Getting Greater Public Benefit from SDC's Redevelopment

Sonoma Valley almost universally opposed the three land use alternatives for SDC drawn up by consultants for Sonoma County's planning department. The most reviled elements in these alternatives—only average levels of housing affordability, buildings covering more of the campus than they do now a hotel, insufficient protection of the wildlife corridor—are there because they help meet a particular economic bottom line. The only revenues enumerated so far are from private free-market developers of residential or hotel projects.

By contrast, the public benefits that the community wants—deeper levels of housing affordability, community services like a health clinic or nonprofit space, recreation, next-generation water and energy systems, educational and training programs, etc.—will require public and philanthropic money. If the bottom line were redefined, if the redevelopment of SDC were instead built on a partnership between public funding (government) and philanthropic funders (nonprofits and donors), Sonoma Valley and the state of California—who owns the property—could realize greater benefits for nature, for Sonoma Valley people, and for the future.

Sonoma County’s agencies and nonprofits are extraordinarily successful at producing public benefits from public and philanthropic funding sources. Over the long time period that SDC will be redeveloped, these types of funds are as sure to materialize as private developer monies are.

To promote the greater use of public and philanthropic funding to achieve greater public good at SDC, Sonoma Valley Collaborative wrote a letter urging Sonoma County Supervisors to instruct their planning department to consider these funding sources in a new economic analysis. The letter also described many example funding sources to pursue.

Read the letter below.