18-0611_VERMEULEN RANCH CENTER, LLC_E7_Correspondence6/11/2018
June 11, 2018
Hi folks--there's a City Council meeting scheduled tomorrow. ~~~elen
property is once again on the agenda. /ul& JUN 11 Pf'J 3 OS
A bit of past history: CITY Cl E!~K
SAU Jl.JA.'i CM', ""Ht ~ n.Q
In 2014 when the issue of the Vermuelen family's desire to have 500 units built on ·
their land, beside Armstrong Nusery by the Speiker development a~d their ~
representative Troy Bourne, the townspeople objected. On October 21, 2014,
. the City Council majority that voted to approve the amending of the General Plan
to rezone 35 acres for agricultural land (rated having the richest soil in California)
to make room for t~e project, consisted of Mayor Sam Allevato, Larry Kramer and
John Taylor.
There was so much objection that the venue had to be moved to a conference
room at our school district office for that meeting.
The meeting time was set, but Mayor Sam Allevato and Troy Bourne changed the
time to a half or hour earlier for people Bourne had invited from out of town
Speiker Senior developments. Bourne provided box lunches for his guests and
they took all the seating in this very large room.
When the San Juan residents arrived on the scheduled time announced, there
was no seating available and they had to stand behind Bourne's seated out of -·
town guests.
Mayor Sam Allevato extended that meeting until3 o'clock the next morning.
The townspeople then rallied and collected almost double the signature.s
necessary to pass a ·referendum that would give the council the power to either
accept the outcome of the referendum or put it out for a special election to the
voters. The referendum was accepted by the newly elected council and the
proposed 500 units were blocked at that tim~.
Troy Bourne, Speike.r, and the Vermuelen family are back again. This time
proposing 180 homes and almost 2,000 car trips a day.
E7
The commis~ion passed it on for approval to the City Council anyway. The same
vague plan was presented to the council and moved on to tomorrows meeting.
The problem of being able to provide water for the 180 homes did come up,
water that is becoming scarce that the residents already living here may have to
share.
One last remark,.·-The Planning Commissioners at the time the 500 units were
being considered, the Commissioners voted not to pass the project because they
found Troy Bourne's EIR-Environmentallmpact Report to be flawed.
Regards, Barbara
For checking the meeting agend~ go to:
sanjuancapistrano.org
October 2015-VOL ·s, 10
~ COMMUNITY WATCHDOG
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~ommunity Common Sense
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~ San Juan Capistrano · .
. The Facts Regarding t~e Vermeulen Lawsuit
You
may
hav e
heard
rum-
b lin gs
about
the
C ity
bei ng
SJC Co uncilmember s ued
K en y Ferguson by the
Ver-
meulen family an d Troy
Bourne of Spieker Develop-
By Kerry Ferguson, San Juan City Council member
ment ("Pl aintiffs,), over the
uns uccessful development
of the Vermeu le n prop erty.
Some supporters of th e de-
velopment have gone so far
as to predict that the lawsu it
will bankrupt the City. A llo w
me to set th e record straight.
Here's w h at o ur c ri tics
haven't told you:
The City strongly di sagrees
with the c laims alleged in
the lawsuit a n d on Friday,
Septem ber 18, 2015, the City
. fil ed a moti on ch a ll enging the
lawsuit on m any grounds.
It is the City's position that
the lawsuit impro p erly seeks
to u s urp the C ity's broad
poli ce powers and to dictate
how a C ity Counci l shou ld
exercise its d iscretion ary
legislati ve and zoning author-
ity by effective ly forc ing th e
City to "up-zone" the proper-
ty from Agricul tu ra l-Business
uses to dense residential uses.
This is
contrary
to Ca li -
fornia
Law.
T he P la in -
tiffs' po s it io n is also not s up-
ported by the facts. Although
the Verm e ul en property has
been used for farming and
other agricultural uses s in ce
1938, Pl a inti ffs' claim that it
can n o lo nger be v iably used
Story continued on page 4 ...
~.
~ San Juan Capistrano
Swn rontitmed.fivm page J .•.
for agricultural and other uses al-
lowed by the Agri-Business General
Plan designation of the property is .
patently false. The property has been
leased to Arm.<;trong nurseries since
1998, a T-Mobile facility provides
extra beneficial use, and the Retail
Center, which is. part {$f the Vermeu-
len Ranelt, continues in business to
this day.
The Agri-Busmess.zoniog allews
many dilkrent types of uses, :but the
Plaintiffs never applied· for any of
those uses·. A mere desire to up-zone
and build a more Jucrative project
th'an historically e~-isted or .cWTent{y
' exists does not p~vide any basis,
constitutional or otherwise, for forc-
ing the City to change the a·eneral
Plan designation.
It is also the City's position that the
lawsuit improperly seeks to .under-
mine the will of the voters. Last
November, well more than the re-
quired number of voters in the City
exercised their inherent referendum
powers by challenging the resolution
that had approved a General Plan
Amendment and Specific Plan for
Spieker Development's Project.
. Once the voters have spaken -by
.referendum petition, the California
Elections Code requires the City
.to repeal the resolution or bold a
special eJection. The City Council
v.oted to repeaJ it since the very
recent election had yielded 60% of
the votes cast rejecting candidates
wlto favored the project, including
two incumbents who bad voted for
1it in .a very Unfairly conduct.ed City
Council Meeting that sought to Rlll1
it through -no matter what.
It should be noted that Spieker did
not challenge the repeal of the Proj-
ect approval and cannot do so now
because the 90 days for filing a legal
challenge has expired.
. .
ing the City should have bought the
Vermeulen Ranch with those funds.
Electing to acquire one property
over another using Measure D or
Measure Y funds that are designated
.for specific uses, such as open space
and preserving the rural character of
the City, does not violate Plaintiffs'
equal protection rights nor provide
any b~tsis for trying to dictate how
It is also important to keep in mind the City should use those funds.
that the California Election Code Again, this is an untimely attempt to
prohibits the. City from taking an challenge decades-old discretionary
action within 12 months contrary to legislative actions by the City, in-
the issue presented by a referendum.· eluding the City's decisions between
The City has also challenged the
Plaintiffs' constitutional claims for
regulatory taking, due process and
equa-l protectim on procedut•al and
legal grounds .
A substantial part of the lawsuit is
based on complaints that the-City
treated the Plaintiffs unfairly by
using Measure o· and Measure Y..:
funds to buy other properties, claim-
1990 and 2009 on how to spend
· · bond funds that were approved by
over two-thirds of the voters. ·
For all these reasons, the City looks
forward to having the City's defense
to this lawsuit heard by the court in
November. We will keep you posted.
T.o subscribe to Councilmember
Ferguson~ free monthly .
e-newsletter, email your request to:
kerrykfergusonsjL@gllllliLcom
Coun cilm an Sam A ll eva~o bas repeatedly claimed publicly that the current City Coun cil majority is "res ponsible for
eleven lawsuits" totaling "millions of dollars". We decided to d o some fact checking to see when laws uits against the
C ity were filed amounting to more than $10,000, and bow much t he C ity taxpayers paid to defend and/or settle each
case*. We s ubmitted a P ublic Records request for informa ti on dated back to 2013 , the year prior to the election of
the present council majority. The results are li sted below. · ··
LEGAL FEES PAID BY SJC TAXPAYERS 2013-PRESENT
LA WSlfiT NAME & BASED ON ACTIONS STATl 'S ~ LEGAL
I BRIF.F I>F.SCI~IPTION OF PRF.VIOl iS AND/OR
Capistrano Taxpayers Association (CTA) v. SJC
After approving a 40% increase in water rates, Council
majority members Allevato, Kramer and Taylor ignored
warnings by CTA that the new "tiered" water rates were
illegal. CTAfiled a lawsuit that claimed the rates violated
Proposition 218, which protects taxpayers from being charged
more for an essential service !han what it actually costs to
deliver it.
Commonsen se.com, LLC v . SJC and Councilmembers
Sam All evato, Larry Kramer and John Taylor
Councilmembers Allevato, Kramer and Taylor voted in closed
session to ban newsracks from city property. Ou r publication
was also prohibited from distributing our paper on City
property. We filed a legal action, asserting our First
Amendment right to free speech. The judge agreed with CCS
and restored ou! E!!Per to C
Vermeulen Ranch Center a nd Spieker Senior
Development Partners, LLC v. SJC
After a successful referendum· to overturn approval by Council
members Allevato, Kramer and Taylor of high-intensity
residential development on former agricultural property, the
developer and landowner sued the City, claiming entitlement
to re-zone the property to allow for residential development
"Vermeulen Lawsuit " at: www.ccsense.
OR PRESENT SETTLEMENT
CITY COli NCIL FEES PAID
Previous Co un cil
Majority
Previous Coun cil
Majority
OC Superior Court
Judge ruled in favor of
the CTA. Council
majority members
Allevato, Kramer and
Taylor voted to appeal
verdict
. -
City settled, paying
attorney fees and court
costs totaling .
. approximately $60,000
..... ~
On -going. Legal fees to
date: $195,000
The court U:wtilidatedthe previou.s. COII11Cl1 's projeCil!JlpTQval ,:r1A~~~~~il.~ ......... ~,
law ~~. elow, ani/ article on~e J3)4 41
Save our Historic Town Center Mark Nielsen, Kenneth E.
Friess, Robert J. Williams v. SJ C
Councilmembers Ailevato, Kramer and Taylor voted to
approve the "Urban Village "'downtown development plan
despite warnings from the C ity Attorney that the plan was not
in conformance with the Historic Town Center Master Plan. A
group of residents filed a lawsuit challenging the approval
which look place at 3 AM
Joan ~€lob, 'Q.
~~~t.~l'ilr.s~~'tbe city l"l01 7..,.,.,rJ,D'n' ri#.H-.TltJIR tJg~rELQ:.
Previous Council
Majority
~ "'"""' . :";2~'A~Mril . ...:Jtlll
Hootan Danes hmand, Lauri Mcintosh and Brian Water rate lawsuit
Montgomery v. SJC resulted from actions
R esidents filed a class action lawsuit against the City for full of previous Council
refund of water charges. An Appellate Court ruled they were· majority; current
illegally overcharged for a period of 4 years but the City only Council members
refunded 1 year of overcharges (see ''Class Action Lawsuit-SJC Water Ferguson, Perry and
Rates" at: www.ccsense.com under "Community Links"). Reeve approved 1
r of refunds
r~~r71rfiW.~...4
So'uthwest Voter Education Project, Tina Auclair and
Louie Camacho v. SJC
SJC r esidents Tina Auclair and Louie C amacho filed a laws uit
against the C ity claiming election process is "racist". Lawsuit
demanded that the City be diVided into districts to represent
Hispanic minorities. (see "Auclair/Camacho SW Voter £d Lawsuit" at
www.ccsense.com under "Community Links ·~.
Total
*Source: City of San Juan Capistrano, OC Superior Court
On-going. Legal fees to
date: approximately
$15,000
On-going. Th e City
reported approximately
$9000 in legal fees paid
to C ity 's attorneys to
date however, court
records reflect
add itional fees of
approximately $50;ooo
to date s ubmitted to the
· co urt by Auclair &
Camacho's attorneys
$9,225,000.0 0
(approximate)