Politics & Government

Hanna Ranch Development Takes a Step Forward

Despite cries from those demanding affordable housing units, project on undeveloped property south of Costco passes muster with city's Design Review Commission.

The developer who wants to transform the Hanna Ranch property in Novato from an illegal off-road motorcycling hotspot to a commercial/retail complex with restaurants, shops, a hotel and groomed biking/walking paths was victorious Wednesday night in a meeting before the Novato Design Review Commission.

Despite a handful of people who protested the development because it does not include affordable housing units, the board unanimously approved the plans for the 19-acre property just south of near the junction of highways 101 and 37. The next step is for the final environmental impact report to be presented to the Design Review Commission before the project moves to the Novato Planning Commission. Final approval would have to be granted by the Novato City Council before any shovels strike the dirt.

Commissioner Patrick MacLeamy answered the affordable housing advocates by saying it’s not the Design Review Commission’s jurisdiction to make that judgment but rather to evaluate the plans for the property as presented by the developer, Hanna Ranch LLC. MacLeamy added, however, that Hanna Ranch a bad spot to locate new dwellings and noted that the site was not seriously discussed as a possible housing location during the yearlong debate over mandated rezoning for housing.

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“If the Planning Commission or City Council decides there must be housing on the site, it would come back to us first,” MacLeamy said. “Adding housing would change the design in fundamental ways. Novato is short on commercial sites and long on housing. This is a much-needed project and will bring sales tax and property tax revenue to the city — not that that’s the only benefit, and that’s not our concern, but I just wanted to point that out.

“I believe the design is first-rate, which is our job to evaluate. It’s one of the best projects I’ve seen come forth to this commission for the years I’ve been serving.”

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Drawings and a scale model of the property design were presented by Hanna Ranch LLC, fronted by Dennis Allen of Urban One. He was supported Wednesday by an architect an  engineer and the primary investors, and he answered several questions about the property plans from the commissioners. For the most part, the plans are the same as those presented to the commission two years ago.

The project calls for 13.5 acres of the 19 to be left alone or just cleaned up. A 116-room, 70,600-square-foot hotel would be located in the property’s bowl area between three knolls and pretty much out of site from passing traffic on Highway 101. Two restaurants of 5,000 square feet each would be just north and east of the hotel. A 42,240-square-foot, two-story office/retail building would be placed on a strip of land the east side of Beverly Ehreth Ecological Preserve pond. A single-story 13,571-square-foot retail building also is planned.

The only access to the site would be at the end of Rowland Way, behind the store, and that was another concern for several of the public speakers Wednesday. Hanna Ranch LLC said there could be an emergency access on the southwest side of the property near where the two highways intersect, but there would not be new offramps or onramps directly to Highway 37 or 101. City representative Alan Lazure said Caltrans would require improvements to the road standards, which would likely cause the cost of the development to skyrocket.

Novato resident John Isaacs, an affordable housing advocate, railed against the plan for not including units for restaurant and hotel workers to live. He said there would be a legal challenge to the project if it were approved by the city.

“This is going against the will of the people of Novato,” he said. “They don’t want these commercial projects built with no affordable housing. Developers have got to start listening to the people of this town. … It is time for developers to take their share of the (housing) burden instead of forcing more of it into our neighborhoods.”

Tom Connolly asked the commission to remember that the housing element of the city’s general plan update — required by the state to zone for future housing — caused a lot of “strife and anxiety” in the city over the past year and that at least 300 workers at the Hanna Ranch development would only add to the area’s traffic if no housing units are included in the plan.

“Nobody is going to ride their bicycle from Vallejo to use all those bike racks” planned for the property, he said, “so I highly recommend that you look at providing housing. It would make a lot of sense to have them live close by to where they work.”

The developer reasserted his stance that housing does not make sense at that location because of the lack of public transportation to the site.

“This has been vetted by the city staff,” Allen said. “There is limited access to services like playgrounds, schools and public transit. It’s an isolated site, which is good for destination retail or a hotel but not right for a residential community. It is very difficult to sprinkle in or add a few units of affordable housing to a site like this. You can’t just stack them over the retail. The economics don’t work that way.”

Harry Lehman, a former Novato attorney who spent nine months working with about 20 other people on the city manager’s Ad Hoc Housing Working Group, said Hanna Ranch LLC has a bigger responsibility that should not be overlooked.

“You need to take into account the social consequences of this development, and those include provisions for workforce housing,” he said.


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