If Modesto is to see significant growth, the city must overcome obstacles similar to those that have kept its prospects relatively dim for decades.
The City Council recently summoned the political will to make a serious run at overcoming the stagnancy of recent decades.
With a 5-1 vote (Councilwoman Rosa Escutia-Braaton was absent), the council majority on April 28 embraced the most ambitious of three growth scenarios placed before it in a draft General Plan.
But no one familiar with the growth process is popping champagne corks yet. Even the most optimistic know that sustained Herculean efforts will be required to overcome political realities standing between Modesto and the vision painted in its emerging General Plan.
The trickiest part could come near the end of the process, likely several years away, when City Hall must convince a regional city-shaping agency that Modesto’s plan is solid. More on that in a bit.
First, some background.
Modesto’s history of relatively slow growth
Modesto is both the largest and most populous of Stanislaus County’s nine cities, with 220,000 people and 29,257 acres. By comparison, the next-biggest is Turlock, with a population of 72,600 and 10,724 acres, and the rest are much smaller.
Yet Modesto’s size has increased at a pace slower than them all in the 30 years since Modesto last updated its General Plan, a document that guides growth. Since 1995, the city limit has expanded 35%, while the others have grown anywhere from 44% in Turlock to 68% in Riverbank. (Patterson’s 261% expansion is an anomaly best understood by considering its relatively compact size in the 1990s coupled with moves to take advantage of prime positioning along Interstate 5).
Modesto has been losing potential wealth by seeing companies locate in other cities, Community and Economic Development Director Jessica Hill reminds audiences every time she gives a public presentation on the proposed General Plan.
Riverbank’s Costco – bringing that city millions in sales tax revenue on Modesto’s very fringe – is but one example.
People have fewer opportunities for housing and good jobs when a city stands still, the reasoning goes – and city hall receives less tax revenue needed for police and fire protection, as well as parks, water and sewer services.
Wood Colony: poster child for standing against sprawl
In their landmark April 28 vote approving the most aggressive growth option, Modesto City Council members suggested that hope for greater prosperity trumps rural charm.
The drive toward a new general plan often is framed as a classic urban v. rural battle between Big Brother Modesto and its agrarian neighbor to the west, Wood Colony.
The hamlet is a close-knit community evoking small-town Americana. People passing through see hand-drawn signs offering farm-fresh eggs and walnuts for sale – and other signs urging protection from development.
Neighbors turned out in droves the last time Modesto cast its eyes of growth to the west, in 2014 and 2015, packing a meeting chamber and pleading to be left alone. Then-council members eventually retreated under intense pressure, deciding to pursue in the future a comprehensive General Plan update – the process now underway.
Early this year, as the effort for a new Modesto General Plan gained momentum, a couple of hundred Wood Colony residents gathered at Hart-Ransom Elementary School for an update from Hill and her team. Many neighbors resolved to reassemble and fight anew.
“I’m a farmer, and my ground is not for sale,” Manuel Azevedo told The Modesto Focus at the January meeting. “We are the way we want to be.”
And dozens did plead their case, some with passion, before the Modesto City Council on April 28.
Joe Dooley said, “You don’t have to ruin everyone’s lives by stealing the whole freaking area.”
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But this time, the chamber was not filled to standing room only, like it was a dozen years ago. And Wood Colony proved not to be a monolith when several audience members respectfully asked for the right to join Modesto and develop their land.
Mayor Sue Zwahlen, 71, waxed nostalgic, recalling frequent childhood visits to both sets of grandparents west of Modesto. She lost sleep over this vote, the mayor said, but ultimately feels she must lead the city she was elected to represent to a brighter future.
“I cherish Wood Colony – the land, the history, the traditions and the people,” the mayor said. “I also know that I’m responsible and must consider our future economic development. … We do have to plan for the future.”
After the meeting, Councilman Chris Ricci explained his dissenting vote, the only one cast that night: “I don’t support any incursion into the original Wood Colony. That’s it.”
Several others adamantly opposed Modesto’s plan to absorb a portion of south Salida, an unincorporated town of nearly 14,000 whose dreams of real cityhood bubble up every now and then.
Still others noted that land eyed by Modesto north of Kiernan Avenue plays an important role in the health of the underground water supply. The region’s aquifer is recharged, or replenished, when water nourishing crops and orchards seeps down there, they said.
“We (heard) some real nice heartfelt statements from (Councilman) Nick Bavaro and Sue Zwahlen about growing up and appreciating values, then they vote for the biggest, most absurd grab of prime farmland,” said Denny Jackman.
He has advocated to preserve farmland for decades, persuading voters to approve slow-growth initiatives, and once served on the Modesto City Council as well.
It’s not a done deal, though.
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Environmental studies required by state law could take 15 months, putting a final council vote on the General Plan into summer 2027. People opposed to Modesto expansion may be expected to air grievances at that time as well.
By then, the Modesto City Council could have a new look.
All three councilmen with first terms ending in November – Eric Alvarez, Nick Bavaro and Jeremiah Williams – have established reelection websites and might be considered incumbent front-runners in their respective races.
But politics can be unpredictable, and it’s possible – although unlikely – that the council could have as many as three new members in early 2027. And that could affect any vote, including one addressing the General Plan that summer.
The next step seems even less certain.
LAFCo: Stanislaus’ most powerful – and most obscure – agency
After council approval, City Hall would ask the Local Agency Formation Commission to OK the growth plan and associated documents. And after that – maybe even years later – Stanislaus LAFCo would be the one to rule on any annexation, a step that pulls land inside the Modesto city limit and closer to actual development.
Stanislaus LAFCo may seem obscure, but its voting commissioners should be familiar – they’re all current or former elected leaders filling other roles.
Currently, Zwahlen once a month takes off her hat as Modesto mayor and puts on a Stanislaus LAFCo hat. She’s supposed to set aside any bias – even though she just bared her soul about Modesto’s need to grow – and make decisions in the best interest of all county residents.
All counties have a LAFCo, an agency empowered to approve or reject changes in city limits such as annexations.
Other Stanislaus LAFCo commissioners are Turlock Mayor Amy Bublak and county Supervisors Terry Withrow and Vito Chiesa. A fifth voting member – Bill O’Brien – represents the public, but many remember him as a former Riverbank mayor and council member (1998-2004) and former county supervisor (2004-2016).
If that seems odd, consider that his predecessors in the public role (or as alternates) include former Assemblyman Bill Berryhill, former Modesto Councilman Brad Hawn and former county planning director Ron Freitas.
“The public does not have representation on LAFCo if that member is always some kind of political retread,” said former Hughson Mayor Matt Beekman.
Political pressures: An unavoidable reality
Beekman’s own history with LAFCo was fraught with politics, although not of his making.
While serving as mayor, he also sat on LAFCo. A beekeeper by trade, Beekman in 2015 joined with rural-leaning commissioners who were also county supervisors to enact policy supporting farmland preservation.
That vote angered other mayors who expected Beekman to come at LAFCo decisions from a philosophical position favoring cities that might want to grow unencumbered by farmland-preserving rules. The mayors – pushed by the building industry – punished Beekman by removing him from LAFCo altogether.
“I don’t look at myself as a victim, I don’t regret my vote and if I had to do it all over again I would have done the same thing,” Beekman told The Modesto Focus. “It was orchestrated. They had their marching orders. That’s how politics works.”
How might that history inform upcoming votes?
Commissioners are supposed to set aside feelings and loyalties when they put on their LAFCo hats. At that time, they should weigh whether proposed growth is sustainable and makes sense.
Creating unincorporated islands by allowing cities to skip over or around ground is a big no-no. That’s how Modesto (and to a lesser extent, Ceres and Turlock) ended up with several underserved neighborhoods lacking sidewalks or municipal sewage – all created many decades ago, long before such rules were in place.
Today’s commissioners rightly reserve specific comment. Even Zwahlen in theory must keep an open mind until Modesto growth proposals reach LAFCo.
“It’s improper and illegal to decide before it comes before you,” O’Brien said.
Chiesa said, “My job on LAFCo is making sure (a proposal) is logical, orderly and not an overreach.”
‘A neat mix of city and country right up next to each other‘
It’s no secret, however, that Wood Colony remains close to Withrow’s heart, and that residents see him – their county supervisor – as their protector.
When first elected in 2010, Withrow’s political opponent was Bill Lyons – whose land development company owns interests in Wood Colony that Lyons and Modesto would like to transform into stores, offices or industry. Opponents favoring the bucolic status quo count on Withrow to keep that from happening.
“I can’t take a position till it comes to LAFCo,” said Withrow, the commission’s current chair. “But I am a big supporter of Wood Colony. It represents what everyone loves about Stanislaus County – a neat mix of city and country right up next to each other.”
If votes on Modesto growth split along traditional city-county lines, Zwahlen and Bublak could lean toward approval while Chiesa and Withrow might be skeptical. That would leave O’Brien with the tie-breaking vote.
O’Brien’s many years on both sides of the question – city and county – make murky any guess as to how he might vote as a public representative.
“The beauty of it is I’m not on either side,” he told The Modesto Focus. “Now it’s, `Hey, what is best for the citizens?’ I don’t have to play politics.”
Garth Stapley is the accountability reporter for The Modesto Focus, a project of the nonprofit Central Valley Journalism Collaborative. Contact him at garth@themodestofocus.org.