Organizations for Rural Quality (RQC/F)

Grass Valley Managed Growth Initiative

All supporting documents will be posted at www.ccatnc.org

Questions - Week Five

Will the Managed Growth Initiative (The Citizens' Initiative) require costly and endless special elections?

Grass Valley United, opponents of the “Managed Growth Initiative”, have asserted that, for 30 years, the Initiative will result in: “Endless, Costly Special Elections.”[1]

Evidently, the Grass Valley United takes a dim view of the democratic process; and if the opponents were consistent, it also would oppose the "developers' initiative" because it requires 12 years of voter decisions on boundary changes.

ANSWERS:

Special elections? Not unless the City (or a sponsoring developer) wish for one. The City is entirely free to choose to place an amendment on a regular or a special ballot, as it see fit.

Ongoing? Hardly. Only an amendment to the Land Use Element would require voter approval. In the 8½ years since the 2020 General Plan’s adoption, there appear to have been just five amendments (the City keeps no register of them), of which only 4 would have required a vote of Grass Valley’s citizens under the “Citizens' Initiative” – an average of 1 every 2 years.[2]

Costly? Not necessarily. The costs of amendments resulting from a request by a developer can be recouped as a development fee.

“The City is already authorized by statute to recover the costs of processing project approvals from the applicant. The Mitigation Fee Act, at Government Code §660000 et seq., expressly authorizes agencies to establish development fees to recover costs associated with the filing, accepting, reviewing, approving or issuing of an application, permit or entitlement to use. Cities and counties throughout the state regularly charge such fees to applicants for projects to cover, inter alia, changes to the city or county’s general plan that are required for the project.”[3]

Thus, an amendment requested by a developer should not cost the City at all. Nor is the cost necessarily high. Grass Valley City Planning Staff reported to the City Council: “The estimated cost to the City to conduct a regular election approximates $8,000, while a special election would cost approximately $46,500.”[4] Note, these costs would be covered by the developer(s).

Endless? Not at all. The introduction of a democratic decision at the ballot creates a definitive process: after an amendment is developed by the city and placed on the ballot, its merits are debated within the community, and a decision rendered by the voters on election day – ending the process.

30 years? This is the only correct piece of the claim: yes, the “Citizens' Initiative” would sunset after 30 years of ensuring the democratic participation of Grass Valley’s voters in shaping their land use constitution.

Noted American journalist, Bill Moyers, recently observed that “democracy only works when ordinary people claim it as their own.”[5] The “Citizens' Initiative” seeks to do precisely that: enable Grass Valley’s voters to claim control of their future by the power of the ballot, allowing them to scrutinize and decide directly how Grass Valley expects to grow.

[1] Grass Valley United, paid advertisement, The Union, April 26, 2008, p.A8.
[2] Email to Mayor Mark Johnson, Joe C. Heckel, Community Development Director, City of Grass Valley, April 4, 2008.
[3] Keith Wagner, Kenyon Yeates, LLP, Friends of Grass Valley Presentation to Grass Valley City Council, Response to Factually and Legally Defective Report, regarding "Misrepresentation #8," May 13, 2008.
[4] City of Grass Valley Planning Staff's report, Report on Potential Issues and Impacts of Proposed Land Use Initiative, to City Council, May 1, 2008.
[5] Bill Moyers, addressing the National Conference on Media Reform, Minneapolis, June 7, 2008.

Next: Questions - Week Six (Link)