Salinas planning commission hears PlaceWorks plan for Phase 1 zoning updates tied to housing element, cancels Dec. 17 meeting

PlaceWorks, the consulting firm hired to update Salinas’s zoning code, told the Planning Commission on Dec. 3 that Phase 1 will focus on changes required by the city’s housing element and state law, with later phases aligning the zoning map and development standards to a new general plan.

“We are starting with implementing your housing element, through some required changes to the zoning as one of the first phases of the work,” Amy Sintheimer of PlaceWorks said, summarizing the project structure and a three-phase schedule the consultant said is expected to wrap up in late 2027. She said much of Phase 1 is legally prescribed and will require fewer outreach steps than later phases.

The presentation listed concrete items that staff and consultants expect to address in Phase 1: updating accessory dwelling unit (ADU) rules to match current state law, replacing subjective conditional-use-permit findings with objective standards, revising the code’s definitions (including…