By Chuck Carter
carbo@cruzers.com

In the wake of LAFCO's denial of Watsonvilles Manabe-Bergstrom property annexation request, the question is what to do now. Some advocate charging forward with a renewed annexation campaign, confident that the third time will bring a different result. But I'm reminded of a comment by a former mayor who said "These LAFCO battles are like banging your head against a wall - we don't get anywhere and it's starting to hurt".

Charging ahead with a renewed annexation campaign and lawsuit will undoubtedly lead to the same result. Most of the LAFCO Commissioners can be expected to continue to follow the state guidelines which compels them to preserve prime agricultural land. An issue of concern expressed by the commissioners before and after the hearing was the lack of any evidence that annexing the 94 acres might give us the economic and job gains we wanted.

After unsuccessfully pursuing the annexation strategy to reach our job goals, I think its time for Watsonville to try a different approach. For starters, we can make a sincere commitment to try some of the alternate means we've heard discussed to reduce economic and social problems with out sacrificing our farm land.

Annexation and development can be insidious: incrementally, slowly, piece by "justified" piece, farmland and environmentally sensitive areas can be irrevocably lost. And after you've paved over the farm land and filled the sloughs, and displaced the farm workers, will the problem of jobs and housing for the poor be solved? If it would, I might make that trade. But no one knows for sure. What can be seen, however, are communities which have lost forever precious good farmland and wildlife areas in the name of the poor. They have some very well off developers, increased population from new commuter residents, and the same impoverished poor, in whose name it was all done, in their overcrowded substandard housing. For that, I can't make the trade.

One thing also to keep in mind, there is a minimum number of acres that must remain in agricultural production in Pajaro Valley to keep it a viable industry here. The job producing ancillary businesses such as cold storage plants, brokerage firms, processing plants, the fledgling agri-tourism effort, and the like, would disappear as agricultural acreage drops.

It's inevitable that Watsonville must have some growth, probably even including some farm land. But we should first annex and develop where agricultural land and environmentally sensitive areas aren't. Watsonville is moving forward with efforts to annex land in the Buena Vista area, East of Highway 1, to help meet its housing needs. The land is not prime agriculture, not environmentally sensitive, not in the Coastal Zone, and some development is already there. This is the right direction.

Here are some things to consider:

There's a tremendous inequity in the county tax base. We could build a county wide campaign for regional revenue tax sharing so that sales tax dollars can be more equitably shared. It would be based on population instead of point of sale. There's a cost to preserving agricultural land. The cost is not building big box sales tax generators like others in the county have been allowed to do. Unfortunately our tax revenue distribution system encourages and rewards those that do. Our residents go to other community's big boxes and spend there.

Revisit the Pajaro Valley Futures Project recommendations. This includes the convening of a Watsonville, Santa Cruz County, and Monterey County joint task force to push for the in-fill and redevelopment possibilities identified in the report to occupy vacant industrial space. Since what we do best here is grow things, we could recruit food processors, even organic, and other ancillary agricultural industry. Encourage more combined commercial and residential areas and even rezone empty industrial and commercial land for attracting higher density housing. I've seen a lot of attractive upscale high density housing.Its ironic that we can all agree to be against urban sprawl but resist high density housing. Its tough to have it both ways.

Keep residential development city centered, rather than spreading out along the edge of town, so more people could walk and take public transportation to get around. Encourage more cafe's and small businesses to start on blocks that are now densely populated enough to support them.

Agriculture in the county takes an immense amount of wealth from this valley. But most of the workers and their families live inside the city. Some type of "in lieu" fees could be assessed the Agriculture Industry to help pay for farm worker services and housing. We should support bargaining rights, benefits, and a living wage for farm workers.

Get Santa Cruz and Monterey Counties to share in the providing of housing in their part of the Pajaro Valley that's affordable to local people.

Get involved in the Action Pajaro Valley Visioning process. The Visioning process allows Pajaro Valley residents to design thier valleys future. This planning process is essential to meet the demands of growth while preserving the valley's valuable farmland and sensitive resources. Don't miss this opportunity to participate in designing a sustainable future for the Pajaro Valley.

As we enter the next century, wouldn't it be great if we became an example of one community which held onto its commitment to social and economic justice for all its residents and at the same time preserved its farm land and environment? I don't want this to become a community which allowed its farmlands to be paved over while those in whose name it was done continued to face poverty, crowded substandard housing, and lack of opportunity. We have a new Watsonville City Council. I'm excited about the opportunity and hope we can join together with a fresh vision for our city. One in which we can find ways to achieve jobs, housing, and our tax base goals while protecting farmland and our natural resources. If we try and fail - I can live with that legacy. I can't live with not trying.

Chuck Carter grew up in the Pajaro Valley and is a member of the Watsonville City Council. He can be reached at City Hall 763-4000 Voice Mail Box# 5403