City sponsors Richard Barberi’s bid to annex 23 acres for
development along Luchessa
Gilroy – For the second time in seven years, Richard Barberi will ask regional land-use officials to let him bring his south Gilroy land into the city limits so he can build homes.
The hope of Barberi and the city, which is sponsoring his bid to annex 23 acres along Luchessa Avenue, is that encroaching development has undercut the land’s suitability for farming.
The members of the Local Agency Formation Commission rejected a 1999 bid to annex the land, arguing it could still support small-scale farming or other “niche” agricultural uses.
Local leaders have accused the agency in the past of placing greater restrictions on the growth of Gilroy than cities elsewhere in the county, while LAFCO officials say the city has simply failed to meet its standards.
But a lot has changed in the last seven years.
Car dealerships, homes and hotels have risen around the rectangular strip of land in the time since Barberi’s last annexation request, and within the next year children will begin playing baseball and soccer on the 81-acre sports park now under construction just south of the site.
The city has also approved a farmland preservation policy that requires landowners to purchase and set aside one acre of land for every acre they seek to develop. The Barberi land would become the first test case of that policy.
City Planning Manager Bill Faus also stressed that “in the last year, we’ve had very much of a warming of relations” with the agency. As a sign of the improved relations, he pointed to a visit by LAFCO officials in December, when they toured various areas that the city hopes to annex in coming years, as well as land earmarked for agricultural preservation.
He said a LAFCO report submitted as background for commissioners’ consideration today appears to bode well for the request.
“Based upon the LAFCO staff report, I think we have a good chance,” Faus said. “The LAFCO report was generally favorable.”
Over the years, the Barberi family has floated the idea of using the site for residential homes and a grocery store or other commercial space. City leaders, uncertain if LAFCO would allow them to annex the land, have denied the family’s efforts to obtain building permits on the land in anticipation of future development. LAFCO approval today would free the family to apply for building permits in the next year.
