Discussion about future plans for the College Area Community, a central portion of San Diego, continues to produce dissent among locals.

The City of San Diego’s Planning Commission Meeting on Nov. 17 workshopped the College Area Community Plan as Item 4 on their agenda. Within this plan, exists an amendment in process that may jeopardize the accessibility of the College-Rolando Library, located on 6600 Montezuma Road, just east of San Diego State University.

The accessibility of the library was first put into question when the 1.8-acre property adjacent to it on 6650 Montezuma Road, was sold to a private developer, 52 Blue Falcon LLC, in 2016.

The land had previously belonged to the College Lutheran Church. The church allowed library goers access to their parking lot. The 103 parking spaces and the driveway into the library, previously on church property, were included in the private developer’s purchase.

The library currently has access to the 28 spaces on city-owned property. Since the library does not contain a driveway from Montezuma Road, the private property and the library share one.

In order to mitigate the concern of a lack of parking, the City of San Diego entered a joint-use agreement with 52 Blue Falcon LLC in 2019. The agreement granted the city and the general public access to the library through a portion of the property on 6650 Montezuma Road. The new property owner, 52 Blue Falcon LLC, also granted the library access to 25 shared parking spaces. The agreement is effective for 20 years from the effective date as stated in the joint-use agreement.

Patrons of the College-Rolando Library are worried that this may not be enough, especially with the amendment that’s currently in process to up zone the developer’s land.

The Community Plan Amendment in Process, taken from Report No. PC-22-040 (located in Item 4 of the Planning Commission meeting agenda on Nov. 17), is stated as follows:

“A Community Plan Amendment was initiated by Planning Commission on March 4, 2021 to redesignate a property on Montezuma Road from visitor commercial to residential (45 to 109 dwelling units per acre) adjacent to the College Area library. The applicant has not pursued any additional discussion with the City to further this plan amendment at this time.”

Marcela Escobar-Eck is the president and CEO of Atlantis, the premier land use and strategic planning consulting firm representing 52 Blue Falcon LLC. She said that in reference to the joint-use agreement, there is nothing to change and they will continue to honor it.

In terms of the Community Plan Amendment, Atlantis has put that on hold indefinitely.

“For the foreseeable future it will remain as is, and that’s not to say that we are going to move forward with other development plans,” said Escobar-Eck. “We have an agreement in place and continue to honor it.”

Ann Cottrell, patron of the College Rolando Library, attended the Planning Commission Meeting on Nov. 17 and said she is concerned that the College Area Community does not have the infrastructure to support increased densification, as implied by up zoning.

“As part of a bigger picture of this plan, we all support appropriate increased density but we already don’t have adequate public facilities,” said Cottrell. “We are just so starved in terms of community facilities.” Community facilities, public transit and park spaces were all issues that were included in Item 4 of the meeting agenda. Matthew Boomhower, planning commissioner for the City of San Diego, spoke about the park space that the property adjacent to the library could have provided in the Planning Commission Meeting on Nov. 17.

“I very much think the city missed a golden opportunity to acquire the property next to the College-Rolando Library space to use as park space, but that ship sailed, and the city did not exercise their option,” said Boomhower. “Having said that, I really think that the staff has done a good job at looking at linear parkways and other efforts to find public green space in the existing right of ways.”

Kara Camden, another library patron, commented in response to her attendance at this meeting.

“I was shocked at the dearth of attention paid to the College Rolando Library in the plan,” said Camden. “Over 50 library supporters submitted comments via webform that were essentially ignored.”

The Senior Public Information Officer for the City of San Diego, Tara Lewis, said that the city will continue to explore increased access to the library.

“The Planning Department and the San Diego Public Library Department work closely together to identify opportunities to increase safe and enjoyable access to library services, and will continue to do so for the College-Rolando Library,” said Lewis.

As a chance for the voices of the library patrons to be heard, The San Diego Library Foundation hosted a listening session on Dec. 3.

The session provided an opportunity for the community to give input on the next Library Master Plan. Misty Jones, the director of the San Diego Library System, and Patrick Stewart, CEO of the San Diego Library Foundation, led the discussion. Topics included parking and future dreams for the library. An estimated 30 people were in attendance.

Jan Hintzman, president of the Friends of the College-Rolando Library, said that the Library Foundation listened to their concerns.

“We left the Planning Commission workshop feeling like we had been slapped in the face. We left the Library’s Master Plan listening session hopeful,” said Hintzman. “Neither could provide an easy solution for us. The difference? One wanted to hear us, the other didn’t.”

– Sofie Fransen is opinion editor of the Point Loma Nazarene University school newspaper and a senior English Education major with a minor in journalism. See her work at: lomabeat.com/.