Monthly Archives: June 2009

On Monday June 8th the Costa Mesa Planning Commission will most likely amend the overlay zone. What this means is that they are going to ease up on the building restrictions in that area of town.

Brief History

The overlay zone affects property owners in Costa Mesa’s Westside industrial area. The ultimate goal of the overlay zone is to eliminate the industrial use of properties and replace them with residential and/or retail buildings. The overlay zone was implemented as a way for the city to “revitalize” the Westside.

To date there has only been 2 projects approved under this overlay and this leads us to the amendment to the overlay zone. The Planning Commission wants to see more development in the overlay zone.  To get more development the Planning Commission is going to create a loophole in the overlay zone.

Here is how. Currently the overlay zone allows the development of mixed use buildings. Mixed use buildings are part retail (i.e. stores) and part residential (apartments). To promote development the Planning Commission is considering removing the workspace requirements, thus making the building purely residential and avoiding current residential density requirements by building under the mixed use title. Also these buildings are allowed to be 4 stories, 60 feet in height with 90% lot coverage. This will create high-density.

Why this matters

Primarily this will create high-density residential community. High-density will negatively effect our quality of life.

This amendment benefits the developers and not the residents of our city. The overlay zone is in place as a way to revitalize our city however if high-density buildings are approved, future problems in the Westside will need to be corrected.

This negative future can easily be avoided.

What can be done

At the very least take a couple of minutes write down your thoughts and email the planning commission at

PlanningCommission@ci.costa-mesa.ca.us

Even better come down to city hall Monday June 8th at 6:30pm in the council chambers and share your opinion(s).