Planning commission unanimously backs amendment to Northeast Quadrant plan to re-designate 37.5-acre Pedrick Road parcel to industrial

The Dixon City Planning Commission voted Dec. 10 to recommend the City Council adopt an addendum to the Northeast Quadrant Specific Plan environmental impact report and to approve amendments that would change a vacant 37.5-acre site on Pedrick Road from a highway-commercial designation in the specific plan to general industrial.

Raffy Boylan, the city's community development director, told commissioners the application seeks only to bring the specific plan into consistency with the general plan and zoning and that "no development is proposed or included in this action." Boylan said the city hired a third-party consultant to prepare an initial study and an addendum to the original NESP EIR and that the staff recommendation is that the addendum is adequate for purposes of acting on the plan amendment.

Applicant Bridal Hogue of Buzz Oaks Construction described the amendment as a preparatory step so the site is ready when an industrial or R&D user arrives. "We're doing this so that we can be ready when a user does come," Hogue said, adding that tens of millions of dollars of infrastructure would likely be required before major development could proceed.

Commissioners pressed staff on topics raised in late written comments — notably drainage and air-quality assumptions — and on a proposed realignment of Professional Drive that would change the project's boundary treatment with a campus project to the south. Boylan said those technical issues would be examined in detail during any future project-level entitlement and engineering review, and that the addendum addresses plan-level effects.

A member of the public questioned why only the 37.5-acre parcel was before the commission and emphasized the city's interest in expanding its sales-tax base; staff reiterated that the amendment is intended to make the specific plan consistent with the general plan and zoning changes adopted earlier.

After a brief deliberation and a suggested edit to Finding 3 (to reference the Northeast Quadrant specific plan EIR rather than the general plan EIR), Commissioner Davis moved that the commission recommend council adoption of the addendum and the specific plan amendments. The motion passed unanimously; staff said the commission's action is a recommendation and the matter will be scheduled for City Council review and final consideration.