From: Ralph Catalano
To: City Council; Jennifer Long; Kevin Jackson; Marjorie Blavkwell Cc: Gray Cathrall
Subject: Comments regarding Housing Element
Date: Tuesday, February 20, 2024 11:49:45 AM
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Piedmont City Council,
The Mayor has proposed that all 132 apartments allocated by the new Housing Element to the Moraga Canyon planning area be built in Blair Park. These would include 62 units for low, very low, and extremely low-income families. She proposes this despite the fact that Blair Park is a former un-engineered landfill enclosed on 3 sides by impassable terrain and on the 4th by a major arterial that an earlier, city commissioned EIR found unavoidably dangerous to access or cross due to sight lines shorter than those considered safe by Caltrans. Given that EIR, the Mayor’s proposal violates existing city policy that all new construction provide safe sight lines.
When reminded of this violation, city staff responds that the Council need not acknowledge the prior EIR because the project it described was not approved. This response misleads Piedmonters and the Council. The prior EIR found not only that Piedmonters would be put at risk by short sight lines if the then proposed project were approved, but also that the alignment of Moraga Avenue allows no access to Blair Park that meets Caltrans safety standards. That alignment has not changed.
The Mayor does not acknowledge that her proposal violates city policy by putting Piedmonters in unavoidably unsafe circumstances. But I plead with the remainder of the Council, and with our professional staff, to acknowledge that housing 132 families in Blair Park will not only physically and socially segregate those families from the remainder of Piedmont, but also put all of us who use Moraga Avenue in circumstances that neither Caltrans nor city policy deem acceptable.
Respectfully,
Ralph Catalano, Ph D
Distinguished Professor Emeritus
School of Public Health
University of California, Berkeley