Plan to replace the market draws numerous questions, concerns
The owner of the land that hosts the Saugus Swap Meet confirmed Tuesday evening the market is expected to continue until at least September.
Doug Bonelli, whose family has owned the land adjacent to Soledad Canyon Road since 1937, spoke Tuesday night in front of the Planning Commission in support of a project that would turn his 35-acre lot into more than 300 homes.
The Planning Commission, however, had a number of questions about the project, which seeks to build 318 residential units and a light manufacturing facility that would take up about 127,000 square feet.
The developer, Peter Vanek of Integral Communities, said as a housing advocate, he felt challenged by some of the questions, because he thought he was proposing a quality project bringing homes people could afford.
The plans also call for 22 of the units to be designated as affordable housing.
Commission members questioned everything from where the swap meet might relocate, which wasn’t really a concern for Vanek, to the fact that the property is in the city’s Job Creation Overlay Zone, intended to increase jobs and housing with mixed-use development.
Planning Commissioner Lisa Eichman said that since only around 3 acres of the 35-acre lot was commercial development, it barely qualifies as “mixed use” at that point.
Vanek said if the commission was seeking wholesale changes for a project that already met the city’s code, then the developer might have to walk away, despite months of planning.
City staff told the commission they would work with Integral further on the plans, with a tentative date to come back at the commission’s monthly September meeting to address the questions brought up during the project’s discussion.