate how the City might grow and change over time in response to some
of these opportunities, challenges and priorities that were heard in the first phase.
From all of the background research and community input, planners will come up
with a few different concepts, each of which will be evaluated to understand what
the impacts of those choices would be on the circulation system, the City's
infrastructure, the City's fiscal bottom line and other metrics to understand the
implications of the choices. Those alternatives will again be shared with the
community and there will be a similar round of outreach (workshop, survey, pop-
up event) to let people know their priorities were heard and accordingly, three
different ways in which that could play out will be presented. The consultants will
share those results with the GPAC, Planning Commission and City Council to
ultimately arrive at a preferred land use plan which will form the basis of the rest
of the General Plan. The General Plan has a lot of different topics (7 or so main
chapters) and many people think of land use and the land use diagram being the
heart of the document. Once the preferred land use plan is determined, it will serve
as the basis for building the rest of the plan/policy document.
The schedule is as follows: After this evening's meeting, consultants will dive into
the alternatives analysis to take a close look at a few different concepts, go back
out to the community to do that analysis over the course of the summer and hope
to arrive at a preferred land use plan sometime in the fall. After that point, work
will commence on writing the plan.
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PAGE 12 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
6. QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, DISCUSSION
C/Tye asked how the different responses from different groups and how similar the
responses were is validated. How does one assume it is not the same people
providing the same information?
Ms. Martin said that this was not a scientific statistical survey. It is definitely
possible and probable that some people did attend multiple events; however, she
believes that by holding events at different settings, the process was able to reach
out to a pretty broad spectrum of the community. There was a great diversity of
people who attended the workshop, but there is no way to say that it was not
precisely the same 60 people showing up time and time again.
C/Tye asked if locations were suggested for a town center or downtown area.
There was a map showing a Metrolink station which, if the City or its
representatives suggested, made no sense to him because it is not in Diamond
Bar. If someone that used the Metrolink station suggested it, he would understand
that because they use it and perhaps are not aware that they traveled through
Diamond Bar and were actually in the City of Industry. Another was the old Honda
property and he does not believe there is anything that could be at the outward
most edge of the City limits.
Ms. Martin responded that it came from numerous sources. The consultants heard
firsthand from people that were asked where something like that could be located
and people brought up a lot of different topics. The discussion involved staff
members and the consultants did their own analysis of places where there is
potential for redevelopment. She believed there was a bit of conflation in the maps
and the way in which the outreach was characterized. This looked at notjustwhere
a potential for a town center might be but also places where there is the greatest
opportunity for redevelopment of one sort or another. So while there is some
overlap, they are not entirely the same thing.
MPT/Low asked if the different sizes and colors of the words in the "cloud" slides
was for artistic purposes or did it represent the strength of the issue being
addressed.
Ms. Martin said that the size of the word corresponds to how frequently it was
mentioned in the survey responses.
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C/Lyons asked if in considering these ideas the cost came into focus or were these
ideas without consideration to cost.
Ms. Martin responded that generally speaking, people were encouraged to put
anything and everything on the table. However, she recalls from some of the
outreach (surveys and comments) that people are concerned about costs. They
do not want to send the City down the path of financial ruin and they do want to
know what the impacts are going to be. Consultants tried to encourage people to
put out as many ideas as they wanted to at this stage in the process and that in
the next stage, the process would take a much closer look at the financial
implications.
C/Herrera asked at what point there would be discussion of the financial viability
of some of these different sites and which might be achievable? The City does not
own the Metrolink or any of the buildings that might be reused for some other
purpose and if that was a consideration, where would the City get the finances to
accomplish that. The Diamond Bar Honda site is only four acres and what is the
feasibility of looking at that site for a town center/downtown development? At what
point will this process look at the different sites to determine which are more
financially feasible/achievable than other site?
Ms. Martin responded that it is an important component of the next phase. The
alternative analysis will include a Financial Feasibility Assessment of up to five
different prototypical developments that could take place on these sites. When
town centers and development opportunities are talked about, there is not an
assumption that it would be the City itself developing these properties in these
ways. These are privately held properties and there may be some sites that are
City -owned. Generally speaking, this is a discussion about actions that are taken
by the private sector. Since Redevelopment no longer exists, it is not an option.
The General Plan, in contemplating these types of uses is taking the role of
expressing a vision of how it would like development to occur in the future should
people decide to redevelop land they own. As an example, the golf course would
not be redeveloped by the City but should it change hands to an owner that is
interested in developing it over time, the role of the General Plan is to articulate
the land use parameters the City expects to see on a site like that. Again, the City
would not be responsible for doing and paying for that development project.
MARCH 29, 2017 PAGE 14 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
C/Herrera asked if the consultants were looking for feedback from the Council and
Commission on those different sites or would that come at a future meeting.
Ms. Martin said that if Councilmembers wished to provide feedback on which sites
they believed to be viable, that information will be taken into consideration
whenever it becomes available.
Comm/Mahlke said that while reading the survey report she was struck by the
inherent conflict of wanting resources, retail and availability, but not traffic which is
difficult for Diamond Bar. From a curiosity standpoint, is that something the
consultants see in their line of work. Secondly, will the alternative analysis attempt
to figure out how those two things could happen and as this goes back out to the
surveys and GPAC, will the questions be designated in a wayto promote reckoning
that has to be done between those two very conflicting ideas.
Ms. Martin responded "definitely." The first answer is "yes" it is very common that
everybody always wants the good stuff and doesn't want the bad stuff.
Unfortunately, traffic is a way of life. The planners and staff will do their best to
mitigate it to the greatest extent possible and try to make smart land use decisions
that help alleviate traffic. One of the ways to start answering the second question,
to help alleviate traffic is to start thinking about the types of trips that people are
taking and what is the nature of those trips? What percentage of trips are occurring
around town, running local errands, going to school, going to the grocery store?
What percentage of them are going straight through Diamond Bar without stopping
and what percentage of them are starting in Diamond Bar and ending somewhere
else or vice versa, such as a commute trip. Where there is an opportunity to start
cutting down on traffic, setting aside the pass-through traffic as a different
conversation, is taking a look at the mix of land uses within the City. If there is a
certain percentage of trips that are occurring because people are unable to get the
goods, services, recreation, entertainment, etc. here in town and they are taking
car trips to Chino Hills, Brea, etc. to obtain those things and Diamond Bar can
provide them with those amenities here in the City, then some of those longer trips
will disappear or they may be shorter in length or rather than take multiple trips,
take one trip and accomplish multiple goals at the same time. This process begins
to look at some of those results reveal themselves as it looks closely at traffic
modeling of some of these alternatives so that will be an interesting point of
comparison to look at in the next phase.
MARCH 29, 2017 PAGE 15 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
Com/Farago asked why a developer has not come to Diamond Bar to develop a
site into a downtown like they have in some of the surrounding communities. What
is it about Diamond Bar that has not attracted that type of development now,
because one would assume that some of this would have already occurred?
Ms. Martin said that was a great question and she imagines that staff may be able
to speak to that to some extent more than she can; however, there are a whole
host of reasons people chose to develop one place versus another. One way in
which her staff can try to take a look at some of those issues is to determine how
conducive the City's current land use regulations and process are for producing
that type of development and would the Diamond Bar land use districts and
standards even permit that type of development? They may not. Is the process
one that is onerous in some way or have other cities, for example, been able to,
through various means, offer some kind of incentives for those types of
developments to take place. Is it a matter of available land or available parcel
sizes? Diamond Bar may have parcel sizes that are not really conducive to larger
developments or maybe the parcels that are appropriate for that are owned by
people who are not interested in doing anything with them. If older shopping
centers have been around for a time and the property owners are perfectly happy
with their revenue stream they have no incentive to change that up and why bother.
A lot of what this is about is whether the City really wants to see some kind of
change and it may involve taking steps to make it worth the property owner's while
to change what they have in place. She would say that probably that inertia above
anything else can be very difficult to overcome.
Com/Farago asked if generating that inertia was part of this plan/exercise.
Ms. Martin said that property owners may see an update to a General Plan as a
sign from a City that they may be interested in working with the property owner on
something like that. Cities whose General Plans, Zoning or Development
Standards have been in place for a long time and haven't really produced anything
different and don't really indicate any great vision or initiative on the City's part,
there is nothing that will make a property owner look at that and say, "all right, I'm
ready to play ball." Whereas, often a process like this can serve as a catalyst for
getting people to think about what opportunities might be in play that they had not
previously considered.
MARCH 29, 2017
PAGE 16 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
Chair/Wolfe said that once he got past the big T -word (traffic) on the cloud site,
some of the other words and thoughts that concerned him were "boring and bland"
which he feels is why there is a conversation about community identity. Three of
the examples that were suggested as possible things to aspire toward are
Claremont, Monrovia and Brea and all of those communities had a historical
downtown upon which they built up into something that many communities now
look to as something they wished they could have. It is one thing this community
has never really had. This is a much younger community and really, Diamond
Bar's example is Chino Hills. But he believes the competition that Chino Hills has
built will make it much more difficult for Diamond Bar to do something akin to that.
So he wonders if there are other communities for which the team has worked on
General Plan updates that are in a similar scenario to Diamond Bar where there
are external pressures that might dictate having to look in a different direction.
Diamond Bar will not be Claremont or have a downtown Claremont for a number
of reasons, but primarily because the City does not have that "historic" center of
town. It won't be Brea for the same reason and it won't be Monrovia, Pasadena,
etc. Chino Hills has built a fantastic vibrant city community center with lots of
shops, lots of restaurants, lots of opportunities for people to be outside and enjoy
themselves and it is just down the road from us and easily accessible from this
community. He thinks Diamond Bar would be hard pressed to replicate something
like that which in his mind is what the City would have to be looking to do to create
a community center. Certainly, we could try to build something that is slightly
different but he does not know what that would be and he is wondering if in her
experience doing this work in other communities that other cities have this same
problem. Majestic Realty is going to build a bunch of stuff just to the west of the
City on Grand Avenue which is going to further erode Diamond Bar's ability to
attract the kinds of restaurants that some of the respondents were concerned
about, whether it is high-end restaurants or a number of restaurants and some of
the other activities. What have other communities done to create their own
community identity and if they merely replicate what is being done east and west
of a community, any such effort will likely fail. Ms. Martin said that no City exists
in a vacuum. Even when she and her colleagues do work for cities that are a little
bit more geographically isolated, they are always subject to outside pressures.
More often than not, she and her colleagues work in communities that have very
close neighbors. Here in the LA area and in the Bay area, San Francisco
Peninsula and in the East Bay, it is city after city after city. They are all in a row
and they cannot help what their neighbor does. The best they can do is be aware
of it and react to it. It is very common. Ultimately, the market is really the primary
determinant of what can happen and how many retail spaces a region can support.
The region as a whole is continuing to grow, not just Diamond Bar but the whole
MARCH
2017
PAGE 17
• JOINT r )
of LA County and neighboring counties. There will always be some additional
demand for these types of things generated purely by population growth. Beyond
that, what is really challenging for cities is that economic development strategy and
identifying what it is that is going to set the City apart and what the City is going to
try to foster and brand and create that is different. If the neighbor to the west starts
putting in big big -box stores, sure, that will take some of the market for some of
those big uses for sure. What she believes is critical for Diamond Bar to consider
getting to the Chino Hills example, is creating some kind of a space, should the
City decide it wants to pursue, that is not just a collection of places for people to
spend money, but a place where people actually want to spend time. That is really
the critical element. When she said this City is not really going to be a master
developer, she also said that the City will still play a large role in shaping what that
place looks like and also shaping what the public realm looks and feels like. Having
some role in how the streets are designed, how walkable the area is, if there is a
community center integrated into part of that, if there is some kind of connection to
the trails system. There is definitely a partnership there and she believes the
challenge is to come up with what that identity is to make something really unique
so that people will really want to stay here in town for or perhaps even attract
people from Chino Hills to come to and to try and carve out that market niche and
do it in a way that can be supported by the economy and market forces at large.
It is not easy, but lots of cities that are next to each other have town centers that
are right next to each other.
ChairANolfe said that part of the commentary was the lack/discontinuity for walking
and cycling trails and he believes that for a community like this with its topography
which is very similar to certain areas in the Bay area, in his mind, this City is built
of many separate communities and he thinks the important thing for Diamond Bar
as it looks to the future is not necessarily creating connectivity on the major
thoroughfares and connecting bike routes on Grand Avenue so that people can
travel through the region, it is more making sure that children can walk to and from
school within their respective communities, that they can walk to and from their
park areas, which in most of the communities are possible, but less, in his mind, a
focus on creating this mass network of cycling and walking trails that threads
throughout the City and connects to neighboring cities. He is just not sure that this
community is that focused on that type of connectivity with the type of topography
it has.
MARCH 29, 2017 PAGE 18 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
MPT/Low asked if at some point demographics will be available to the study to
compare demographics and economics that have been garnered during this
phase.
Ms. Martin responded that the second volume of the background report includes a
lot of demographics, both of Diamond Bar and of some of its neighboring
communities and when it comes to land use projections of how much growth it can
support demographics and economics will play a role in that they will be able to
equate acreage planned for single family homes to a certain number of people who
would reside in those homes.
M/Lin said that in any type of plan and studies that involve the public, when the
study is concluded many say they were not aware of things and when a plan is
formulated they may say it is not what they want. He is concerned that when a
vocal minority comes to a meeting to voice their opinions, the silent majority does
not have a say. Before the preferred plan is put on paper, will there be another
round of a more comprehensive public input process such as a website or online
survey where people can respond.
Ms. Martin responded that a website exists and the survey was online. They
continue to shape the outreach process based on what was successful and what
was not successful from the first phase. The good news is that the list of people
who have expressed interest in this process is growing. Whenever anyone comes
to any of the events or logs onto the website and puts in their email address, etc.
they become part of the mailing list and will receive notifications of every meeting,
online survey, etc. There will be another complete round of public outreach during
the next phase that will be multi -pronged. It will have both an in-person
component, as well as an online component. They will be going to some of the
same types of events that were mentioned before. They often find that the trouble
with workshops is that it asks people to go to yet another "thing" that is not on their
schedule. And so the advantage of going to an event that is already occurring is
that people are already there and they do not have to attend a separate event.
They have done mailers, advertised in various City publications and staff has been
great at publicizing things and the Public Information team has a lot of really great
ideas for how these things can be disseminated. The team is always open to
suggestions from you and anyone in the community of how the team could better
reach out.
MARCH 29 ,2017 ,.. ' JOINT CC & PC MTG #P1
M/Lin asked if the GPAC members' input reflected on the results of these events.
Ms. Martin responded that all of the meeting notes from the GPAC meetings are
typed up separately so that anyone can see what members specifically had to say.
She knows that there were a number of GPAC members who attended the
workshop as observers rather than participating. Whether or not they responded
to the survey, she cannot say.
M/Lin said that Diamond Bar had a very successful redevelopment trend over the
last couple of years. The Country Hills Town Center was a blighted retail location
and a developer turned that around to be one of the more popular community
centers. Based on the county statistics for 2016, the average per -family income
was $118,000 which is higher than Beverly Hills which was $78,000. He believes
there is money to be spent in Diamond Bar and what is needed is to find out what
suits the residents as far as businesses and activities.
C/Lyons asked if responses were from residents only or if there were responses
from people who live in other communities.
Yesenia Arias said that while she could not speak to other venues, the first
question asked at pop-up events was whether they were residents. Events at the
schools involved residents.
C/Lyons said that the team might want to consider being a part of the Concerts in
the Park events because many people attend those events. However, there are
non-residents who attend as well so the team would want to be careful to determine
residency.
C/Tye felt the more immediate event was the City's Birthday Party which would
afford a great outreach opportunity.
Chair/Wolfe said that one of his colleagues informed him that the response rate is
only about 8/10ths of one percent and to put that in context, LA County spent about
$19 million for its last election at the beginning of this month and they had over 11
percent response which is dismal. While there is a lot of data in front of the Council
and Commission he really thinks that what the City is trying to do is to look to what
the future of this community should be and he thinks that not even having one
MARCH 29, 2017
PAGE 20 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
percent of the population respond is inadequate at best and he does not believe it
is a data sample set size the City should accept as the basis for moving forward.
In short, he believes everyone needs to figure out some strategies for getting out
into the community and being more proactive. This is a tough bedroom community
and everybody is coming home after a long day of commuting and they really do
not want to be bothered. But he believes it is a mistake to say well, this is the level
of response the City can secure so we're going to move forward. Something
different has to be figured out before the City can be done and he does not know
the answer. In his daily job he works with Arellano and Associates on other things
and they have a similar problem as M/Lin pointed out his firm has. It is very difficult,
but he believes this is very critical to the future success of this community so that
hopefully, our children will want to live in this community that we can't say "that's
good enough."
C/Herrera opined that this is quite a document with lots of information. She
highlighted that people did not want the City to be harmed — they want fiscal
sustainability and yet, they want ballfields, they want a senior center of their own,
they want a youth center for teens, they want senior housing. We, the City, would
like a hotel for fiscal sustainability and she believed a hotel on a 4 -acre site would
not be feasible or realistic in the future. However, if we look at a piece of land
where a lot of these things can be achieved, that is the golf course. If there was a
specific plan that included senior housing, walking trails, a small senior center
adjacent to the senior housing, on the other side of Grand Avenue convert the club
house into a Youth Center, put some ballfields in that area and leave the space
closest to the homes a nine -hole golf course (mini-course/executive course) and a
hotel. Restaurants would love to be in that location and visible from the freeway.
There is a huge development going in on Grand Avenue but it will be hidden and
not visible from the freeway. Businesses love visibility — they want to be seen from
the freeway and have people leave the freeway to visit their businesses. The
Diamond Bar Golf Course is going to be minimized when the SR57/60 Confluence
becomes a reality because the project will take land away from the golf course.
She does not know what the process would be to look at what is really realistic,
feasible and viable and conversely, there could perhaps be a golf course on Tres
Hermanos.
Ms. Martin said that this type of analysis is exactly what the planners hope to get
into in the next phase. And again, while it is a General Plan and not a Specific
Plan, should the community decide that it is interested in repurposing the golf
course in that way she believes a Specific Plan would be the appropriate tool and
ATITOOTMIPUF111oreliz 11-11115610-1:114 &110111A
the role of the General Plan would be to specify what the Specific Plan would then
need to include and could include some of those uses C/Herrera mentioned.
M/Lin asked if the consultants would be presenting a single plan or if there would
be a selection of plans.
Ms. Martin explained that the alternatives analysis will look at three different
scenarios. Ultimately, when this process gets to the preferred plan there will
necessarily be a range of buildout that is possible according to that particular land
use plan purely because, for every site land use designations are applied and
typically, there is a range of development intensity that could occur i.e. single family
2-7 units per acre, and on non-residential sites FAR so there could be a real variety
depending on the intensity of what occurs on any given site. They typically try to
arrive at something that represents a reasonable mid -point for purposes of analysis
and they will look at more of that range when this process gets to the EIR and are
doing the analysis there, both on the preferred plan and on EIR alternatives.
Lew Herndon stated that he has been a Parks and Recreation Commission for
more than 10 years and for decades prior to that Diamond Bar has had a shortage
of youth sports fields. The 2011 Parks Master Plan acknowledged the shortage of
parks and sports fields. Tonight the documents before the Council and
Commission further acknowledge the shortage of parks and sports fields. Why is
this important? About three years ago The Daily Bulletin exposed that less than
one in three of students in WVUSD and PUSD can pass the basic California
physical fitness test. A follow up article stated that the problem was not improving,
but getting worse and child diabetes, obesity and related illnesses were on the
upswing. In his opinion, Diamond Bar needs to offer its children an incentive to
play outdoor sports by providing them with sufficient lighted and up-to-date youth
sports fields. He suggested that the planners talk to the youth sports board of
directors who represent thousands of families in the City.
Lee Paulson said the 1995 General Plan's stated goal is to "maintain the rural
setting of the community through the retention and maintenance of extensive
amounts of natural open space and hillside vegetation" and under the Land Use
policies stated "design new subdivisions to minimize their impact on community
character, surrounding neighborhoods and natural features." He realized that the
southern part of Diamond Bar's Sphere of Influence in LA County is a significant
ecological area #15 and LA County has specific language in their goals and
MARCH 29, 2017
PAGE 22 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
policies for open space that says "prioritize open space acquisitions for available
land that contain unique ecological features, streams, watersheds, habitat types,
and/or offer linkages that enhance wildlife movements and genetic diversity." That
area of the Boy Scout Ranch and the southern portion is one of the most
ecologically diverse areas in the entire country and he would like to see the
language which prioritizes those significant ecological areas placed into the
updated Diamond Bar General Plan which offers a link between the pieces of Tres
Hermanos and would allow the City to determine to a significant degree what
happens in Tres Hermanos. Secondly, he understood that Diamond Bar allows
developers to pay a mitigation fee for cutting down ecologically valuable trees and
to reduce the amount of parkland in their developments but he was also told that
that money goes into the General Fund for additional parks which he has not seen
happen. He felt any mitigation fees should be required to create those things
someplace else (replacement of trees or building of new parks). His
understanding is that the Planning Commission is talking about passing an
ordinance that any request to build a granny flat does not need an environmental
review.
Jim Gallagher said he and his wife moved to Chino Hills in 1993 and at that time
they were excited to be part of a new city and participated in its General Plan.
Residents were proud of the fact that when their city was developed that foremost
in the General Plan was the vision of an open space and a rural -like atmosphere.
As a result, Chino Hills enjoys 3,000 acres of community -owned open space that
is visible throughout the community, 39 miles of trails and 50 parks with a good
economic base that sustains the community. He urged the City Council, Planning
Commission and consultants to try to figure out how to work that formula into
Diamond Bar's General Plan amendment to prevent urban sprawl. He is present
tonight to express his concern about Tres Hermanos and believes Chino Hills and
Diamond Bar should keep Tres Hermanos as open space. It is part of a natural
watershed and part of the missing middle of the wildlife corridor that goes from the
Cleveland National Forest to Puente Hills. He envisions open space revenue
sharing, a conservation easement or tax -based sharing between the two
communities.
M/Lin said by the way, a large part of the traffic problem in Diamond Bar is caused
by the Chino Hills traffic.
Robin Smith spoke about the Existing Conditions report and what she felt were its
flaws and inconsistencies in the Biological Resources section. She summarized a
6: •.29, 2017 PAGE 23 GP ,.
document she provided to the Council and Commission. The map is incorrect on
many levels. It is not a true representation of field surveys and it affects the health
and well-being of the community, especially now when it is critical that any plan
the City creates to mitigate the greenhouse gas emissions which the City is bound
to do, if this opportunity of how the City can capitalize and partake of its natural
resources, it will result in a huge loss. The City enjoys natural aquifers, clean
groundwater, and natural settings of trees on hills and in valleys that serve to clean
the water and the air, which is a unique environmental situation to Diamond Bar.
She wants tangible answers to her questions to learn what a corrective scenario
would be on any subject in the Existing Conditions report because this report will
change the baseline upon which all other work is based. For purposes of
transparency and to inform the public, she would like the minutes of the GPAC
meeting posted on the website two weeks after the event and not months after.
Allen Wilson said that the survey said that people wanted more business but no
more traffic and he believes to have a more healthy community there should be
the opportunity for "walk and shop" days for Diamond Bar. Residents need to use
their purchasing power. Before asking more businesses to come into Diamond
Bar this process needs to look at the fact that many main street businesses have
closed and more are closing every day. It is true this is a bedroom community, not
a historical community. He lives within walking distance of the golf course and if
that property is developed, it will impact his community. Residents want more
walking areas and the bigger challenge is the topography.
June Harris said she did not receive the survey and never saw a pop-up. Her kids
do not go to DBHS. Is there a better way to reach out to get more people in the
community to participate? None of her neighbors knew about it. She knew about
the planning because she looks at the website on occasion.
Bob Belker, a 30 -year resident, said he was very involved with the business
community when the City was first incorporated. He has 25 years of helping
nurture new business everywhere but Diamond Barwhich is why he ran for Council
and will run again. Something he heard that got him excited was the debate about
the sampling and where the data came from. But when those who come from out
of town are criticized that if this City is going to be built it should be thought of as
a "destination" and if there are people responding to queries and are from out of
town, seize that opportunity and find out why they are here. That is what Diamond
Bar needs to build on.
MARCH 29, 2017
PAGE 24 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
Paul Diebold, Wagon Trail Road, was a commuter and is now semi -retired and
wanted to observe this process and become more involved in it. He gathers from
the conversation this evening that there is a significant interest in establishing or
improving on the unique identity of Diamond Bar or creating a "sense of place" and
creating an identity for the community. One theme that seems to run through the
comments this evening is the extent to which we have preserved natural resources
and in that arena, the City has what might be referred to as a comparative
advantage in natural resources that may be somewhat unique in terms of the
region. Brea went the road of creating a downtown with theaters and associated
retail uses. Chino Hills did something similar and they have plans to include
residential. He believes Diamond Bar could look at the potential to build on
Diamond Bar's natural resources as some sort of an "eco' community by looking
to the future economy and what will happen 20 years from now. He believes there
will be an even greater emphasis on environmental quality, health and well-being
within the community and a lot of commercial activity in that sector that would
sustain the community economically and environmentally. Another item has been
what is around the City and he briefly looked at the slide presentations and all of
the maps end at the boundaries of Diamond Bar. He believes the alternatives
process should take into account and inform Diamond Bar residents as to what
those adjacent land use and plans are in Industry and the south boundary of the
City.
Robert Manford, a 13 -year resident and a city planner. Diamond Bar's topography
does not lend itself to a unified planning model, it is more to quality -centric or
customer -centric. It would be good to look at sub -areas so that each sub -area can
plan accordingly. Someone indicated that seems to be a conflict between adding
business which would create additional traffic problems and he believes using
j ystemati( GGli route strategies would be helpful to revitalization strategies.
Another questioned why there are no developers interested in Diamond Bar? He
believes public-private partnerships would be good and it would be good as part
of the public outreach for the City to invite developers to come and look at Diamond
Bar and the City needs to decide what it can do that would be helpful to the
businesses.
Mario Salas saw the notice for tonight's meeting in The Windmill. He knows there
will be construction in the area of the SR57160 and wanted to know if that would
include the SR57 to the SR60 east. He agrees with a previous speaker that Tres
Hermanos should remain intact while allowing for the community to participate in
that area with minimal to no development distress to the environment. He believes
AR 29, 2017 PAGEJOINT
the City can have businesses without additional traffic impacts. He believes most
of the City's traffic problems have to do with pass-through traffic. If business is
increased, it may increase the amount of traffic to a slight degree but it is not a big
deal. Fighting pass-through traffic to get from home to the freeway is a problem.
John Verdugo has children at Quail Summit, Chaparral and DBHS and is very
aware of the traffic and other communities coming into the City's fields and
Diamond Bar youth going out to other fields. He agreed with Mr. Herndon about
field use and field allocations and what thatwill be in the future. He is on the board
of Diamond Bar Go Softball (field manager) who is on the fields all of the time and
his thought is that the fields and parking could be redesigned and buildings could
be moved it would greatly enhance the sport fields. Because this is a good
community and the fields are much better than fields in other cities the youth like
to stay here and it will attract more youth from outside the City who want to be a
part of the Diamond Bar leagues and the school districts. In his opinion, growth
for Diamond Bar should be geared more toward families, family events such as
Concerts in the Park and parks and recreation activities and the hills should be
preserved.
Peggy Jackson, a 40 -year resident, moved to Diamond Bar because the theme
was "Diamond Bar Country Living" and it really was a beautiful town. She has
seen it grow but as a previous speaker said, the thing that stood out to her from
the presentation was that the City was boring and bland and in her words, ugly.
The City has grown to not have the beauty the City used to have and she wanted
to know if there were CC&R's for commercial properties in the City because she
believed that if the look of the commercial properties were improved and especially
if the Planning Commission and the people who have given this presentation will
concentrate more on the look of an environment and atmosphere can be created
that will make people feel like she felt when she first moved to the City.
RESPONSE TO PUBLIC COMMENTS:
CDD/Gubman responded to comments critical of the public outreach efforts that in
coordination with the City's Public Information department, staff has identified
several venues to advertise the various outreach efforts to encourage participation
in the General Plan" Update process which has included sending out individual
mailers to all residents for the first and only workshop to date. The information is
on the City's website and pop-up events where signage and other handout
information has been provided to inform the community about the website where
MARCH 29, 2017
PAGE 26 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
they can register and receive updates. Every month in the DBConnection City
Newsletter there is a small article that features the General Plan Update process.
The City also uses its various social media tools which require community
members to be registered. Staff and planners continue to work with Public
Information staff to identify other opportunities and if there are specific segments
of the community that are not being reached staff will look into the possibility of
other outlets where the net can be widened to alert folks to all- of the various
activities that are part of the General Plan Update process.
ChairM/olfe reiterated that it would be incorrect for this process to proceed with
such a small respondent list from the City. Everybody goes to the grocery store
and the Girl Scouts are very successful in selling cookies and wondered if there
were things that have not been done in the past that could be implemented to
enhance the public outreach so that this process can garner a much higher
percentage. In fact, he would argue that even 10 percent is not satisfactory for
what the City is trying to accomplish but he would be happier with 10 percent than
less than one percent.
Com1Mahlke looked through the Diamond Bar Facebook page and found no
mention of tonight's meeting within the last week. She knows that it is difficult and
that the City cannot make people like the City's Facebook page, but the reality is
that as people scroll Diamond Bar is not being seen. There are less than 3,000
people that like the City's Facebook page which is a very small amount of people
considering how many people likely are on Facebook. Perhaps Facebook needs
to be approached with a different idea as well and perhaps by increasing input in
terms of social networking and technology, it will provide a different cross-section
as well which is vital input. Tomorrow night is the State of the City address and
there is always a great video and fun things and why aren't we doing that for this?
Make people want to be involved. She doesn't know what the answer is but if it is
not being put on the City's Facebook page Diamond Bar is missing opportunities.
Ms. Arias said that in her experience in working with different cities on projects like
this, bluntly speaking, General Plans are not sexy and there is not a lot of inertia
at the beginning. But what she has found is that once the City establishes an
"identity" for the project people begin to get involved and people are given the
opportunity to provide feedback. Some of those ideas are reflected in the
alternatives that are presented during phase 2. The number of respondents goes
up. The number of people that are interested goes up. The discussions get a little
healthier and meatier as the project moves forward. She is sorry that the
MARCH 29, 2017 a
AGE 27 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #3
Commissioners are discouraged by the numbers, but when she and her team are
out in the community asking for people to complete a 16 -question survey, there is
usually only one person in the household who will complete the survey. She
believes that the comprehensive program the consultants have put together has a
traditional base and it has a social media base and there are a lot of constituents
that prefer to get their information in hardcover in the mail because they want to
read it. There are some individuals who would rather have the survey available
online. She has taken copious notes and the City did a really good job of putting
signs up three weeks prior to the workshops so that people could have an idea of
what was coming and how they could participate. She offered that this could be
expanded to make sure to use Facebook more often because so many things
come up on Facebook and Twitter so fast that people scroll to the latest news.
She understands there is room for improvement, but she does not want anyone to
be discouraged because she believes Phase 2 will spark more interest and be a
little more entertaining. She is telling her neighbors about it and hopes that
everyone here does the same.
C/Tye asked how many surveys were taken, started to be filled out and did not get
turned in or was every survey that was picked up returned completed?
Ms. Arias said that during the pop -ups, iPads were available and if people were
provided an iPad they completed the survey onsite. The surveys that were handed
out were usually taken home. None were returned to her. She was told by people
who took hard copies that they needed to take them home and formulate their
ideas and that they would complete the survey online and return it to the City. She
does not know how many people actually did that but she felt that regardless of
whether they returned the survey that person was made aware of the project and
what was coming.
C/Tye asked because he felt 16 questions is a bit onerous and it might lose
people's attention after 8 questions.
Ms. Arias said she received that feedback which was constructive criticism they
received from the community that perhaps the survey was too long. Phase 2
includes another survey that is slightly more interactive (scenarios, trade-offs,
priorities, costs, etc.) so they can select one priority over another, for example. It
is more entertaining and dynamic over a Q&A situation which she hopes will result
in more engagement and feedback.
MARCH 29, 2017
PAGE 28 -GP4,-QINT CC & PC MTG #2
NEXT STEPS IN THE PROCESS:
CDD/Gubman stated that from this point the next step is to embark on Phase 2
and there has been some groundwork done on that. There will be no joint meetings
or GPAC meetings while staff and the consultants begin crafting the Alternatives
Plan. This will not go into granular detail but will be in draft form and somewhat
nebulous but detailed enough so that it can be presented to the GPAC and
community to begin having some iterative feedback to better define the plan and
make sure that as this process moves from a more bubbled diagram graphics to
more specific graphic information that it will be done in an interactive way. It will
probably be a couple of months before the next GPAC meeting which does not
mean that things have come to a standstill. There is a lot of data and feedback to
work with which will be the basis for the next phase. Staff will continue to provide
monthly updates in the DBConnection newsletter and will be re-evaluating other
venues to keep the General Plan Update process in the public eye so that when
the next round of public meetings is announced it will not come as a complete
surprise.
M/Lin said he sensed that the outreach process needed to be modified and he
suggested that staff and the consultants could work toward a modified framework
and present it to the Planning Commission and City Council so that the Council
Members and Commissioners know what the next phase of outreach activity will
be.
CDD/Gubman responded that there is an outreach program that was mapped out
at the beginning of this process and there has been discussion about what has
worked and what has not worked so that the focus can be on those outlets that
generate more response. Staff can provide the Councilmembers and
Commissioners with the amended or updated or enhanced outreach program.
ADJOURNMENT: With no further business before the joint session, M/Lin
adjourned the General Plan Update Joint Meeting No. 2 at 8:41 p.m.
MARCH 29, 2017 PAGE 29 GP JOINT CC & PC MTG #2
The foregoing minutes are hereby approved this 9th day of May, 2017.
Raymond Wolfe
Planning Commission Chairman
Respectfully Submitted,
l
Greg Gubman
Community Development Director
Respectfully Submitted,
i bbi -
Tommye Crins, City Clerk
The foregoing minutes are hereby approved this 6th day of June , 2017.
e
Jimmy Lin, Ma or
