Regional plan on quality of life, growth approved

Sacramento-area leaders approved a sweeping growth plan Thursday that they hope will allow the region to better absorb nearly 2 million new residents by 2050.

Directors of the Sacramento Area Council of Governments adopted the Sacramento Region Blueprint, crafted during two years of public meetings.

"I think it's important to note that everyone wants the California dream," said SACOG Director Lauren Hammond, a Sacramento councilwoman. "Everyone wants a golden California. This region is part of it. This decision we make today will ensure we have a golden California."

The blueprint, which covers six counties, including Yuba and Sutter, calls for mixed land uses, higher residential densities and emphasizes reinvestment in existing developed areas.

According to SACOG, the blueprint results in fewer and shorter car trips, more people biking, walking, and taking transit and less congested roadways.

SACOG officials emphasized that the blueprint is conceptual, but the agency is expected to make a big push to ensure that the region's cities and counties take its vision into account when they approve new development.

The adopted scenario will become part of SACOG's Metropolitan Transportation Plan update for 2005, a formal document that serves as a long-range transportation plan for the region. It also will serve as a framework to guide local government in growth and transportation planning through 2050.

"We all have some particular nits to pick with this map somewhere along the line," said Director Roger Dickinson, a Sacramento County supervisor. "I have mine."

But Dickinson endorsed the blueprint and suggested it will play a significant role in the region's future.

"Whether history records it as significant or simply frivolous will depend on whether we around this table and our colleagues in this region and the citizens in this region commit ourselves to realizing the potential we have," he said. "We have gone further with more people than any region in this country. The vista is enormously exciting."

SACOG directors unanimously approve the blueprint, an outcome that was not in doubt. A press release announcing the approval was distributed at the meeting an hour before the vote.

Director Heather Fargo, Sacramento's mayor, called the meeting a "lovefest."

"I can't overstate my appreciation to you to get this thing going and to keep it going," said former SACOG Director Tom Stallard. "What we have done with the blueprint is to bring the reality of regionalism here.

"Who would have believed we would have the (Building Industry Association) and Metro Chamber and (the Environmental Council of Sacramento) and all these people saying we're really doing something good here?"

Many directors voiced their enthusiasm for the blueprint during the meeting. The directors from Yuba-Sutter - Hal Stocker, Dan Silva, Dave Doolittle and Judy Richards - said nothing. Interviewed later, Stocker said: "This is an effort to shape our destiny. The people will not be impotent in this process, and they are going to have a voice as to where we can go in the future."