San Clemente Planner Can Stay on Panel

The San Clemente City Council voted unanimously Monday night to let Hal Joseph remain on the Planning Commission after hearing a city attorney’s opinion that his role in bringing a developer to a project in the city would result in only a temporary conflict of interest.

City Councilman Tom Lorch said the question of Joseph’s removal from the Planning Commission was “an emotional issue . . . and something we still don’t have all the facts on.”

“So we decided to remove it (from the council agenda),” allowing Joseph to retain his post, Lorch said.

Mayor Brian J. Rice had called for Joseph’s resignation from the five-member commission last week because of Joseph’s involvement in getting Centex Development Corp. to purchase undeveloped portions of the 1,077-acre Forster Ranch.

Abstained From Voting

Joseph, who stands to receive a finder’s fee from the landowner, Estrella Properties, has abstained from voting on any matter affecting the Forster Ranch property and Dallas-based Centex since last March. Rice has contended that Joseph could be required to abstain from votes on the project through March, 1990, thereby crippling the commission’s ability to deal effectively with a major issue in the city.

But after Monday night’s meeting, Rice explained his change of position on Joseph. “The city attorney’s comments that there is a conflict of interest only lasting 2 months made me decide to move for removal (of the issue from the council agenda),” he said.

Joseph, a longtime real estate consultant who has been a member of the Planning Commission for the past 3 years, left immediately after the vote and was unavailable for comment.

Earlier, however, Joseph said of the controversy: “This is not World War III. “I haven’t done anything wrong or illegal. Everything I’ve done has been very up-front and I think the council has gone overboard in saying that I should be removed.”

Centex Plan Approved

Centex, which has expressed an interest in purchasing the Forster property since last March, has been negotiating with the city over development plans. Monday night, the City Council approved Centex’s plan to build a 233-home development on the land. Centex was one of eight developers competing for a limited number of housing units allowed under the city’s 1986 growth-control ordinance, Measure B.

Forster Ranch is one of San Clemente’s four major developments slated to be considered by the Planning Commission in coming months.

On advice from San Clemente City Atty. Jeff Oderman, Joseph has been abstaining from votes on all matters involving Forster Ranch and Centex that have come before the commission since last March.

Rice last week called for Joseph’s resignation, saying his abstentions leave only four planning commissioners who can vote, raising the possibility of tie votes on sensitive issues affecting the property and Centex.

Joseph said he had planned to formally resign his post at tonight’s Planning Commission meeting but changed his mind after receiving a letter from the mayor last week demanding his resignation by noon last Thursday.

Rice also offered Joseph the option of issuing a public declaration that he would not accept any money from the Centex Corp. If Joseph did not resign or issue the declaration, Rice said at the time, he would have the issue placed on Monday’s City Council agenda.

Initially, it was thought that state conflict-of-interest laws would require that Joseph abstain through March, 1990, a year and a day after close of escrow on the sale. But the state Fair Political Practices Commission later advised Oderman that since Centex was the buyer and the finder’s fee was being paid by the seller, Joseph would not be in conflict-of-interest after the close of escrow.