Month: November 2013

2013 might go down as the year that the Davis City Council put a number of longstanding issues to bed.  If it seems like we have been dealing with Cannery, water, and the firefighters for a long time, it is true.  If there is one point that the Enterprise editorial raised that I agree with, it is that it has been a long road for Cannery.

However, it is also a road that may not end with a council vote – just as water did not end with a council vote and may not end even with a citizen’s vote.

By Tia Will

My story begins almost three years ago after I decided to downsize and bought a house in Old East Davis within direct line of sight of the east-west railroad line. I gave a lot of thought to cost, location, walkability, general neighborhood mix, and how I would adjust to the noise from the trains.

What I did not give any thought to was the safely, or ability to get out of my essentially cul-de-sac street should I need to evacuate rapidly. From what I have heard, it does not seem that many of us look into this issue prior to moving in. It seems that we just make the assumption that someone will have looked into the safety issues prior to approving or building the project. Or we simply don’t consider it at all.

Discussion Has Focused on Details Rather Than Core Philosophical Issues: The Davis Enterprise‘s editorial this morning argues that there has been enough talk and debate and that it is time to build on Cannery and “turn an old eyesore into a new neighborhood.”

“The Hunt-Wesson tomato plant shut down in October 1999. That’s right, Davis has been dealing with this crumbling, derelict eyesore on the northern end of town for more than 14 years,” the Enterprise writes, and they note all of the changes that have occurred since 1999.

When the Davis City Council voted 4-1 last month to reexamine the possibility of pausing the conservation easement process at Mace 391, one of the concerns that even proponents of the business park expressed was the possibility of harming the city’s reputation and thus prospects for getting future easements, and harming the ability of Yolo Land Trust (YLT) to do their work on behalf of communities like Davis.

A letter dated November 12, 2013, from the US Department of Agriculture’s State Conservationist Carlos Suarez, addressed to Mayor Joe Krovoza, indicates that the consequences would be serious and grave.

By Lee Bartholomew

The possibility of the property’s re-emergence as a business park is on my mind. Aside from the obviously bad business practice associated with a change of heart in respect to this property, I wonder at the economics of such a venture. First, as to data collection; have you, or has staff, seen any demand or feasibility studies for larger business parks in the region? Any meaningful absorption forecast?

It would seem as though these questions need some study prior to a sea change for the property. A change to spec development, in my view, reflects a major policy decision about the nature of land use in Davis.

For the last several months, one of my frustrations was attempting to figure out why it seemed like, every step of the way, the Covell Village folks seemed to trying to stop the Cannery.  It was all below the surface – no one could put a finger on it and no one would go on the record.

The most tangible thing I heard was that Tandem Properties would not allow an easement on their Cranbrook Property.  There were some suggestions that they were trying to leverage joint planning while, in public at least, they denied interest in developing Covell Village for another 20 to 30 years.

By David Morris

Donations target Davis Roots, Hacker Lab expansion, and Wet Lab Incubator: Capitol Corridor Ventures (CCV) announced today that it has pledged to donate 600,000 (USD) to support the Davis technology community in 2014. The pledge focuses on three specific areas of the tech ecosystem, and includes funds for Davis Roots, an expansion of Hacker Lab into Davis, and establishing the Davis Wet Lab Incubator Challenge Fund.

The CCV pledge highlights the increasing momentum of organizations that support Davis tech entrepreneurs. “We are very fortunate to have so many positive entrepreneurial activities happening in Davis right now, and it is important that we continue to build on this momentum,” said David Morris, CEO of CCV who also serves as Managing Director of the techDAVIS Business Association. “This pledge is intended to provide a boost to the Davis tech ecosystem that will have long term impact.”

Following the series of deals cut by ConAgra on Cannery, it seems likely that the council will approve the project at this point.  That, of course, does not quite give the project a green light because one of the biggest remaining questions is whether the deals struck by the food giant will be sufficient to diminish or eliminate the possibility of a group putting it on the ballot.

There has been for some time a belief that the neighboring Covell Village developers have been either passively or actively attempting to stop the development at Cannery.

By Matt Williams

At the beginning of Tuesday night’s Staff presentation Mike Webb stepped through the key components of the Development Agreement and then turned the microphone over to Ashley Feeney and Mary Jo Bryan for the announcement of the Monday agreement reached by New Home Company and Choices for Healthy Aging (CHA).  Taken together those elements represented the culmination of a whole lot of listening by the ConAgra/New Home Company team, and a whole lot of persistence by the many and varied interest groups around Davis that felt they had a vested interest in the Cannery project.

Although it often appeared to be more painful than it needed to be, that process is a textbook example of the old adage that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.  It could also be called a Win-Win agreement.