ATTACHMENT 8-1
Public Participation, Outreach, Notification and Feedback
Public Participation
Consistent with the requirements of State housing law, the Housing Element and related General Plan update process included outreach to solicit input from the public throughout the Housing Element process. Public outreach efforts included study sessions wi th the City Council and Planning Board, community workshops, a community survey, public notices translated into Spanish and Armenian, and the creation of a webpage with access to project related updates and resources.
Public Outreach
The City’s Housing Element update process was initiated with the Burbank City Council teleconference study session on July 21, 2020, which provided information to the Council members and the Burbank community of the current and proposed update of the Housing Element. On August 27, 2020, the City conducted community workshops for stakeholders including developers, housing service providers and housing advocacy groups.
Furthermore, on October 3, 2020, and February 27, 2021, the City conducted an additional community workshop wit h the public including residents and businesses to provide opportunities for public input and questions. Two study sessions were also conducted with the Planning Board on January 25, 2021, and May 3, 2021, to provide information on the Housing Element and other General Plan updates. Moreover, the City conducted a Housing Element online survey in three different languages (Armenian, English, and Spanish) from September 30, 2020, to January 4, 2021. The survey provided for input on the potential areas for fut ure housing within the City, ranking of priority housing programs, and identifying disadvantaged communities. There was a total of 227 respondents to the survey. Additionally, the Draft Housing Element and other General Plan elements were available for public review on the City’s website starting on April 27, 2021.
Pursuant to State CEQA Guidelines, a Notice of Preparation (NOP) for the Project was circulated in March of 2021, notifying the community and relevant agencies that an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) was being prepared for the project. On March 31, 2021, during the 30- day NOP period, staff hosted a community scoping meeting to receive public input on the project description. Finally, as required by CEQA, the City also released the Draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) on its website for public review on January 26, 2022, and reached out to all the stakeholders including developers, residents, housing advocacy groups, and Housing Element and CEQA interest list providing information on the EIR for the Project.
Public Noticing
Notification of project events were provided through the City’s e- notify email system, publication in the LA Times, emails to a Housing Element interest list including stakeholders and workshop participants, posts on the City’s social media accounts, and announcements at Landlord Tenant Commission and Senior Board meetings.
Additionally, approximately 20,000 flyers were distributed to households in census tracts with most of Burbank’s lower and moderate-income areas.
ATTACHMENT 8-2
Public Feedback
The City has received five comment letters on the Draft Element (included in Appendix F- 6 of Housing Element – attached as Attachment 5) and has addressed these comments in the Element. Some of the key comments that were received focused on questions regarding redevelopment of non- vacant sites within the planning period 2021- 2029, projection of future accessory dwelling units (ADUs), recommendations for addressing fair housing and promotion of integrated neighborhoods, and programs and polici es that are being included to address major constraints to redevelopment in the City.
The City has added evidence to the site analysis that indicates the redevelopment of non- vacant sites within the City in the recent past (Appendix D of Housing Element – attached as Attachment 5). Furthermore, evidence in the form of ADU building permits in the recent past, combined with programs and policies facilitating ADU production have been included in the Housing Element to justify ADU production over the eight -year planning period (Attachment 3). Additionally, the City has done analysis on the regional and local patterns of segregation, access to opportunity, displacement risk, and included concrete actions and milestones to address and identify contributing factors to fair housing issues (Appendix B of Housing Element – attached as Attachment 5). Finally, programs have been included in the Housing Element — including, establishing streamlined processing and approval as well as objective development and design sta ndards to better enable well designed urban infill development, and establishing incentives for the consolidation of individual parcels into larger development sites — to address major constraints to redevelopment within the City (Attachment 3).