Carlsbad council allows developer to seek rezoning for 7‑acre Bressy Ranch site, sends application back for review

The Carlsbad City Council voted unanimously to allow a landowner and developer to formally pursue a general‑plan amendment and rezoning for a 7.02‑acre site in the Bressy Ranch area, sending the application back to staff for application completeness, environmental review and expanded public outreach.

Staff framed the council’s role as procedural: the meeting asked only whether the privately initiated application should be allowed to proceed for full processing, not whether the project merits approval. Eric Lardy, the city’s assistant director of community development, said remanding the request would trigger up to 12–24 months of application development, analysis under the California Environmental Quality Act and enhanced stakeholder outreach before any final decision.

The applicant team and the developer emphasized that a vote to remand would not be an endorsement of the project. A representative for Lehi Investments, which owns the parcel, asked the council to “allow us to be heard” and to give the developer a “seat at the table” to address neighborhood concerns. Eric Kebelhart, speaking for Toll Brothers, described the site as a vacant, graded parcel ready for redevelopment and said the firm’s illustrative plan proposes roughly 105–111 for‑sale townhome units with design and parking that “meets and exceeds the city’s minimum parking requirements.”

Residents who live near the site urged the council to deny processing or to attach strict conditions. Susan Ferguson, an 18‑year resident of Bressy Ranch, warned that approval to process could lead to density increases through state density‑bonus rules and said the community’s narrow streets and parking patterns would be heavily strained if the site were developed at the proposed scale. “This lot is not big,” she said, urging the council to consider traffic and parking impacts and the potential for future density bonuses that could increase unit counts.

Community organizations raised technical concerns. Chris Wright of ELUA cited airport land‑use overlays and said portions of the site fall within safety zones that limit residential density; he asked staff to clarify height and unit limits tied to airport proximity. Lardy and other staff members responded that the applicant would need to comply with FAA Part 77 and airport overlay restrictions, and that the R‑designation chosen by an applicant could be revised to meet those constraints.

Council members across the dais said the remand was primarily about process, not project approval. Several members stressed that allowing the application to proceed would not obligate future approval and would require the developer to bear costs for environmental review and consultant studies. Council members also encouraged robust neighborhood outreach during the processing period.

A motion to adopt the resolution remanding the application to staff for processing passed unanimously. Next steps: the applicant may submit a formal application, pay processing fees and proceed with the public outreach and environmental review described by staff; any later decision to approve or deny the project will return to the council after staff and the Planning Commission review the fully developed application.