A meeting will be held at 6 p.m., Wednesday, Dec. 6, in the Council Chambers to look at the environmental issues raised by the Housing Element update and potential changes to the city’s Zoning Code.
The meeting will be part of this month’s Environmental Quality Control Board meeting. The legal notice announcing the meeting did not mention the EQCB. However, the agenda for the Dec. 6 EQCB meeting did specifically include the scoping meeting.
The purpose of the meeting is to look at the scope of the environmental impact report on the Housing Element Update and the zoning changes that will result, according to a legal notice announcing the meeting. The notice was published in the Nov. 23 issue of the Sun.
This is necessary because California law requires cities to update the Housing Elements of their General Plan at regular intervals. Seal Beach is currently required to plan for 1,243 places for people to live.
By law, the state can’t force the city to build anything.
The sites the city is looking at include: Leisure World, the Accurate Storage site, the Shops at Rossmoor, Old Ranch Town Center, Seal Beach Plaza, the Seal Beach Center, 99 Marina Ave., Old Ranch Country Club, Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach at PCH and Seal Beach Boulevard, the city’s water site (located on the Navy base but the city’s property), and Main Street.
Leisure World would not require rezoning, according to the Initial Study performed by Stantec.
“Of the 13 Housing Opportunity Sites, six would require rezoning, one would be rezoned through a proposed Specific Plan, and one would require an amendment to the Main Street Specific Plan,” Smittle wrote in her staff report to the Environmental Quality Control Board.
According to her report, the city will also need to create a new zoning designation for mixed commercial and residential high density land use. That would apply to five of the potential housing sites, according to Smittle’s report.
The Old Ranch Country Club has applied for a new specific plan to allow development of the site for residential and hotel use. In February 2023, College Park East residents raised concerns about the project. A 1999 agreement limited Old Ranch area development, but the City Council has authority to create the specific plan requested by the owners of the Country Club. (See “1999 agreement limits Old Ranch development” at sunnews.org.)
The property at 99 Marina Dr., a former oil facility, is listed as a potential “redevelopment or reposition opportunity” on a JLL Investor Center website.
As reported last week (see “Seal Beach Housing Element, Zoning Code updates” at sunnews.org), the city on Nov. 16 issued a notice that it was preparing an environmental impact study for the project. You can find copies of the initial study at the Mary Wilson Library Branch, the Rossmoor Los Alamitos Library Branch or online at the city’s website.
The public has until 5 p.m., Friday, Dec. 15, to comment on the initial study.
A copy of the initial study is available on line and is part of the agenda package for the Dec. 6 Environmental Quality Control Board meeting. The package is available on the city website. Copies of the initial study are also available at the Mary Wilson and Los Alamitos-Rossmoor branches of the Orange County Public Library.
