Planning Commission green lights Koll project

Mathis Winkler

NEWPORT BEACH -- The city’s first Greenlight vote is one step closer

after planning commissioners on Thursday unanimously recommended the

approval of a 250,000-square-foot expansion project at Koll Center.

The commission’s 6-0 vote -- short a vote because Commissioner Anne

Gifford was absent -- is but the first hurdle the project, which includes

a 10-story office building and two parking structures, must leap. Next up

is the City Council, which could take up the matter as early as June 26.

A council approval would launch a citywide vote because the project

falls under Greenlight’s jurisdiction. Approved by voters in November,

the slow-growth initiative requires a special election for any

development that adds more than 40,000 square feet or 100 peak-hour car

trips or dwelling units over what’s allowed in the city’s general plan.

Project developers have already said they would pay for a special

election that could take place as early as this fall.

Planning commissioners said they felt comfortable in moving the

project along.

“We went through this project in detail,” said Commissioner Larry

Tucker, referring to several previous hearings in which he and his

colleagues looked at the project.

While planning commissioners had felt in the past that the Koll

developers had not done enough to deal with traffic increases that could

result from the project, a development agreement between the city and the

developer changed that, Tucker said.

“The applicant has come back and . . . offered to put up a substantial

amount of money,” he said. “I never had a problem with the project. [The

developer] just had to help to remedy its impact.”

On top of about $1.16 million in mandatory traffic and transportation

fees, the developers have agreed to pay $2 million for long-term traffic

improvements, as well as $112,500 to fund a planning study for the area

and $60,000 to build a new fire station.

Tim Strader Sr., one of the partners in the Koll project, said he felt

the expansion would help to alleviate traffic problems in the area around

Jamboree Road and MacArthur Boulevard, where the center is located.

“We believe that this project will be a solution,” he said. “Because

if the project is not approved, the city will not get $2 million to solve

the problem.”

But Barry Eaton, a member of the city’s Environmental Quality Affairs

Committee, pointed out that the Koll development agreement fell short of

a draft agreement between the city and chip-maker Conexant Systems Inc.

Conexant officials have put their 566,000-square-foot expansion

project on hold pending a recovery of the economy. The project would also

require a Greenlight vote.

But planning commissioners said the Koll money would come in a lump

sum rather than installments, as arranged for the Conexant project.

A Conexant offer to give $250,000 toward a fire station also exceeded

their “fair share” of what a new station would cost and rather served as

an additional incentive to approve the agreement, while Koll’s $60,000

represented the right amount, Tucker said.