SoHum Community Park Hearing on Land Use Designation Tomorrow in Eureka

Southern Humboldt Community park from websiteShould the Southern Humboldt Community Park be allowed to change its zoning?

The Planning Commission has recommended to the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors that the Park Board be allowed to make some changes. These proposed changes would allow (among other possibilities)

  • Up to five events per year with between 800 and 2,500 attendees in addition to staff and vendors
  • one larger event per year that could last one to two days and have up to 5,000 attendees including vendors and staff

The Public Notice for the meeting held tomorrow at 6 p.m. is as follows:

On Thursday, January 5, 2016 at 6:00 p.m., or as soon thereafter as the matter can be heard, the Humboldt County Planning Commission will hold a public hearing in the Board of Supervisors’ Chamber, Humboldt County Courthouse, 825 Fifth Street, Eureka, California, to consider the matter listed below. It is being recommended that the Planning Commission recommend approval of the project to the Board of Supervisors. Specific questions regarding the proposed project and the Final Environmental Impact Report prepared for the project may be directed to Michael Richardson, Senior Planner, at (707) 268-3723.

Southern Humboldt Community Park; Garberville Area, Application Number 6111 (filed 5/24/2010); Case Numbers GPA-10-02, ZR-10-02, CUP-10-04, SP-10-10; Assessor Parcel Numbers 222-091-014 and 222-241-009. This project would add a Public Recreation (PR) designation to the Garberville Community Plan and change the County’s General Plan land use designation for the entire site to the Public Recreation (PR) designation. The current land use designation is a combination of Agricultural Rural with a 5- to 20-acre minimum lot size on 256 acres and Agricultural Lands with a 20-acre minimum lot size on 150 acres. The current zoning is Agriculture Exclusive on 393.6 acres and Qualified Heavy Industrial (MH-Q) on the remaining 12.1 acres. This project would add a Public Facility (PF) Zoning designation to the Zoning Ordinance and change the zoning of 87 acres from Agriculture Exclusive (AE) to Public Facilities (PF). A Qualified (Q)/Recreation (R) combining zone overlay would be added to 306.7 acres that will continue to be zoned AE to allow for recreational uses such as trails and temporary event parking in the AE areas. The discretionary entitlements being requested by the applicant include the following: General Plan amendment, Rezoning, Conditional Use Permit for Medium (up to 5 events per year with between 800 and 2,500 attendees in addition to staff and vendors) and Large Events (1 event per year, 1 to 2 days, 2,500 to 5,000 persons including vendors and staff; and a Special Permit for cottage industry (value-added farm products, food products, nursery and seed production) and one-lane bridge placement and reduced setbacks from a stream and wetland. The applicant is also seeking to preserve 54 residential development credits that could be sold in the future if and when the County establishes a Transfer of Development Rights program. The parcel is served by on-site water and sewer. The project is located in the Garberville area, on both sides of Sprowel Creek Road and Camp Kimtu Road, approximately one mile south from the intersection of US Highway 101 and Sprowel Creek Road, on the property known as Southern Humboldt Community Park located at 1144 Sprowel Creek Road.

Any person may appear and present testimony in regard to this matter at the hearing. If you challenge the nature of the proposed action in court, you may be limited to raising only those issues you or someone else raised at the public hearing described in this notice, or in written correspondence delivered to the Planning Commission at, or prior to, the public hearing. The Planning Commission needs ONE ORIGINAL AND 14 COPIES of any materials submitted either prior to or at the meeting. The Planning Commission’s decision will become effective if an appeal is not filed within the appropriate filing period. An appeal may be filed by any aggrieved person who has testified in person or in writing on the project and must be submitted in writing with the required fees to the Planning Division of the Humboldt County Planning and Building Department before the end of the appeal period. If appealed, the decision will not become effective until the appeal is resolved. If you challenge the nature of the proposed action in court, you may be limited to raising only those issues you or someone else raised at the public hearing described in this notice, or in written correspondence delivered to the Planning Commission at, or prior, to the public hearing. The staff report for this project will be available on our web site http://humboldt.legistar.com on the Friday before the Planning Commission meeting.

General questions regarding the Planning Commission, the permit process, submission of materials, and other information not specific to this project may be obtained from the Planning Division of the Humboldt County Planning and Building Department, 3015 H Street, Eureka, California 95501. Telephone (707) 445-7541.

Facebooktwitterpinterestmail

Join the discussion! For rules visit: https://kymkemp.com/commenting-rules

Comments system how-to: https://wpdiscuz.com/community/postid/10599/

Subscribe
Notify of
guest

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

12 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Perspective
Guest
Perspective
7 years ago

This should be entertaining.

Dan Fuller
Guest
Dan Fuller
7 years ago

On Thursday, January 5, 2016 at 6:00 p.m.??? I think that the year should be 2017??!!! Unless thisa is really OLD news!!! Just a quick FYI!!!

Resident @ large
Guest
Resident @ large
7 years ago

I think parking 2,500 – 5,000 cars and trucks on the river bar 7 times during the summer is a crime. Just because Reggae started it doesn’t make it right. The Eel deserves more respect.

Ed Voice
Guest
Ed Voice
7 years ago

Here is the link to the proposed project, including all the supplemental information:

https://humboldt.legistar.com/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=2914608&GUID=C220572D-1ACC-4CF1-AB9B-40F76DCFE2B8&Options=&Search=

It's A Farce
Guest
It's A Farce
7 years ago

I gotta agree that putting all those vehicles on the river bank SEVEN times a year is outrageous. I love a good party and live music but when did we become a community that needs to beat up on our river for some good times? I’m surprised that we have become quite misdirected in our relationship with our beautiful and relatively healthy natural environment. Many of us are here to hopefully heal and protect this land. What happened? Now it’s “party first, make money and oh yeah those animals are cool too I guess?!” Does this mean I need to now boycott Benbow Arts Fair since it is a fundraiser for such foolishness? I bailed Reggae a decade ago as it had become an ugly sore on the river. What’s up earth people of Humboldt? What are we here for?

Bill
Guest
Bill
7 years ago

This isn’t on the river bar. It’s on a old ranch across the road from tooby park.

Resident @ large
Guest
Resident @ large
7 years ago
Reply to  Bill

They’ve asked for variances to do exactly that already .

Chris
Guest
Chris
7 years ago

Why do you folks have such disdain in your hearts for salmon, steel head and the glorious Eel River?

Starting to look as though we’ll need to get those monkey wrenches out of retirement soon.

Ed Voice
Guest
Ed Voice
7 years ago

It ain’t over until the Supervisors approve everything. At least the Planning Commission questioned and got rid of the Park Boards “Development Credit” scheme that was included in their project and included more than a dozen major conditions and recommendations the Park Board will still need to tackle before having events, concerts, festivals, camping and sports tournaments at the Park, before they can turn it into a commercial RENT-A-Park.

It ain’t over til its over, I will fight to the end to save the South Fork Eel and its habitat, wildlife and eco-systems.

last night was only the first step in the Park Boards process and I will fight them at every step.

Its sad that people have to lie, degrade & destroy something and call it progress.

Eric Kirk
Guest
Eric Kirk
7 years ago

I want to thank the community for its support. We packed the room and people had to stand out in the hallway. We had folks from all walks of life speaking to the various benefits of the project. It was a great evening for Humboldt County.

This was the crucial moment, though we could still use support for the Board of Supervisors finalization which should come soon. We are hoping for a unanimous decision.

It will be nice to actually start the process of creating the sports fields and get the kids out there playing. It’s been so long a process!

Ed Voice
Guest
Ed Voice
7 years ago
Reply to  Eric Kirk

Eric,

How come Justin Crellin from the MATEEL was the only person who spoke to the Planning Commission in support of events, concerts and festivals with more than 800 people per event?

I would ask you on your blog, but you have not allowed me to post for some time now. So much for freedom of speech?

Ed Voice
Guest
Ed Voice
7 years ago

“I want to thank the community for its support. We packed the room and people had to stand out in the hallway. We had folks from all walks of life speaking to the various benefits of the project. It was a great evening for Humboldt County.”

The people who supported the Park Boards project and attended the Planning Commission hearing are approx less than 1% of the population of Southern Humboldt. Less than approx 1/3 of those people who attended the hearing spoke in support of the project, 3 speakers had been paid or are being paid for their work on the project, 3 more speakers are making interest from secured private loans to the Park Board and 2 more speakers have private for-profit lease agreements with the Park Board.

But you are right Eric, you did have “folks from all walks of life speaking to the various benefits of the project”, for-profit benefits that is!

I hope you remember this night, all those people, standing room only, because that is what the Park will become, with your proposed 365/24/7 Camping, Concerts, private events, Festivals and unlimited sports tournaments, it will be standing room only at the Park, just like it was in the Supervisors Chambers…