Huntington Beach senior housing project passes second reading on split vote

The Bolsa Chica Senior Care Community project passed a second reading at Tuesday night’s Huntington Beach City Council meeting.

The council voted 4-3 to adopt Ordinance No. 4327, which approves a zoning text amendment that changes the land from commercial general to a specific plan, SP-19, for the project.

It was one final 4-3 vote from the highly divided council as it has been comprised over the past two years, though this time conservative Tony Strickland joined with outgoing minority members Dan Kalmick, Natalie Moser and Rhonda Bolton to approve the amendment and move the project forward. Mayor Gracey Van Der Mark, Mayor Pro Tem Pat Burns and Casey McKeon voted against.

The vote was the same as it had been at the Oct. 15 meeting, when the project was introduced.

Burns was the most outspoken about the project, which was downsized from original plans by real estate developer Hines and Clearwater Living to 134 assisted living units and 25 memory care units. It will be built at the southwest corner of Bolsa Chica Street and Warner Avenue.

Much of the disagreement Tuesday focused on whether the Bolsa Chica project was commercial or residential.

“These are residential units and should be treated and evaluated as such,” Burns said. “This project should be evaluated as a residential medium-high-density project, which six of us up here have campaigned against [high-density development] at some point.”

He added that the floor-area ratio, a formula that determines the maximum floor area that can be developed on a property, deviated more than the allowed 10%.

Huntington Beach City Council members Natalie Moser and Rhonda Bolton, right, listen to resident Jo Ann Arvizu give public comments during Tuesday night’s meeting.

(Matt Szabo)

Kalmick responded that the ratio is used in commercial projects, not residential projects, and called the project an ordinary assisted-living facility.

“This is not residential development,” Kalmick said. “This has facilities in it that are designed to assist people as they get toward the end of their life. This has nurse’s quarters, this has nurse facilities, nurse stations. It is not built as a residential building.”

Bolton asked city director of community development Jennifer Villasenor if the project would count toward Regional Housing Needs Assessment numbers. The answer was no, due to the lack of independent living units.

She agreed with Kalmick that the project was not a residential development and responded to members of the public who said that it was.

“I kind of feel like we’ve already been tarred and feathered, painted with this brush of being in favor of something that is not what this is,” Bolton said. “In a way, you’ve created a perverse incentive. Now you come back and ask us to change the decision that we’ve made, but you’ve already tarred and feathered us for making that decision.”

Tuesday’s meeting was the last full meeting on the dais for Kalmick, Moser and Bolton, who failed in their bids for reelection earlier this month. Some residents presented flowers to the outgoing trio, as well as retiring City Clerk Robin Estanislau.

Chad Williams, Butch Twining and Don Kennedy are set to be sworn in at the next meeting Dec. 3, making all seven council members seats held by conservatives. Lisa Lane Barnes was elected the new city clerk.