By: Rich Rifkin

Rich Rifkin — Sat, 06 Oct 2012 00:07:40 +0000

So much is wrong with this commentary that I cannot answer all of Mark’s opinions and dubious “facts”. I will tackle a few. He writes: “This was the Parkview Place cooperative apartment project, which has just broken ground at the corner of Fourth and D streets.” It is not a cooperative project. It’s in fact a condominium. Mark continues: “The issue wasn’t that the project would displace one of the oldest houses in Davis.” Displace is the wrong word. The project destroyed a rare example of a very old house (built around 1880 or so), which the HRMC judged to be a merit resource. “The city’s Historic Resources Commission reluctantly signed off, realizing that preservation of the house was impractical …” This is a strange contention. The HRMC had no discussion as to the “practicality” of preservation. Rather, we followed the guidelines as we are required to do. “… and even contrary to the wishes of the last Peña family descendant who was living there.” There is no truth in this statement at all. Narcissa Peña was the last Peña resident of that house. She lived there her entire life. Her estate sold the house to the Parkview Place owners. She never saw any part of the plans for Parkview Place. So for Mark to suggest that Narcissa wanted Parkview Place built is patently false. “Before Parkview Place, there was Maria Ogrydziak’s net-zero-energy project at the corner of Third and B. Here the problem was the lack of a sloping roof.” Again, Mark gets this very wrong. Not long before Maria proposed her ultra-modern condo project, the City Council had just adopted new zoning and planning guidelines for the 3rd & B neighborhood. The Ogrydziak project in multiple ways–not just with its roof–violated the letter and the spirit of those guidelines. Her project was not just horribly ugly; it was terribly out of place in that neighborhood. It is across the street from a merit resource and two doors down from a landmark resource. No one who cares even the least bit about Davis history could conclude that her project would fit in there. It would have destroyed the setting for those historic homes. When Mark was on the Planning Commission, he was one of the few commissioners who could not see this. He did not seem to care that her project was contrary to the guidelines. He never once gave any consideration to the historic value of the neighboring properties.

Comments on: There must be 50,000 ways to say no

By: Rich Rifkin