Chandler Council sends general plan, home-rule renewal to voters
Courtesy of City of Chandler
The Chandler City Council placed two items on this year’s election ballots during February meetings, including its 10-year general plan, which has this future land use map and many other new provisions.
The Chandler City Council has added two expected items to upcoming elections for voters to approve.
Council voted unanimously the week of Feb. 23 to add the items. Voter approval of the city’s next 10-year general plan to the July 21 primary ballot, while voters will have the chance to add another four years to the city’s home-rule option status by approving it in the Nov. 3 general election.
Council started the week with a work session Feb. 23 to discuss what’s been titled “Chandler 2026 General Plan: Evolving the Chandler Way.” That’s the working title of the city’s 10-year general plan, which residents and committees have had a hand in updating, helping to guide future development.
The last Chandler General Plan was adopted in April 2016 and was ratified by voters with 85.8% in favor in the Aug. 30, 2016 primary.
The recent work session was followed by a special meeting with public hearings scheduled on both the general plan and on a renewal election on the city’s home-rule status.
Planner Lauren Schumann went over some of the more heavily changed elements — relative to the 2016 general plan — and the steps and cycle and priorities associated with the 2026 version in the work session.
Land use is a main component of the general plan. The plan includes a future land use map with four identified growth areas.
In the work session, Mayor Kevin Hartke asked Schumann if staff guided any conversations or accounted for pending 2026 state legislation that might restrict what types of particular restrictions or architectural standards Chandler and other cities can put into general plans.
Schumann said she wasn’t aware of any such proposed legislation. Hartke said he is aware of such proposals, though those might not become law this year.
Planning Administrator Kevin Mayo advised that planned area development approval processes, or PADs, are a way to mitigate the effects of new state laws that affect architectural requirements or provisions.
Council member O.D. Harris asked if some type of “footnote” could be added to the general plan to indicate that the Kyrene School District is closing a middle school and a K-8 academy this summer, with other districts in the area likely to ponder such a move in the years ahead. He’s concerned about redevelopment of those school sites for much different purposes in the future.
Hartke and Schumann both assured Harris that the general plan and city zoning already have short lists of what could be brought into a neighborhood, such as a churches, other types of educational facilities or offices.
Also, City Manager John Pombier said, city staff talk regularly with Kyrene, Mesa and Chandler Unified school district leaders about facilities plans, and would immediately reach out to neighborhood residents if there were ever a city or developer proposal to significantly change the use of a former school building site.
Schumann also walked council through changes to the general plan for the Price Road Tech Corridor and a new provision that will allow employers and potential employers to build multi-story employee housing on-site as part of a campus that’s vertical, with first-floor commercial uses in residential towers.
Pombier said walkability and the ability to live at or very near employment is something potential employers tell cities that they can’t find.
Schumann emphasized that all such proposals — even by Wells Fargo, which is already permitted to build two nine-story buildings on land that its main office building occupies — would have to go through a developmental approval process, where staff and Council and, in many cases, the planning commission can impose many stipulations.
Council member Matt Orlando said he has concerns about developers getting approval for such mixed-use campuses and later deciding to not build out or staff the employment sides of the projects, therefore negating the economic benefits of the zoning.
Mayo and the mayor both pointed out that the PAD permitting process will mandate that there be functional non-residential components to the plans as a permit condition.
Harris expressed concerns about not having more stops in place to ensure compliance with the non-residential uses.
Pombier said he understood Harris and Orlando were merely watching out for ways developers might try to game the system, but ended the conversation by reminding them Council has the final review and vote on major developments.
“At the end of the day, they still have to come to you guys,” Pombier told the Council.
Mayo read additions to the policy requiring “ancillary” employee residential uses “subordinate to the primary employment use,” which Orlando and Harris seemed to appreciate.
The vertical Price Road provision also uses the general plan’s new city definition of “urban” residential zoning, which will be 26 or more dwelling units per acre.
Council voted unanimously the night of Feb. 23 to put the general plan on the July 21 primary ballot. That turned out to be the last day Maricopa County Elections accepted ballot language for that election.
The city missed the window to have home-rule renewal on the primary ballot, as home-rule requires two public hearings at regular meetings, held Feb. 23 and 26. Gov. Katie Hobbs signed the primary election date rescheduling into law Feb. 6, after Chandler had already held its Feb. 2 and Feb. 5 meetings.
Council voted unanimously Feb. 26 to place home rule on the Nov. 3 ballot.
The city must renew its home-rule option — a complex designation that involves flexibility on spending — every four years.
Established through a 1980 law, most Arizona cities and towns that went with home-rule generally continue to find it popular among residents.
Chandler voters have approved the home rule option 11 consecutive times since 1982 — by a 85%-to-15% margin in 2018 and by an 86-to-14% margin in 2022.
Email Jason W. Brooks at jbrooks@iniusa.org. Please submit comments at yourvalley.net/letters or email them to AzOpinions@iniusa.org. We are committed to publishing a wide variety of reader opinions, as long as they meet our Civility Guidelines.
Jason W. Brooks News Editor | Chandler Independent
Jason W. Brooks joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in July 2021 as an associate editor. After a year covering Buckeye, he has covered Chandler since the fall of 2022, in addition to assisting the Daily Independent throughout his time at INI.
Education: University of New Mexico, bachelor of arts in journalism and mass communication, print emphasis, English minor.
Random Fact: He and his siblings witnessed a Space Shuttle launch and landing in the same year in person, on opposite coasts.
Hobbies: Karaoke, bicycling and American Sign Language.
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