San Diego\u2019s plan to make it easier to open child care centers in University City, Mira Mesa, Clairemont, Kearny Mesa and Torrey Pines has hit a setback that the City Council is scheduled to confront this fall.<\/p>\n
The council unanimously decided in May to allow child care centers in an area around Marine Corps Air Station Miramar\u2019s airport that\u2019s known as the airport\u2019s transition zone.<\/p>\n
The goal was to address a glaring shortage of child care; most of the city is classified by social service agencies as a child care desert.<\/p>\n
But the county\u2019s Airport Land Use Commission voted in July to reject the zoning change, based on concerns that large groups of children are more vulnerable during aviation emergencies because they can\u2019t evacuate as smoothly and swiftly.<\/p>\n
The commission\u2019s vote forces city planning officials to either abandon the zoning change or ask the council to consider overriding the commission with a supermajority vote \u2014 at least six of the council\u2019s nine members.<\/p>\n
Planning officials announced Aug. 24 that the council will have an initiation hearing for the overrule roughly six weeks after that announcement \u2014 likely sometime in October.<\/p>\n
If the council votes then to initiate the overrule, the city\u2019s Planning Commission and then the council will be asked to vote on the overrule itself later in the fall.<\/p>\n
The battle between the city and the Airport Land Use Commission, an agency governed by the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority, comes after years of efforts by city officials to allow more child care facilities.<\/p>\n
In 2022, city voters approved a ballot measure to allow child care centers to operate at public parks and in recreation facilities \u2014 but none have yet opened in those locations because of funding problems.<\/p>\n
Measure H, which was placed on the ballot by the council, won approval from 68% of voters.<\/p>\n
San Diego gets praise for trying to solve the problem, but success has been limited, said Courtney Baltiyskyy, vice president of policy & advocacy for the YMCA of San Diego County.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe really appreciate the city\u2019s efforts,\u201d she said Monday. \u201cA majority of the city is a child care desert.\u201d<\/p>\n
Baltiyskyy said zoning rules have been one of the biggest barriers to addressing the problem.<\/p>\n
For years, each of San Diego\u2019s annual land development code updates has included various efforts to soften zoning and other rules governing child care facilities.<\/p>\n