Petaluma changed urban planning forever

In the mid-1970s Petaluma gained nationwide fame for being the first city in the nation to effectively limit growth and to do it legally. The effort that accomplished this became known as “the Petaluma Plan,” and that plan became a focus of planning studies at our nation’s universities.

Students of urban planning would visit Petaluma to learn the secrets of how this plan was developed, and their first step was at City Hall, where they were shown that the skill and foresight of the city’s leaders had crafted a document that would help change urban planning forever. They were shown how the city had boldly gone where no planners had gone before.

A nice version, and perhaps partly true, but the Petaluma Plan did not really happen like that.

The plan was known as the Environmental Design Plan, and its most controversial component was a document called the Residential Development Control System, which limited the city’s growth rate to 5 percent, or about 500 homes, each year.

Prior to Petaluma’s plan, other efforts to limit growth nationwide had been stricken by the courts, generally on grounds that those plans were discriminatory. There was a basic mindset on the part of both developers and urban planners that you could pass zoning laws and other regulatory measures, but you could not restrict building based on absolute numbers.

How did Petaluma become a national leader in urban planning given this background? You might say that the city leaders had a major revolt on their hands and they had to do something.

In the late 1960s Petaluma experienced a building boom east of the freeway, attracting buyers seeking relatively inexpensive housing and a reasonable one-hour commute to San Francisco. The flurry of subdivision construction severely stressed the city’s ability to provide services. That ability was limited by a very strong city manager backed by a frugal City Council who believed in spending as little as necessary to accommodate new growth.

As one subdivision after another was built east of the freeway, there were no parks or other amenities included. The city had a master plan for Lucchesi Park, but had no intention of building it until the community was ready to pass a bond measure for its construction, an effort that was doomed to repeated failure. An archaic street system, including a two-lane East Washington Street over the freeway and into downtown, aggravated the problem.

Increasingly, criticism of city policies was voiced, much of it from the east side, where 75 percent of the population commuted to work, versus 39 percent of residents west of the freeway. One refrain gained some currency: why can’t you slow down the growth until you can figure out a way to build some parks and fix some streets? City Hall made it clear that the city had no intention of doing that.

Then, in 1970, the Old Adobe School District was plunged into double sessions at the school. Discontent became anger, and that anger was enhanced by a supervisorial election in 1970 that focused on the city’s growth policies.

Shortly afterward, in January of 1971, the city revealed that Petaluma had outbuilt its sewer capacity, that 1,261 homes were planned on the east side in 1971, and that a $3.2 million bond issue was needed.

In February, Mayor Helen Putnam and City Manager Robert Meyer hosted a forum at Kenilworth school that started badly and got worse. The city attempted to show that things were not as bad as they seemed, and it was the wrong approach to an angry crowd. When, in response to a complaint about the absence of park facilities east of the freeway, Mayor Putnam asked why they didn’t instead just use their back yards, the crowd erupted and further communication was fruitless.

The city went ahead with the bond issue in June, and it failed by a large margin. City Hall, with backs to the wall, had to do something, and they decided finally to yield to widespread public demand and try to set limits on growth

A San Francisco planning firm, Williams and Mocine, was retained to guide Petaluma through the process. Concerns about legality were justified. There had to be a plan that clearly was not discriminatory.

Throughout the fall of 1971, a large group of citizens met to debate and agree upon the future of Petaluma, while the consultants worked out the mechanics, ultimately recommending 500 homes a year for five years.

In a memo to the City Council in November 1971, Williams and Mocine wrote:

“A way must be found to evaluate, limit, and control development ... Little precedent exists for such activity by local government but we believe that the changing values of our society regarding growth, environmental quality, and equal opportunity for all citizens will lead communities to explore ways to accomplish these ends ... It seems important to base such a control system on a clear showing that it is in the public interest and to provide clear and equitable procedures ... The courts have recently ruled against communities attempting to limit growth by means which keep out low- and moderate-income citizens and which directly or indirectly accomplish racial exclusion. We believe that the greatest strength of the Petaluma Development Policy may be its clear statement that all types and values of housing are to be provided.”

The Environmental Design Plan, with its growth control element, was approved by the City Council in early 1972, and then the court battles began. While the city convened a citizens committee to determine which homes would be included in the annual 500 limit, developers sued. The city lost the first round in 1974, when a San Francisco court ruled the plan unconstitutional in that it violated a constitutional right to abide and settle, and issued a restraining order.

The city appealed, and the following year the Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the constitutionality of the plan. Then, the developers appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which refused to hear the appeal and let the lower court ruling stand.

Today still, more than three decades later, Petaluma is still a magic word whenever statewide planners gather. This city made a difference in the way communities are planned, and it was first in the nation.

(Don Bennett, a business writer, consultant and Argus-Courier columnist, has been involved with city planning issues since the early 1970s. A 12-year veteran of the Petaluma Planning Commission, he currently serves on the Sonoma County Planning Commission.)