Irvine to Join Fight Against 3 Developments

The Irvine City Council decided early Wednesday to fight the county’s approval of agreements with developers covering three residential projects and to join the legal battle over the countywide slow-growth initiative.

By a 3-1 vote just after midnight, the council ordered its attorney to join attorneys for Laguna Beach in filing a lawsuit seeking to overturn the three development agreements, which would protect plans to build 21,000 residential units in unincorporated areas near Irvine.

The council also voted 3 to 1 to file legal papers seeking to make the city a party to an Orange County Superior Court lawsuit challenging the slow-growth initiative. Two building industry organizations and the Orange County Chamber of Commerce filed that lawsuit in an effort to have the initiative taken off the June ballot.

Under the Irvine council’s vote, the city--again with Laguna Beach--will attempt to become a part of the suit in order to defend the initiative.

Councilwoman Sally Anne Miller opposed both motions. Councilman C. David Baker was absent.

Miller said later that she has “grave concerns about the extent to which the city is becoming involved in this issue politically and financially.” The lawsuits, she said, will “cost much more” than the approximate $10,000 the city initially has set aside for them.

“And politically, I think it would be preferable for the people of Irvine if we were to try to get with the Board of Supervisors to work out some kind of negotiated settlement” over the housing developments, she said.

But Mayor Larry Agran said he favored a suit to block the 21,000 homes planned for Aliso Viejo, Marina Hills and Bear Brand.

The agreements protecting those developments, approved by the Board of Supervisors on Feb. 10, would mean more traffic into Irvine by way of the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor.

The development agreements allow builders to go forward with their projects even if the slow-growth initiative--or other land-use restrictions--are imposed in the future. In return, developers agree to provide about $67 million for road improvements in south Orange County.

Supervisor Thomas F. Riley, who shepherded the development agreements to passage, said Irvine itself has helped to create the need for more housing.

“With the extensive commercial development that Irvine has allowed within its boundaries, it has created a tremendous number of jobs,” he said. “And I applaud that, but if you have more jobs, you’re going to have more people who need someplace to live. We’re just trying to meet this need that is being created by actions of the Irvine City Council.”

The other lawsuit involved in the council’s decisions Wednesday was filed by the Building Industry Assn. of Southern California, the Orange County Chamber of Commerce and the Commercial Industrial Development Assn.

“The two cities want to participate in the lawsuit to defend the right of voters to be heard on the initiative,” said San Francisco attorney Mark Weinberger, who will file court papers Friday to intervene on behalf of Irvine and Laguna Beach.

Though the Board of Supervisors and the registrar of voters have been named defendants in the suit, they announced Tuesday that they would not actively defend the initiative at a March 23 hearing.

Belinda Blacketer, an attorney for the slow-growth group that got the initiative on the ballot through a petition effort, did not welcome the intervention of Laguna Beach and Irvine on her side.

“We don’t know enough about what they are doing,” she said, declining to elaborate.

In another vote, late Tuesday night, the council agreed to place on the city ballot in June an initiative on an agreement last month between the city and the Irvine Co. that would increase the amount of open space in the city by 10% over the next 20 years.

In exchange, the Irvine Co. will be allowed to engage in more profitable types of development elsewhere in the city, such as higher density residential and commercial projects.

Council members said that voter approval would legally protect the open-space plan from possible attempts by future city councils to weaken it.