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No clustered housing for South Moro Hills
But Oceanside leaves door open to farm toruists
The area's unique soils and microclimate nourish avocados, tomatoes, strawberries, flowers, succulents, coffee.
In a 3-2 vote, the Oceanside city council agreed last week to completely halt consideration of clustered housing in South Morro Hills, the city's last remaining farmland.
A community plan for the 3,500-acre agricultural region in the city's northeast corner will also be shelved until Oceanside's general plan update is approved, which is expected to take about three years.
Once that happens, the council will resume discussion of plans for South Morro Hills, including the development of tier 2 agritourism such as event spaces, weddings and resorts to support existing agriculture. The area's unique soils and microclimate nourish avocados, tomatoes, strawberries, flowers, succulents, coffee, and more.
City planners proposed changes to the current zoning that allows one home for every 2.5 acres.
The city began exploring agritourism in 2015. A few years later, a more controversial idea arose for the bucolic setting: hundreds of new homes. While a voter referendum put a stop to the North River Farms proposal — called out as sprawl by residents and groups like the Sierra Club — the clustered housing idea stuck around.
In its next iteration, city planners proposed changes to the current zoning that allows one home for every 2.5 acres, instead suggesting the lot size be one acre. The goal, they said, was saving farmland by revitalizing the area, potentially putting five units of housing on a single-acre cluster, leaving four acres for farming.
The area lacks water, sewer, and other services.
The area lacks water, sewer, and other services.
Dozens of neighbors showed up at a workshop last week on Oceanside's community plan update and climate action plan, many eager to talk about South Morro Hills.
"There has been an overwhelming response from residents to preserve our farmland," said mayor Esther Sanchez, who made the motion for a full stop on clustered housing in the South Morro Hills draft plan.
The motion came after councilmember Rick Robinson moved a motion that the South Morro Hill community plan go forward and not be removed.
"I know there's been a lot of talk about 2.5 acre lots," Robinson said. "But if farming quits, our major farmers quit, and start selling off their land at 2.5 acre lots, my guess is you'd have about 1300 parcels of 2.5 acre lots. Think about what that would look like. What people want is the farm to table stuff and that takes our big farmers to do that."
Deputy mayor Eric Joyce was also against halting the discussion of South Morro Hills.
City attorney T. Steven Burke Jr. said it had already been removed from the community plan update.
Sanchez said it wasn't; it was going forward separately. "The report did reference some potential future time that clustered housing could be brought up. And that is why I'm bringing this up now. I don't want staff to be doing that at all."
"We know that having housing next to farms means the end of farming,"
City staff agreed to remove all references to clustered housing in South Morro Hills.
"We know that having housing next to farms means the end of farming," Sanchez said. "I can't tell you how many times I've seen that whenever you have housing right next to a farm, there are complaints every day. I think the answer is having an overlay for agritourism tier 2. We actually stopped all movement towards that and ended up doing discussions that really went nowhere. I believe this is going to be the beginning of doing something positive here."
Michelle Costellano-Keeler, a third-generation farmer who participated in the development of the South Morro Hills plan, said farming is getting harder due to the costs of water and labor and offshore competition.
"The future of farming could be agritourism; it is a possibility, but tier 2 agritourism would need to be robust and it's not feasible without that significant infrastructure that needs to be paid for. Those agritourism visitors need to park a lot of cars and flush a lot of toilets."
Here's something you might be interested in.
No clustered housing for South Moro Hills
But Oceanside leaves door open to farm toruists
No clustered housing for South Moro Hills
But Oceanside leaves door open to farm toruists
The area's unique soils and microclimate nourish avocados, tomatoes, strawberries, flowers, succulents, coffee.
In a 3-2 vote, the Oceanside city council agreed last week to completely halt consideration of clustered housing in South Morro Hills, the city's last remaining farmland.
A community plan for the 3,500-acre agricultural region in the city's northeast corner will also be shelved until Oceanside's general plan update is approved, which is expected to take about three years.
Once that happens, the council will resume discussion of plans for South Morro Hills, including the development of tier 2 agritourism such as event spaces, weddings and resorts to support existing agriculture. The area's unique soils and microclimate nourish avocados, tomatoes, strawberries, flowers, succulents, coffee, and more.
City planners proposed changes to the current zoning that allows one home for every 2.5 acres.
The city began exploring agritourism in 2015. A few years later, a more controversial idea arose for the bucolic setting: hundreds of new homes. While a voter referendum put a stop to the North River Farms proposal — called out as sprawl by residents and groups like the Sierra Club — the clustered housing idea stuck around.
In its next iteration, city planners proposed changes to the current zoning that allows one home for every 2.5 acres, instead suggesting the lot size be one acre. The goal, they said, was saving farmland by revitalizing the area, potentially putting five units of housing on a single-acre cluster, leaving four acres for farming.
The area lacks water, sewer, and other services.
The area lacks water, sewer, and other services.
Dozens of neighbors showed up at a workshop last week on Oceanside's community plan update and climate action plan, many eager to talk about South Morro Hills.
"There has been an overwhelming response from residents to preserve our farmland," said mayor Esther Sanchez, who made the motion for a full stop on clustered housing in the South Morro Hills draft plan.
The motion came after councilmember Rick Robinson moved a motion that the South Morro Hill community plan go forward and not be removed.
"I know there's been a lot of talk about 2.5 acre lots," Robinson said. "But if farming quits, our major farmers quit, and start selling off their land at 2.5 acre lots, my guess is you'd have about 1300 parcels of 2.5 acre lots. Think about what that would look like. What people want is the farm to table stuff and that takes our big farmers to do that."
Deputy mayor Eric Joyce was also against halting the discussion of South Morro Hills.
City attorney T. Steven Burke Jr. said it had already been removed from the community plan update.
Sanchez said it wasn't; it was going forward separately. "The report did reference some potential future time that clustered housing could be brought up. And that is why I'm bringing this up now. I don't want staff to be doing that at all."
"We know that having housing next to farms means the end of farming,"
City staff agreed to remove all references to clustered housing in South Morro Hills.
"We know that having housing next to farms means the end of farming," Sanchez said. "I can't tell you how many times I've seen that whenever you have housing right next to a farm, there are complaints every day. I think the answer is having an overlay for agritourism tier 2. We actually stopped all movement towards that and ended up doing discussions that really went nowhere. I believe this is going to be the beginning of doing something positive here."
Michelle Costellano-Keeler, a third-generation farmer who participated in the development of the South Morro Hills plan, said farming is getting harder due to the costs of water and labor and offshore competition.
"The future of farming could be agritourism; it is a possibility, but tier 2 agritourism would need to be robust and it's not feasible without that significant infrastructure that needs to be paid for. Those agritourism visitors need to park a lot of cars and flush a lot of toilets."
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