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Director of Community & Economic Development:
H. Brent Sinclair, AICP
Chief Building Official:
Will Crew
Business Development Manager:
Linda Boston
Planning Manager:
Patrick Kelly
City Engineer:
Bill Sandhu
Traffic Engineer:
Jeff Barnes
Development Related Department Contacts
- Community & Economic Development (209) 571-5566
- Fire Prevention (209) 571-5553
- Parks, Recreation & Neighborhoods (209) 571-5573
- Public Works (209) 342-2284
- 24 Hour Inspection Request Line (209) 571-5881
Community & Economic Development
www.modestogov.com/ced
Fire Department
www.modestofire.com
Parks, Recreation & Neighborhoods
www.modestogov.com/prnd
Public Works
www.modestogov.com/pwd
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Urban Growth Review
The Modesto Urban Area General Plan “Community Growth
Strategy” (Chapter II, Section C.1) calls for a review of
the growth trends in the Modesto Urban Area on a periodic
basis. As noted in the Community Growth Strategy, this
periodic review should provide for the selection of
potential urban areas to be served with urban infrastructure
during the next five years. In general, the maintenance of a
five-year supply of available vacant and agricultural land
served with urban infrastructure is desirable and urban
growth should be directed as long as economically feasible
to these new growth areas currently served with City
services. This periodic review is known as Urban Growth
Review (UGR).
The last UGR report was accepted by the City Council in July
2003. Based on the findings of the 2003 UGR report, the City
Council scheduled the Johansen and Empire North
Comprehensive Planning Districts (CPD)s, and the Shackelford
neighborhood for a Measure M advisory election. Each of
these three areas received an affirmative advisory vote.
The current UGR process began in October 2008. The City
Council’s Economic Development Committee is facilitating a
series of workshops concerning the 2009 UGR, from January
through April 2009 and will forward a recommendation. The
2009 UGR report will address the following items:
1) Inventory of vacant land within the City limits available
for urban development;
2) Estimate the land acreage needed for residential,
commercial and industrial
development in the next several years, in order to determine
whether a surplus or deficit in supply of vacant land
exists;
3) Identification of alternatives for providing
additional land for development;
4) Discussion of infrastructure needs to serve future
growth and any areas identified for possible annexation;
5) Any recommendations for scheduling growth areas on the
November 2009 ballot for a Measure M vote, to increase the
available sites / vacant land inventory.
For more information regarding Urban Growth Review, contact
Brad Wall, Principal Planner at (209) 577-5273 or at bwall@modestogov.com.
Housing Element Update
Staff is preparing the updated Housing Element, which is one
of the seven state-mandated elements of the General Plan. In
the past, staff has utilized consultants to prepare the
Housing Element. For this update, staff has determined that
the necessary time and expertise are available by City
staff. At this time, staff is evaluating the 2003 Housing
Element’s requirement to accommodate 15,300 affordable units
to determine whether Modesto has achieved that goal.
For the 2009 Housing Element, Modesto is required to
accommodate an additional 11,100 affordable units. The State
Legislature passes bills during every session that affect
affordable housing; staff is working to ensure that the
City’s 2009 Housing Element passes muster with the
Department of Housing and Community Development, which will
extend the City’s eligibility for various set-aside funds
for affordable housing. In accordance with state law, the
Housing Element is updated on a five-year cycle. Among other
things, Senate Bill 375 (2008) changed this to an eight-year
cycle, beginning with the next cycle.
For more information regarding the Housing Element Update,
contact Cindy van Empel, Senior Planner at (209) 577-5280 or
at cvanemple@modestogov.com.
Kiernan Business Park East
The Kiernan Business Park East project site is located on
the east side of Dale Road between Kiernan Avenue and
Pelandale Avenue. The Kiernan Business Park Specific Plan is
proposed to be amended to include approximately 39 acres of
Commercial and Medium High Density Residential development
on the east side of Dale Road, with 114 acres remaining for
Business Park development. The draft Environmental Impact
Report (EIR) was completed and made available for public
review on December 17, 2009. The public review period
concluded February 2, 2009. Response to comments received
and the final EIR are now being completed. It is anticipated
that the amendment to the Specific Plan and final EIR will
be brought before Council for consideration by mid 2009.
For more information regarding Kiernan Business Park East,
contact Josh Bridegroom, Senior Planner at (209) 551-5540 or
at jbridegroom@modestogov.com.
Telecommunications Ordinance
Over the past few years, the City of Modesto has reviewed
multiple permit requests for wireless telecommunication
(telecom) facilities, mostly proposed on freestanding poles
and commonly referred to as cell towers. The City of Modesto
has up until now not had specific standards to address
telecom facilities and the City review has been based on
height requirements in the Zoning Ordinance for the district
where a cell tower is proposed.
To address this deficiency, City Planning staff, working
with an independent telecommunications expert, drafted an
ordinance that provides standards for height, location and
design of new facilities. The ordinance provides incentives
to encourage co-location on existing facilities, and to
encourage “camouflage” designs on new facilities.
After workshops with cellular providers, and the City’s
Planning Commission and Board of Zoning Adjustment, the City
Council formally adopted the ordinance on April 28.
For more information regarding the telecom ordinance,
contact Paul Liu, Senior Planner at (209) 577- 5282 or at
pliu@modestogov.com
Neighborhood Compatibility and Multi-Family Residential
Design Guidelines
For many years, the City’s Zoning Code has required
second-story additions to existing homes and new two-story
houses located in established neighborhoods to go through an
administrative review in order to ensure that privacy and
massing issues that relate to immediately adjacent
residences are addressed. In recent years, there have been
increasing concerns expressed by neighbors about the scale
and compatibility of some of these homes and additions, and
this has resulted in an increasing number of appeals of
staff approvals to the Board of Zoning Adjustment (BZA) and
City Council. These concerns came to a head in 2007, when a
group of residents requested that the City prepare
guidelines to address these concerns. On November 11, 2007,
the Council acted on this request and directed staff to
pursue the following programs:
1. Neighborhood Compatibility Guidelines to address
compatibility issues created by new homes and additions in
existing neighborhoods.
2. Multi-Family Residential Design Guidelines to ensure
that new multi-family projects are compatible with the
surrounding neighborhoods and are of high-quality design.
City Planning staff, following this direction, prepared
drafts of both sets of Guidelines.
The Neighborhood Compatibility effort has been focused
primarily upon providing more effective guidance for
second-story review. For this reason, the organization of
the document reflects those topics already identified in the
Zoning Code for consideration under the current secondstory
review provisions. These topics include Privacy, Scale and
Massing, and Solar Access, with the addition of some general
consideration for design consistency. Additionally, the
Guidelines provide some guidance on lot pattern and
neighborhood layout issues, particularly with regard to lot
size compatibility and flag lots. They are not intended to
be “design guidelines” in the usual sense and do not contain
guidance for achieving any particular architectural style.
The purpose of the Multi-Family Residential Design
Guidelines is to encourage high-quality multi-family
development that emphasizes safety, livability, and
long-term viability. The Design Guidelines include an
Introduction and six chapters: Site Planning, Circulation
and Parking, Building Design, Landscaping, Miscellaneous
Site Elements, and Safety.
The two sets of Guidelines underwent two workshops with
the public and Planning Commission over a period of several
months, and were recently adopted by the City Council on
April 28, 2009.
For more information regarding the Guidelines, contact Steve
Mitchell, Principal Planner at (209) 577-5287 or at
smitchell@modestogov.com
CAPITAL FACILITIES FEE DEFERRAL PROGRAMS
The City of Modesto (City) supports economic development
through the growth of Modesto businesses. It also encourages
the construction of residential and affordable housing
development projects within the City. However, due to the
continued rise in development costs and today’s weak
economy, many development projects are stalled or abandoned.
Since the early 1990’s, the City has offered several Capital
Facilities Fees (CFF) deferral programs to encourage
economic development as well as affordable housing
developments. By implementing CFF deferral programs, the
City seeks to ease this cost barrier by deferring the time
for payment of certain development impact fees.
New development increases the demand for health and
safety services provided by the City, affects the quality of
the community’s infrastructure, and increases the need for
public facilities.
Typically, CFF is paid to the City at the time a building
permit is issued and helps pay for the cumulative impact of
new development through infrastructure improvements and
additions, thereby also contributing to the community’s
economic development. Facilities partly funded by CFF
include park, police, fire and administrative buildings,
bike trails, public landscape areas, community centers,
transportation and transit facilities, as well as roadway
improvements. CFF does not fund maintenance of existing or
future city facilities.
CFF deferral programs benefit economic growth and
development by allowing the deferral of impact fees. In most
cases, the programs allow developers and single-family
affordable homeowners to pay a small portion of CFF at
building permit issuance, and defer or delay paying the
remainder of the fees until a later date (deferral period
varies). CFF deferrals are administered by the
Infrastructure Finance Program office located in the City’s
Community & Economic Development Department. To defer CFF,
homeowners and/or developers are required to complete an
application and enter into an agreement with the City. Upon
approval by the City
Council, the agreement is recorded and a lien is placed on
the property until the terms of the agreement are met. Below
is a summary of the City’s current CFF deferral programs.
RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENTS:
1. Single-Family Affordable Housing CFF Deferral
The Affordable Housing Fee Deferral Program is designed
to encourage development of affordable housing projects.
This program allows for the deferral of CFF for eligible low
and very low income housing projects constructed in the city
and the city’s sphere of influence.
Qualifications: Any single-family affordable housing unit
constructed by any person or
entity. The home must be purchased by a homebuyer earning
between 61-80% of the
area median income who will use it the development as their
principal place of residence.
Conditions: All or a portion of the CFF can be deferred
up to five years. Starting in the sixth year, the homeowner
begins making payments of principal and interest and
continues to pay annually over a ten year period. This
deferral requires an application, signed Agreement approved
by the City Council, Promissory Note and City Deed of Trust
to secure the note and places a lien on the property.
Interest penalties apply if deferred fees are not paid
within the maximum fee deferral period.
2. Single-Family Residential Deferral until Final
Occupancy
NEW! The Single-Family Residential Deferral until Final
Occupancy is designed to
encourage development of single-family residential homes by
deferring payment of the CFF until a Certificate of
Occupancy is issued by the Building Safety Division.
Qualifications: Any single-family home constructed by any
person or entity.
Conditions: CFF is deferred until a Certificate of
Occupancy is issued by the Building
Safety Division or 18 months from execution of the
agreement, whichever is less. This deferral requires an
application, $250 processing fee, $12 recordation fee,
preliminary title report, signed Agreement, and places a
lien on the property. Interest penalties apply if deferred
fees are not paid within the maximum fee deferral period.
NON-RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENTS:
Rather than paying CFF at the time a building permit is
issued, a property owner or developer may elect to defer
payment of all or a portion of those fees if the development
falls into one of two categories.
1. Category A – Non Residential CFF Deferral:
Qualifications: Any non-residential project, excluding
industrial warehouses, where the CFF exceeds $150,000, and
where there is a single owner. This may be one parcel or a
group of contiguous parcels. For industrial warehouses, the
conditions are the same except the CFF must exceed $50,000.
Conditions: 10% of CFF is paid when a building permit is
issued. The remaining 90%
plus interest is paid in equal installments over 10 years.
This deferral requires an
application, preliminary title report, signed Agreement
approved by the City Council, and places a lien on the
property. Interest penalties apply if deferred fees are not
paid within the maximum fee deferral period.
2. Category B – Non-Residential CFF Deferral:
Qualifications: Projects, excluding industrial
warehouses, where the CFF is between
$25,000 to $150,000, and where there is a single owner. This
may be one parcel or a
group of contiguous parcels. For industrial warehouses, the
conditions are the same
except the CFF must be between $25,000 to $50,000.
Conditions: 20% of CFF is paid when a building permit is
issued with the remaining
80% paid in equal installments over 5 years plus interest.
This deferral requires an
application, preliminary title report, signed Agreement
approved by the City Council, and places a lien on the
property. Interest penalties apply if deferred fees are not
paid within the maximum fee deferral period.
For more information regarding CFF Deferral Programs,
please contact the Infrastructure Finance Program Office @
(209) 577-5211 or visit the City’s website at
www.modestogov.com.
The Modesto Action Center is a web-based customer
relationship management program on the City’s website at
www.modestogov.com that is available 24 hours a day, seven
days a week. This program makes it easy for citizens,
businesses, organizations and visitors to send questions,
compliments, complaints, suggestions and service requests
directly to a City staff person who can help. An additional
feature of the Modesto Action Center is a “Frequently Asked
Questions” section.
The Modesto Action Center is organized by topics and
subtopics so that an inquiry is routed to the most
appropriate staff member who can then respond to a
customer’s communication more effectively and efficiently.
The Community and Economic Development Department offers a
variety of subtopics under the topics of Building, Business
Development, Planning and Traffic. We encourage our
customers to utilize the Modesto Action Center so that we
may serve you better!
Statistics for January – March 2009
Residential Permits
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Single-Family: 4
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Multi-Family: 0
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Remodels: 515
Commercial Permits
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New: 1
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Remodels: 55
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Misc: 64
Total Permits: 639
Inspections: 7005
Zoning Applications: 4
Plan Reviews: 11
Tentative Subdivision/Parcel Maps
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# of Maps: 2
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# of Lots: 47
Encroachment Permits
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Encroachment: 72
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Subdivision: 0
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Well: 2
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Outdoor Dining: 0
Transportation: 34
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