Carmel Valley board addresses city review process for One Paseo project

By Karen Billing

The city review process for One Paseo was discussed at the Carmel Valley Community Planning Board meeting held April 26. While exact dates of the process aren’t known, there are a lot of milestones to hit before the project reaches City Council.

“There will be a lot of opportunity for the community to participate,” said board chair Frisco White.

The first phase ongoing right now is the circulating draft environmental impact report (EIR) and comments are due on May 29.

“City staff has to incorporate all of those comments into the final document,” said city planner Bernie Turgeon. “I don’t know how long it will take for staff and the applicant to address them all.”

The final EIR will then be prepared and a hearing at the planning commission can be scheduled a minimum of 14 days afterward.

Community members were concerned about that 14 days but Turgeon stressed that is just the minimum time it could be scheduled and it isn’t likely to be that soon.

“There’s not a chance at all that the project won’t come before the (Carmel Valley) board or regional issues sometime this summer,” said Marcela Escobar Eck, a consultant for Kilroy.

Escobar Eck said that it would be “suicide” for a developer to bypass a community planning board recommendation and there will be an opportunity for the board to weigh in on the project.

“The goal is not to surprise the public here,” Turgeon assured the group.

The Carmel Valley planning board will see the project again for recommendation likely before it goes to the planning commission and White said they are considering holding a separate meeting in a larger venue than the library to be able to get the most community involved and provide “meaningful” public input.

After hearing the project, the planning commission has 60 days to make a recommendation to City Council. City Council will then hold a public hearing to approve, conditionally approve or deny the application at the hearing.

Carmel Valley Recreation Board member Ginny Barnes asked the city that they consider increasing their hearing notification area to larger than 300 feet from the site. She also asked that they consider not holding any major meetings during the summertime.

The DEIR can be accessed on One Paseo’s site, onepaseo.com, and opposition group What Price Main Street’s site is whatpricemainstreet.com. A hardcopy is available at the Carmel Valley Library.