The recently approved 'Plan Orinda' accommodates over 3,000 new housing units mostly in downtown, and potentially 7,500 new residents... According to the EIR, Plan Orinda will cause a "significant impairment of emergency response and evacuation." When presented with that disturbing determination, the City Council accepted it as the necessary cost of complying with state demands. Orindans for Safe Emergency Evacuation, or OSEE, strongly disapprove of that choice and have filed a lawsuit to rectify the situation.
The City Council was inundated by State laws and outside housing advocacy groups that pressured them to add housing at any cost. The issues of emergency response and wildfire evacuation received very little attention. Attorney General Rob Bonta has been pushing back on housing-at-all-costs where fire risk is too high in communities like Orinda. The Council needs to hear the voices of residents demanding the protection of safe emergency response and evacuation. The OSEE lawsuit provides us that opportunity. Counter-pressure is needed now because it is the last chance we'll have.
Please join us from 7:00 to 8:00 pm on Tuesday, April 25, to hear more and ask questions. There will be a short background presentation and information about the lawsuit followed by thoughts from someone with first-hand experience in evacuating during the Oakland Hills Firestorm. Then discussion. We’ll be in the Sarge Littlehale Room next to the Police Department in City Hall. (Easiest access is from Santa Maria Way off Altarinda). Hope to see you there!
If you can't join in person, please listen on zoom. We will answer questions that come to us through the chat.
How is it possible that Orinda, which is essentially “built out” (very few undeveloped lots) is being forced to grow 40% (from 7,000 households to 10,000)? Can our schools accommodate 40% more students? is Oakland required to grow by 40% (70,000 new households)? San Francisco (150,000 new households)?