Letter: Supervisor Sears Responds to Tam Junction's Plan Bay Area Concerns

June 5, 2013

Dear Residents of Tam Valley, Almonte and the Gateway communities:

You and others in our community have raised questions in recent months about Plan Bay Area and the designation of Priority Development Areas (PDAs) in our area, in particular, and throughout Marin County.

As your representative, I have been having ongoing conversations with County planning staff about PDA designations. These designations have implications for current and future housing and for much needed transportation infrastructure funding in and around our heavily trafficked Tam Junction area.

I have been carefully examining both the opportunities and the constraints that PDA designations bring to our Southern Marin communities. In order to make the most informed decisions possible, I, together with Supervisor Susan Adams, who represents District 1 (which includes the Marinwood PDA), have asked our Community Development Agency to consider the following three scenarios:

1)     Removing Tam Valley/Almonte from the 101 transit corridor PDA

2)     Removing only the Manzanita area from the PDA

3)     Removing Marinwood from the 101 transit corridor PDA

We asked County planning staff to evaluate the impact removing a PDA designation might have on receipt of much needed transportation dollars through the One Bay Area Grant (OBAG) program or otherwise, and to return to the Board of Supervisors as soon as possible with their analysis and possible recommendations for action.

Recently, bicycle and pedestrian advocates and local families from Tam Valley advocated for and won an OBAG grant of $175,000 to help fund a much needed bicycle and pedestrian study for improvements along Shoreline Highway, a corridor serving our gateway neighborhoods, commuters and students. I want to know the impact revising the PDA designation would have on this grant of funds and achieving safety improvements for our area.

Transportation funding for smaller local projects to help make travel safer along Shoreline Highway is hard to find. I am not aware of any other sources of funding that could backfill a loss of funds if removing or revising the PDA designation means we cannot keep this OBAG award of $175,000. Before pushing for action that might jeopardize this funding award, I want to fully understand the possible consequences of removing or revising the PDA designation for the Tam Valley area.

Accordingly, I have asked both Brian Crawford, Director of our Community Development Agency (land use planning staff), and Diane Steinhauser, Director of the Transportation Authority of Marin, to analyze (1) whether removing Tam Valley/Almonte from the 101 transit corridor PDA would result in loss of the $175,000 OBAG grant and other potential sources of funding for transportation and bike/ped needs; and (2) whether removing only the Manzanita area from the PDA would result in retaining that grant and other sources of funding.

I will, of course, keep you informed as I get answers to these important questions. We want to be sure our decisions support the community’s desires for appropriate locations for housing and for funding to relieve traffic congestion and provide safer bike and pedestrian access to Tam Junction, the heavily trafficked entry to our valley.

Sincerely,

Kate Sears
Supervisor, Southern Marin