The petition
We, the undersigned citizens of Petaluma wish to encourage responsible retail development while preserving the small town character of our community. The City of Petaluma's General Plan 2025 describes Petaluma as having “a close-knit, neighborly and family friendly city” possessing a “rich historic character”. The General Plan prioritizes the need to “strengthen the visual and aesthetic character of major arterial corridors” and “enhance downtown by preserving its historic character, increasing accessibility and residential opportunities, and ensuring a broad range of businesses and activities.” We find that the construction of large-scale “bigbox” chain store retail developments will threaten the viability of the local businesses and economy, create traffic congestion, overburden limited water resources and put an undue burden on our town’s infrastructure. Proposed retail developments (including East Washington Place, DSL and Chelsea Outlet Expansion) if approved should be amended to include:
• A 50,000 square foot building size cap in all commercial districts to support the local economy and preserve the scale and character of the City.
• All applicants seeking a permit to build large-scale retail development larger than 25,000 square feet must pay for a comprehensive fiscal impact study, a public hearing and related municipal staff support in order to estimate the positive and negative economic effects of the project on the local area prior to project approval.
• A parking cap of 2 spaces per thousand square feet of retail, unless the project includes a parking structure with retail on the ground level.
• All new retail developments should implement Smart Code principles and be in keeping with the aesthetics and preservation of the historical and cultural character as defined in the General Plan 2025 & the Central Petaluma Specific Plan.
• Proposed future projects will not add to the current net water usage. Approved projects must pay for new water conservation improvements to the existing water supply system that will yield equal or more conservation of the existing supply to offset new demand.
We believe these should apply to all proceedings, applications and petitions pending on, or commenced after, the date of filing this petition at the Petaluma City Clerk’s office.
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