San Diego’s planning groups say new $1,000 fee to oppose projects stifles community input

Nearly two years after the city of San Diego changed longstanding policy to begin requiring community planning groups to pay for appeals, the groups’ leaders say the $1,000 fee has proven to be a barrier to fight against projects they oppose.

The appeals process allows anyone to challenge approved projects if they believe there are factual errors, new information, unsupported findings or conflicts with a city plan or rule.

But while other residents paid $1,000 to appeal decisions, community planning groups were exempt.

That changed beginning in 2022, when the City Council removed their fee waiver. Joe LaCava, the District 1 councilmember who has led efforts to overhaul planning group rules, said city officials believed it was inappropriate to give “a special benefit” that was not applied to other organizations. 

“If community groups felt strong enough, they still have the right to file an appeal,” LaCava told inewsource. “But to allow them to do that without cost was problematic.”

Community planning groups have provided input on projects, from housing developments to infrastructure upgrades, for more than 50 years. Made up of citizens, the groups are considered “integral components of the planning process, and are highly regarded by the City Council and by staff,” according to the city’s website. 

The city provides the groups up to $500 annually in reimbursements, meaning they typically don’t have the $1,000 in their budgets to cover an appeal. 

Lynn Elliott, newly elected chair of the North Park Planning Committee, said she believes they should have “more authority” to talk with developers about designing projects in neighborhoods, especially high-rise housing structures.

Elliott said she’s seeing housing developments slowly turn North Park into a more urbanized area, prompting a lack of parking without having alternatives to driving cars, such as an improved public transit system.

Paying $1,000 to file an appeal is a new hardship, Elliott said.

“(Residents are) very frustrated, and we don’t have the money to pay this fee,” she said.

Elliott said group chairs wanted at least one free appeal per year, but that “compromise” ultimately didn’t get enough support. 

Since 2018, the city has received 192 appeals against projects, 30 of which have come from community planning groups. Some groups file more than others depending on the number of projects in their neighborhoods. Construction activity also slowed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The La Jolla Community Planning Association has been the most active, filing 15 appeals since 2018 — as many as the eight other groups filed throughout the years combined.

In 2019, planning groups filed 12 appeals. Last year — after the city began charging the groups — they filed just four.

A city report shows the Planning Commission denied most of the appeals it received in 2023, but one appeal for a two-story housing structure in La Jolla, for example, was accepted and led to modifications for the project.

One of last year’s appeals was filed by the Barrio Logan Community Planning Group against the New Leaf Biofuel project, which would have constructed an underground pipeline in the neighborhood — a 1,000-acre, predominantly Latino community south of downtown San Diego that includes the city’s port and a naval base. After months of protest and resistance from the planning group, environmentalists and other community stakeholders, the company canceled the project in 2023. 

The Barrio Logan group did not have to pay to appeal the project, as it was temporarily exempted before the city’s changes went into effect for groups located within Coastal Commission boundaries.

All planning groups will now have to pay the filing fee for appeals moving forward, a city spokesperson said.

Barrio Logan planning group Chair Julie Corrales said she doesn’t think it’s fair for the city to charge the groups for appeals.

“I think in a way they’re trying to curb frivolous appeals, but the folks that are gonna be most impacted are the planning groups in poor Black and brown communities, because it’s harder for us to come up with a thousand-dollar appeal,” Corrales said. 

LaCava said there are effective and ineffective ways to influence a city-approved project. Barrio Logan’s appeal helped stop the project because there were legitimate public health concerns and plenty of community protest, he said.

By contrast, LaCava said, simply disliking a project — even as it abides by city regulations — isn’t a good enough reason to stop it. He said planning groups have opposed a new apartment building in their neighborhood for reasons surrounding increased population density or lack of parking constructed with the building. 

LaCava cited a 2012 incident in which a developer reduced the height of a housing project after receiving feedback from Navajo Community Planners, Inc. that the building was too big. Despite the developer trying to accommodate the group’s suggestions, the group opposed the project anyway, he said.

“That sends a very negative message that if you can’t get the support, no matter how hard you try, why bother?” he said.

Removing the appeal waiver is just one piece of sweeping changes for community planning groups over the past two years. Now, the groups are required to apply for official recognition as the city attempts to make the groups more representative of their communities.

That has pitted groups against each other in the Hillcrest and La Jolla areas as they seek official recognition. In Uptown — which includes Hillcrest, University Heights and Bankers Hill —  a new group known as Vibrant Uptown has argued the existing group, Uptown Planners, has more older, white homeowners than the area’s demographics.

The City Council will hold a hearing to consider planning group recognitions this spring.