Over the protests of more than 190 residents on hand for the December 10 Rancho Cucamonga Planning Commission meeting, that advisory panel recommended that the City Council early next year alter the land use allowances in Etiwanda Heights to to permit multi-family housing to be built on that never-before-developed land.
The planning commission’s action raised hackles for multiple reasons.
The specific plan for that area which provides the legal land use standards for the 4,085-acre area in the northeast quadrant of the city, known as the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan, was derived over a more than 20 month public vetting process throughout the last few months of 2017, all of 2018 and most of the following year in which the city painstakingly sought and gathered the input of city residents with regard to how the property should be zoned and ultimately developed prior to the plan’s official adoption on November 6, 2019. The Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan was then relied upon by municipal officials in making an application to the San Bernardino County Local Agency Formation Commission [LAFCO] to annex the 4,085 acres or 6.38 square miles, which at that time were outside the city limits, into Rancho Cucamonga. City officials, who in city documents and in multiple verbal statements during the derivation of the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan offered assurances that the city would abide by the land use and development standards contained in the plan, reiterated those commitments repeatedly while LAFCO was evaluating the annexation proposal. Throughout that process, city residents, most particularly those living at the periphery of the acreage proposed for being brought into the city raised no objections to the annexation, at least in part because of their faith in the city’s avowals.
The land use standards specified for Etiwanda Heights remained in place for more than five years after the passage of the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan.
Unbeknownst to the public, in 2024, county officials entered into confidential and exclusive negotiations with developer James “Jimmy” Previti and representatives of his company, Frontier Enterprises with regard to 1,252.21 acres – slightly less than 1.96 square miles – of county flood control district property which was contained within the 4,085 acres annexed by the city in 2020. That property was subject to the land use restrictions articulated in the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan.
On the day prior to Thanksgiving 2024, November 27, 2024, in a closed-door session from which the public was excluded, the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors worked out the final details and then ratified the sale of the 1,252.21 acres for the agreed-upon price of $93 million, or $74,275.21 per acre.
Just as secretively as the county had carried out its negotiations for the sale of the flood control property to Frontier Enterprises, also referred to as the Previti Group, Rancho Cucamonga City officials began a dialogue with the Priveti Group in January 2025. Those discussions pertained to the company’s intention to initiate construction on the property it had acquired from the county.
Hidden from the public was that the exchanges between city officials and the landowner were taking place with regard to the 1,252.21 acres or that the Previti Group was pressing city officials to deviate from the standards contained in the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan. More than ten months elapsed without city residents having an inkling that a move to radically alter the character of the northeast corner of the city stretching up to the boundary of the Angeles National forest at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains directly below Cucamonga Peak was ongoing. The general public, ignorant such discussions were taking place, were excluded from them. More than ten months elapsed before the city’s residents were given a glimmer of what was coming their way. On November 18, the city posted a notice on its website that at the December 10 Rancho Cucamonga Planning Commission meeting the planning commission would discuss and consider an alteration of the city’s planning standards as pertains to Etiwanda Heights in the form of a specific plan amendment – meaning most apparently the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan.
Simultaneously, the city posted four 8-foot by 4-foot dimension signs which announced, simply, that the Previti Group, as the applicant, was seeking had made “A request to amend the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan and subdivide Planning Areas 1 and 2 for single family lots.”
On the same day, a few eagle-eyed residents began inquiring at City Hall as to what the proposed subdivisions were to consist of. There inquires were followed over the next few days by a handful of others. While most were put off by city officials who said the details would be forthcoming with the December 4 posting of the agenda for the December 10 meeting, one of the more persistent residents learned that what the Previti Group was proposing was to add nine new building types to the previously used generic description of single-family residential, including duplexes, quadplexes, 12-plexes, walkups, so-called cottage courts, motor courts, several higher-density small-lot product types and new block configurations. In addition, a single talkative city employee who spoke without authorization of higher-ups at City Hall, disclosed, the Previti Group was asking for the creation of a density transfer mechanism and objective standard changes along expanded regulating zones within the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan specific plan area which would permit those housing products to be constructed. At that point, it was immediately apparent that the proposed amendment was intended to allow the introduction of multi-family housing types into Etiwanda Heights that were excluded in the adopted 2019 Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan and referenced in the city’s 2020 public commitment during the annexation process.
Word spread like wildfire among the residents of Etiwanda and the neighborhoods of eastern Alta Loma proximate to Etiwanda Heights. This provoked further and far more efforts to ascertain, precisely, what was happening, why it was happening, who was driving the proposed land use and policy change, whether this had been triggered by a proposal at odds with the previous development standards that originated with a landowner/developer or whether the change was being pushed by either elected city officials or city staff. According to several of those city residents who made those inquiries, city officials – from those at the level of the planning division up to that of city administration and the city council – stonewalled them. According to one city staff member, an order emanating from the office of the city manager, where Elisa Cox was at that point in the process of succeeding John Gillison as the city’s top administrator, had gone out that no information pertaining to the action that the planning commission was to take on December 10 was to be provided to the public.
As the calendar progressed from November to December, confusion reigned over how extensive the redrafting of the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan was, with city officials refusing to budge off the position that the revamped version of the blueprint for the developmental future of Etiwanda Heights legitimately remained a confidential document until it was to be officially unveiled. Social media exploded, with posts on the @EtiwandaHeights Instagram account and the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood New & Updates Facebook page stating that the city was in the process of “reintroducing multi-family housting deppite [a] public promise of single family [residential untis] only. The City of Rancho Cucamonga, City Council & Mayor are proposing major changes to the approved Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood & Conservation Plan, changes that contradict its 2020 commitment of 2,700-3,000 single-family homes and zero mulit-family units.”
The posting on the @EtiwandaHeights Instagram noted that the city was in the process of including “new proposed building type to include duplexes, quadplexes, 12-plex apartment buildings and walk-up multi-story apartment buildings.” According to the @EtiwandaHeights Instagram posting, “Increased density affects evacuation, will increase traffic, school congestion, wildlife corridors and overall community character.”
Among the postings on the @EtiwandaHeights Instagram site was a map which showed the proposed location of the duplexes, four-plexes and 12-plexes, showing that roughly 97 percent of the property to be slated for multi-family development was north of Banyan Street and predominantly east of Milliken Avenue, as well as along a strip north of Banyan immediately west of Milliken Avenue with. Scores of residents posted relatively short statements decrying the action the city was proposing.
Among those were”
“This will create more traffic, more congested living, take away our views, destroy the beautiful natural surroundis we live in, endanger the wildlife in the area, create noise pollution create all other types of pollution , use up already scare resources, overcrowd and strain schools, strain the power grid.”
“We do not want high density housing in this area.”
“Seems to me that the leaders in our city are most interested in the revenue they will gain as compared to honoring the plan that the city and committee members worked on together to maintain the family community that we all moved here for.”
“[T]he city agreed to preserve the area and promised not to build multi-unit homes. Now, we find that, despite that commitment, plans are moving forward to build duplexes and even 12-plexes in the same area. This is a clear breach of trust, a betrayal of the promises made to the community. This kind of dishonesty is exactly what we don’t want from our city officials. [Our leaders cannot be trusted to honor their word.”
“Given the destruction of the fire in the foothills of Alta Dena, I don’t know why we would place more people, more congestion on the few roads out. This proposal puts our citizens at unnecessary risk.”
“No to high density apartment style housing and yes to single family homes.”
“Multi-family housing units are a horrible idea. The traffic is already ridiculous and the schools are so crowded.”
“Rancho already has a high population density. The elementary school is overloaded, and the roads to the middle school are severely congested every day after school. Please stop building high-density housing and destroying our community. This project will fundamentally change the Rancho Cucamonga we love. It would bring heavier traffic, parking spillover, blocked mountain views, and a level of high-rise development our community has never asked for. Approving it opens the door to even more tall buildings, added strain on local services, and years of construction disruption. This isn’t just a policy decision — it shapes the future of our hometown. It will change Rancho for our children and generations to come.”
“Don’t concrete the foothills!”
“We built our home in an area zoned for equestrian parcels. We were required to spend thousands of dollars to build a horse trail and now I see a sign going up for condos and shops at the end pf our street. Where will the people in condos put their horses?”
“Don’t build there.”
This development will increase traffic and congestion, diminish our scenic views, and destroy the beautiful natural surroundings that make this area unique. It will endanger local wildlife, create noise and other forms of pollution, and strain already limited resources. Our schools, power grid, and infrastructure are not equipped for this level of growth. We already pay high taxes to maintain the quality of life here, and that should be enough to preserve what we value—not to fund overdevelopment.”
“Unfortunately, the city is ruining what was once a very peaceful, beautiful place by overbuilding. The whole city is overburdened by high density housing. We are not Los Angeles. The city has no respect for its citizens.”
“Rancho Cucamonga is already congested. High density housing will not help fix that.”
“This is excessive and will cause the area to become lower quality and not desirable.”
“Enough is enough!!! We have watched corrupt politicians and developers put condos and apartments on most empty lots in Rancho. It strains our resources from our roads, to our school, even out water and electric grid.”
“Literally no one around here wants this. Not a single person.”
“We simply do not need additional high density buildings along with more traffic, overcrowded schools, graffiti, and crime within our city.”
Under California law, public meetings or hearings at which official governmental action is to be taken – meaning voted upon by an elected or appointed governmental board – must be agendized at least 72 hours – three full business days – in advance of the meeting.
By early December it was being widely circulated that the city was going to hold off until the last minute in providing the city’s residents and the public in general with a preview of what action pertaining to the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan the planning commission was to consider and vote upon on December 10. Furthermore, word was that the matter was a done deal, such that the planning commission was geared up to give passage to the item pertaining to the future development within Etiwanda Heights as laid out by the city’s planning staff. According to this informed [speculation, chatter], city officials were intent on effectuating the change to the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation plan to permit the construction of high density housing within the planning area and did not want to give those who might be opposed to the plan’s alteration specific information in time to rally an effective opposition to amending the specific plan.
As it would turn out, those reports proved prescient.
A petition to the city council was circulated which state that those signing it “oppose the proposed amendment to the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood & Conservation Plan that would reintroduce high-density and multi-family housing north of Banyan Avenue, specifically the introduction of duplexes, quad-plexes and 12-plexes apartment style buildings.”
The petition further stated, “The city made a clear commitment during the 2018–2019 planning process that this area would be protected from high-density development. Residents participated in good faith and supported the adopted plan based on that promise. Revisiting this issue now—without transparent explanation or community involvement—undermines trust and threatens the character, traffic safety, infrastructure stability, and open space our neighborhood depends on.”
The language of the petition stated, “We urge the City Council to:
Reject the proposed amendment.
Honor the commitments made in the adopted Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conversation Plan.
Engage residents transparently in all future planning decisions.”
Protect our neighborhoods. Protect our voice. Protect the original Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan.”
As was widely anticipated and predicted, the city’s planning division did not post the agenda for the December 10 planning commission meeting until 5:59 p.m. on December 4. What was revealed was a confirmation of what two of the city’s employees had risked their jobs to reveal in November when they spoke out of school to some of the city’s residents in previewing what was on the drawing boards in the backrooms at City Hall. Laid out was that the Previti group was requesting to “amend the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan to amend the neighborhood area density consistent with the existing general plan and use designation of traditional neighborhood; add nine new building types and amend development standards for existing building types; amend the regulating zones to permit new building types and expand existing building types in the Camino Overlay, neighborhood estates, neighborhood general 1 and neighborhood general 2 regulating zones; add new open space types and standards and add “shared yard” as a frontage type; add new new block configurations; and establish a formal mechanism for transferring development rights (density) within the neighborhood area to enable less density near existing neighborhoods and facilitate appropriate clustering of residential uses elsewhere within the neighborhood area.”
Revealed was that the city was indeed on a course to go back on the assurances city officials had made in formulating the original Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan and that phraseology such as “new building types… new block configurations… transferring development rights [to achieve] clustering…” and “add[ing] new building types” was a code for allowing apartments, walk-ups, 12-plexes, four-plexes and duplexes to supplant the single-family residences those who were already living, or who had in the last five years moved, nearby were told they could count on being built when the property was developed.
By the time of the December 10 meeting, the petition had been signed by more than 760 residents.
On the evening of December 10, 191 members of the public were present in the Rancho Cucamonga City Hall meeting chamber to attend the planning commission meeting. The overwhelming majority of them were opposed to the proposal to alter the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conversation Plan. Of those 191, 27 addressed the commission during the course of the hearing. Twenty-six of the 27 voiced opposition to amending the specific plan or in any fashion increasing the density of the residential development that is to take place there.
Before they did so, Rancho Cucamonga Planning Director Jennifer Nakmura told the planning commissioners and the crowd that Previti had requested the zoning changes in January and that the city was in the position of not being able to resist them because of state mandates imposed by the California Department of Housing and Community Development intended to prevent local land use restrictions and controls from getting in the way of the imperative to overcome the shortage of housing. The Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan, Nakumura in essence staid, because the state had determined that when there is a discrepancy between a specific plan, such as the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan, and a city’s general plan, the general plan takes precedence. Since the Rancho Cucamonga General Plan, revamped in 2021, allows the “traditional neighborhood” standard of eight units to an acre to be built within residential districts, Nakamura said, the Previti Group now has the option, which the city cannot preclude, to virtually double the density on the residentially-zoned property in Etiwanda Heights, such that the limitation of residential units specified in the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan to 2,700-to-3,000 single-family homes was no longer operative. In fact, if Previti chooses to do, he can construct in excess of 6,000 homes across the 790 acres designated for residential development in Etiwanda Heights, Nakamura said. It was for that reason, she said that the planning division had worked with the Previti Group to derive the proposed specific plan amendment.
Matthew Fogt, representing the Previti Group insisted that the action the company was requestion was to entail “not changing the specific plan but rather adding to it.”
Fogt, while referencing directly or alluding to the California legislature’s passage of bills to encourage housing development and the California Department of Housing and Community Development’s authority to enforce those laws and rules which put developers in general and the Previti Group in this case in a position, essentially, to dictate what type of housing units they could construct and at what density, indicated that the Previti group was nonetheless willing to and was working with city officials to meet officials’ expectations.
When asked why the Previti Group was unwilling to develop the 790 acres it owns in Etiwanda Heights in accordance with the standards specified in the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan, Fogt, starkly though urbanely, revealed that the company never intended to abide by the limitation of construction on the property to exclusively single-family homes and that it had conveyed as much to city officials long ago, either before purchasing the 1,252.21 acres from the county or shortly thereafter.
“The answer is it [exclusively building single-family homes] just doesn’t pencil,” Fogt said, using a phrase which in the parlance of real estate developers means an assessment of whether a project will work financially. In essence, Fogt told the planning commission that the Previti group would not stand to realize a substantial enough profit on developing single family homes in Etiwanda Heights to proceed with building there. Fogt credited Jimmy Previti, in contemplating the 2024 purchase of the property “knowing about both” the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Community Plan and the general plan before moving forward to make the purchase. Fogt indicated Previti, while aware of the single-family home construction requirement on the residentially zoned property in Etiwanda Heights, never intended to meet that expectation and never promised or committed to abide by it, planning instead to use the less restrictive standard in the city’s general plan, which would permit up to eight units per acre to be built on all land developed for residential purposes.
“He knew there was a 2021 general plan and [with] the density [that it allowed] would make it work,” Fogt said.
Jimmy Previti, Fogt said, is being a good guy by “not using state law levers” – i.e., bringing to bear state law such as State Housing Crisis Act of 2019 and other mandates originating with the governor or state legislature and enforced by the California Department of Housing and Community Development – to force the city into allowing the Previti Group to construct wall to wall residential subdivisions with six to eight units to an acre in Etiwanda Heights. Instead, Fogt sought to explain, Previti was seeking through the specific plan amendment to obtain the ability to engage in density transfers whereby the company would be able to cluster 12-plexes, quadplexes, duplexes, auto courts with garages facing the street that would embody a high density residential district in the middle of the land to be developed in return for constructing houses on larger parcels at the periphery of the property bordering existing homes which are likewise of low density. In this way there would be a leavening of the density to prevent unseemly contrasts between adjoining residential properties, Fogt said.
Virtually all of the 26 Rancho Cucamonga residents who addressed the commissioners that night – Dachao Li, David Horwitz, Fred Sanchez, Cynthia Campos, Ryan Paglinawan, Jack Warshaw, Mailan Pham, Phil Hakopian, Edward Aldaz, Henry Liu, Jennifer Pacheco, Robert Gallardo, Dr. William J. Smith, Des Alvarez, Robert Abbruzzese, Hazel Wilkinson, Richard Santucci, Justin Nottingham, Starr Bose, Michael Miramontes, Alicia Mosley William Marror, Chris Little, Mike Vogel, Ron Fakhoory andChristy Dicesare – live in Etiwanda or that part of Alta Loma on the outskirts of Etiwanda Heights and had less charitable views of what Previti was requesting of the city and its officials.
By merely considering what Previti was requesting, it was asserted, the community was being given second shrift and city officials were in the throes of giving approval to an approach toward development that “prioritized profits over promises made. High density was never part of that promise,” one said.
A recurrent theme was what one of those speaking referred to as city officials’ “broken promises.”
What the city was doing by going along with Previti was to put “more people in high density [living arrangements] in a higher fire danger zone. This is the wrong neighborhood for high density,” one said.
Accommodating Previti in his demands to be allowed to construct high density residential subdivisions on the chaparral-covered land near the base of the foothills was, the planning commission was told, “a direct contradiction” of the assurances city officials had given Rancho Cucamonga’s residents.
The city documents relating to the alteration of the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan and the specific plan amendment and the language in Nakamura’s presentation were loaded with “eupemisms” employed to mask the city’s betray of its residents, one person said.
Another used the phrase “broken promises” in characterizing the city’s action, while another called what city officials are engaged in “a breach of trust.”
One resident noted that with the erasure of the land use standards contained in the original Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood Community Plan and the substitution of liberalized zoning regulations at Previti’s request, the city’s regulations become meaningless since they are subject to unlimited modifications at the whim of the next developer who makes a request.
“What’s going to happen with future revisions?” he asked.
In particular reference to the auto courts that the Previti is proposing, consisting of houses, duplexes, quadplexes or 12-plexes clustered around a small parking lot for the vehicles of those who live in them, residents expressed doubt as to whether that form of multi-family housing would be compatible with the existing surrounding residential area, would resist aesthetic deterioration over time or provide sufficient space for the residents to park their cars, let alone for their guests who might visit them to park.
“To put this many people in that small of an area, we are fooling ourselves,” one resident said. “Each of these homes will end up with excessive car parking.”
Another resident dwelled on the outright misrepresentations the city’s planning staff had engaged in.
“We were told there was not going to be anything [i.e. residential lots] above Wilson less than a half acre,” one said.
Nakamura and the rest of the city’s planning staff are without integrity, one resident said, exclaiming, “I don’t understand our staff anymore. We should never even consider that kind of housing up there.”
The city and Previti were engaging in, one resident said, “classic bait and switch,” with past and current city officials ofer “false, vague and empty promises.”
There was a major disconnect between the attitude evinced by the members of the public who were present in the meeting chamber and the planning commissioners themselves, all of whom evinced a belief that Previti’s rights with regard to developing the property he had purchased from the county trumped the limitations on the intensity of the development of that property that city officials during the last decade had assured residents would be maintained.
Planning Commission Chairman Tony Morales, in particular, evinced little patience or sympathy toward and showed rather disapproval of the widespread resident opposition to the proposed alteration of the specific plan, at one point expressing the view that the opposition was the product of misinformation spread with regard to the alteration of the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan and that those opposed to Previti’s development proposal had employed “algorithms” in the use of social media to whip up the intensity of opposition into a frenzy. Morales went so far as to assert, indeed to seek from his colleagues on the commission a declaration that the only information to be relied upon in the commission’s decision-making process would be that provided by staff and the input from the public relating to the alteration of the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan be disregarded because of its reliability. This provoked a virulent immediate reaction from the crowd present, members of which hastened to remind the chairman with shouts from the floor, which he did not officially recognize or acknowledge, to the effect that the city, city management and the city planning department had purposefully withheld from the public relevant information pertaining to the proposed amendments to the specific plan for more than two weeks in the face of repeated public requests for that information.
At one point, Nakamura disclosed that planning staff had requested, while the confidential dialogue between those staff members and the Previti group was ongoing with regard to the requested changes in the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan, that Jimmy Previti meet with community members to acquaint them with what he was asking the city to do and provide them with an explanation of why making the change was necessary and desirable. Previti, she said, had respectfully declined to do so.
This galvanized Commissioner Melissa Diaz, who was vexed by the Previti’s seeming insensitivity to the community members in whose midst he was proposing to construct as many as 6,320 dwelling units. After reconfirming that the city staff was pressing forward with undertaking the alteration of the specific plan at Previti’s request, Diaz gave indication she was moving toward voting to deny the request, saying Previti was seeking the trust and permission to engage in the shaping of a significant section of the city and it was her impression that “The developer does not know the community well enough to be given the type of leeway they are asking for.”
This changed the tempo and complexion of the discussion considerably and for a time, the momentum in the room appeared to have shifted and was moving with considerable force against the Previti Group. Commissioner James Daniels had at the outset of the planning commission’s consideration of the item recused himself because he lives in the Etiwanda Heights district or its immediately surrounding area. This left Morales, Diaz and commissioners Al Boling and Bryan Dopp as the four lone decision-makers to consider the relevant issues and render a nonbinding but influential recommendation to the city council as to whether the city should stick by the commitment its officials collectively made to both the Local Agency Formation Commission when it sought clearance to bring the 6.38 square miles into the city in 2020 and the city’s residents when the city council adopted the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Community Plan the prior year, while pledging to permit only single-family homes to be built in a quantity of no more than 3,000.
Dopp took particular issue with the auto court component of what the Previti Group is proposing, asserting that such a residential product was out of place in that neck of the woods of Rancho Cucamonga. Echoing in his statements was what came across as an identification with the concerns being expressed by those who had spoken out that evening, garnering at one point the spontaneous applause of the crowd when he registered frustration with the prospective deviation from the land use standards contained in the specific plan. Boling, too, came across as courting crowd when he noted that land zoned for residential development north of Wilson Avenue, which lies near the southern end of the relevant property, lies within a high fire danger zone and had been slated for low density development. Many present were of the impression that a 3-to-1 majority was forming, with only Morales in opposition, to recommend that the city council remain steadfast in maintaining the land use mandates contained in the Etiwanda Heights Neighborhood and Conservation Plan.
The discussion drew itself out, however, and once again, while an extended and unexpectedly profuse palaver focusing on multifamily units and specific types of multifamily units raised first by Dopp and which involved primarily Dopp and Boling ensued, the gravitational pull on the dais vis-a-vis the Previti Group and the city’s residents began to veer back, relatively speaking, in favor of amending the specific plan. The focus moved to moderating, rather than limiting, the land use flexibility contained in the proposed amendment. The crowd witnessed the four-fifths strength commission, with roughly three-fourths of the dialogue emanating from Dopp, focus on making a show of taking something contained in amendment away from the Previti Group to arrive at what might be represented by the city as some order of a “fair” compromise. That discussion penultimately landed on the allowances of 12-plexes and walkups, i.e., apartments. Ultimately what followed was a decision to remove from the permitted land uses not both 12-plexes and walkups but walkups alone.
This ostensible compromise gave the planning commission, along with the entire planning department and the city, cover to adopt making the recommendation that the city council at a future date give passage to a slightly modified specific plan amendment and the first two phases of development to take place under that modified specific plan, which is to consist of a total of 410 dwelling units, one being 177 homes and nine undeveloped lots on 27.73 acres and the other being 233 homes and eleven undeveloped lots on 39.22 acres. Under that development plan, the Previti Group will be allotted roughly 6.42 lots per acre.
In giving a rationale for the commission’s support of the specific plan amendment, Boling, noting that in this instance he and his colleagues were acting as “an advisory body,” remarked that even though, “we make the recommendation, we don’t make the decision.”
Dopp said the city amending its specific plan in Etiwanda Heights would bring about financial relief for homebuyers. “The only way to create affordability is to increase supply,” he said. “That is an unfortunate reality that we can’t ignore.”
Diaz said that although “I don’t know if I can trust the developer will respond to the needs of the community, I do think this land needs to be developed.”
Presaging that the city council at its only meeting in January or one of its two meetings in February will follow the planning commission’s recommendation, the city said granting the amendment would “expand housing options.”