Winter 2004

Practicing Planner

Copyright by American Planning Association

Collaborative Community-building:

The Santa Fe Community College District and Villages at Rancho Viejo

By Joe Porter, Jack Kolkmeyer, and Carl Moore

In Santa Fe County, New Mexico, government, developers, and citizens have changed the local approach to planning and development to create an alternative to the sprawling rural subdivisions that are creeping out from Santa Fe and threatening the special qualities of the magical countryside and culture. The change has evolved through two parallel and interactive processes. One is the county government's movement to change policies that promote rural large-lot subdivisions and instead channel growth into higher density and less consumptive development patterns. The second is the development of the 20,000-acre Rancho Viejo landholding.

BACKGROUND

In 1996, the future of development in Santa Fe was uncertain. In a comprehensive plan update, the city planning staff promoted an infill growth strategy that citizens ultimately rejected. The only place left to accommodate the city's burgeoning growth was in the southern corridor, but county officials had no experience managing sophisticated community development. Local advocacy groups had long considered the southern corridor "the poster child for sprawl" — 2,000 acres of it had already been zoned for large lots with individual wells and septic tanks. There was no confidence in the capabilities of the local development industry to do anything different. And the sprawling subdivisions created political problems over and above land-use issues. Some county residents were becoming acutely aware of what was threatened or disappearing — namely the landscape, rural habitat, affordable housing, and scarce resources, especially water. Others had become attached to the large-lot lifestyle and wanted to protect it. Everyone wanted a piece of the land; this was true for old-timers as well as recent arrivals. Rural character and rural lifestyle are still much-debated topics in Santa Fe, and county planners recognized that any change in planning style could spark opposition to a change in land-use regulations.

But county officials and one developer overcame the challenges through a process of working together: first, to determine how to bring community values to life in a new development, then to articulate them with an actual demonstration village, and finally to incorporate these design principles in official county plans. This interactive engagement, a learning process shared between developer and planner, continues to enrich both the development and regulations for the area.

The Unique Nature of the Santa Fe Region

Santa Fe residents generally reject the principle of infill development, which leaves the corridor south of the city as the primary growth option. Starting in the 1960s and 1970s, Santa Fe began to fall prey to indifferent suburban development. The irony is that the compact, traditional pattern of old Santa Fe attracts "amenity migrants," yet the transplants tend to live in large two- to 10-acre lot subdivisions that create the antithesis of what attracted them. Private wells, roads, and septic systems are the rule. These subdivisions are destructive to natural resources and are an economic drain on Santa Fe County.

At first, rural subdivisions with gravel roads and no buildings were relatively invisible on the land. But as homes were built, the scenic landscape changed and traffic grew. Regional population shifts, an influx of new arrivals, and a growing economic gap between newcomers and long-term residents woke county government to the fact that it wasn't providing adequate services, particularly water and sewer, and that greater efforts were required to accommodate future growth. Both urban and rural sprawl would exacerbate these needs, especially as relatively severe drought conditions began to set in.

Most disturbing was that new development was totally void of the spirit of the traditional villages that epitomize Santa Fe County. In his 1959 book Santa Fe, writer Oliver La Farge spoke of Santa Fe as a place of "junctions and arrivals" and described the area's land as "immutable." Smaller and older settlements all had a very close relationship with the land. How they evolved was completely dependent on the land and how it was used. Madrid was a mining community. So was Cerrillos, but it was also an important stagecoach stop. La Cienega and Galisteo were important farming and ranching communities. By contrast, the rural subdivisions did not grow out of a purpose or fit organically on the land but were surveyed according to an economy of lines on a two-dimensional map, and they were not created around mixed-use centers.

Dilemmas

Santa Fe County's dilemma was clear: How could it switch from creating rural subdivisions with questionable political support and limited financial resources and instead build the capacity to manage sophisticated higher-density development that would preserve the landscape, habitat, and water and also offer affordable living?

The dilemma for large landowners in the area was different. In 1981, four landowners joined together to buy a 20,000-acre ranch, Rancho Viejo, south of Santa Fe. They loved the land and wanted to see it developed in a way that would benefit the Santa Fe region as well as the partnership's families. Larry Meyer, one of the four owners, and Duane Black, the chief operating officer of Phoenix-based SunCor Development Corporation, talked on and off for 10 years about how they might work together to best develop Rancho Viejo.

SunCor is a commercial and community development company wholly owned by Pinnacle West Capital Corporation, a Fortune 500 energy company and owner of Arizona Power. Santa Fe is a relatively small market with an increase of approximately 1,100 residential units a year, a number that is not adequate to support the total purchase of a property the size of Rancho Viejo for development.

The challenges for the Rancho Viejo Partners were how to gain long-term zoning approval; justify the hefty front-end investment typical of large-scale new communities; meet community expectations for affordability, economic development, and sustainability (especially with regard to water supply); and do so in a small market with a difficult political environment. An added obstacle: There was already a history of large out-of-town corporations struggling to identify with and respond to the culture and way of doing business in Santa Fe. Despite the challenges, luck was on their side.

FACTS OF THE CASE

The Developer Makes the First Move

The Rancho Viejo Partners hired planning and design firm Design Workshop to begin development planning for their project. Prior to entering into a development agreement, SunCor and the Rancho Viejo partners took the significant step of having Joe Porter of Design Workshop take them through a one-week vision workshop in 1996. The purpose was to establish community and environmental values for Rancho Viejo, as well as a concept plan to serve as the basis for their land sales and development agreement. The partners had asked Jack Kolkmeyer, planning director for Santa Fe County, to drop by for an informal visit during the workshop. And it was there that he saw — as Porter explained the chaotic wall of emerging tracing-paper plans, sketches and idea cards — the same emphases on the land system and village pattern that were early ideas in the county's new growth management plan. The two men realized within minutes that Santa Fe County and the Rancho Viejo owners shared a vision for a new growth pattern in the corridor south of Santa Fe. The brief meeting resulted in what community facilitator Carl Moore would later describe as "expanding the shadow of the future." The common vision bolstered the confidence of both county officials and the Rancho Viejo owners, and provided a common direction for them. With this synergistic beginning, they embarked on a rather startling innovation in planning in which they were able to work simultaneously and in concert with each other, instead of sequentially. This new way of working together created a feedback loop that pushed the planning process far beyond the minimum standards set by regulations and into the realm of sustainable community development — no easy task in the high mountain desert of New Mexico. It also transformed the traditionally adversarial relationship between developer and planner.

To serve as the foundation of the business agreement between the two entities, the landowners and developer crafted the Rancho Viejo Vision Plan in a one-week charrette led by Design Workshop. That plan resulted in increased awareness and establishment of basic principles to guide development. It identifies the northern 11,000 acres of the property for community development because of the proximity to Santa Fe and the amenity offered by the system of open meadow and juniper- and piñon-covered arroyos. The plan envisioned developing a series of small villages defined by the land system, for which the tradition of New Mexico villages provided a valuable theme to build on. The vision emphasized conserving water, protecting the environment, creating affordable housing, and fostering economic development — real concerns of both long-term residents and county government. The plan sets aside the southern 9,000 acres of the property to be conserved with limited, very low-density development, which created a self-imposed growth boundary for a portion of the Santa Fe region. This property is treeless, rolling grasslands visible to travelers approaching Santa Fe on Interstate 25 and Highway 14 from the south and from the higher elevation neighborhoods that ring the city of Santa Fe. Early on, the Rancho Viejo Partners decided to hold these lands for some time, hoping that they might become part of a broader public conservation effort. Conservation interests are now investigating ways to combine Rancho Viejo with state, Bureau of Land Management, county, and other private lands to conserve a total of 35,000 acres of land in the Galisteo Basin.

The landowners and developer used the vision document to create a business plan that combined a long-term vision with the ability to start in small increments and build toward it. The plan also had to be able to respond to political or market slowdowns or inadequate long-term water. Here was one of the development's very first and most important innovations. Because the market was too small to justify the carrying costs of a huge land purchase, Black and the Rancho Viejo Partners forged a business deal that prices the value of the land based on the amount of development instead of on the acreage. This allows the land to be purchased and developed one home at a time, one village at a time. The land purchase price that is paid to the Rancho Viejo Partners is figured as a percentage of each home and each commercial parcel that is sold, an arrangement that has significant community development implications. With this deal, SunCor reduced early debt and carrying costs, which kept prices low and provided flexibility to respond to market and political change, while the Rancho Viejo Partners get a greater long-term return by participating in developed land values. In addition, by tying the land price to finished homes, there is no land cost for parks and open space. The resulting increase in the pace of home sales and the sales price premiums that result from increased views and proximity to open space benefit both SunCor and the Rancho Viejo Partners.

The partners and the developer recognized that SunCor was an outsider and would have to listen and be sensitive to local culture and traditions to become accepted in the community. They protected the new community with a business plan that did not incur high front-end costs and that could survive slow times, given the small market and local political situation. And they acknowledged that the typical "big plan" zoning approach would not work in Santa Fe County, which instead needed planners and developers to start small, listen to residents and officials, understand the market, and gain the community's respect through actions.

The vision plan produced both a land purchase agreement and a decision to start the planning process by creating a village where county officials could see community principles played out. With a tangible solution on the ground, they could start to feel more comfortable about changing their policies and regulations — and allow further development at Rancho Viejo.

County and Developer Engage

The county proceeded to complete and adopt a growth-management plan for the entire county and a master plan for this southern corridor. Both exemplified many of the principles the two entities held in common, but they went beyond the proposed Rancho Viejo development to plan a large district in the southern corridor, which was owned by five major landowners and a number of residents in rural subdivisions.

The new district was created to provide an alternative to sprawl. In creating a plan for it, Kolkmeyer and senior county planner Judy McGowan wanted to think about metro-area edge problems in a new way and create a new development pattern, and a set of rules and regulations to implement that pattern in the nonurban areas near the City of Santa Fe. Proposing a plan for the 17,000-acre College District at the edge of one of America's oldest and most culturally rich cities was, at first, intimidating. Santa Fe was founded in 1610 and its historic plaza and Palace of the Governors were laid out then according to planning principles known as the Law of the Indies created by Phillip II in 1573 to guide Spain's settlement of the New World. Thinking about this at the turn of the millennium infused the county planners with a deep desire to understand what was so successful about those early planning concepts and how they might help people to better understand how to design for the present and meet the needs of future generations.

In order to start Rancho Viejo and the planning process that would eventually rezone the Rancho Viejo landholding, SunCor General Manager Bob Taunton asked for and received permission from planning officials to create a demonstration village. Design Workshop began to design this village, a place that would make manifest the community principles articulated both by county officials and the developer. This action was aimed at confirming that villages would work as a long-term development strategy in the southern corridor. But the demonstration would also test the new community principles formed by county officials — principles on which they would base their master plan for the newly christened Santa Fe Community College District (named for the college that had been established on land grants from the Rancho Viejo Partners). This first village earned administrative approval by transforming a previous master plan for a 2,000-acre rural subdivision (with wells and septic tanks) into a village of 350 dwellings fully serviced with sewer and water systems and surrounded by vast open space.

This coming together of county officials and the major developer around common interests established a mutual respect and resulted in an interactive process. County ideas were tested in development plans, which in turn influenced county plans. The process included working meetings to strategize and plan for every element of community development. It was non-linear and sometimes messy. At times, workshops were formalized and facilitated; at other times, meetings were informal and instinctive. But the spirit of listening, testing, and embracing change was constant.

Before this change, the county had no experience in managing sophisticated and fully serviced community development. The process of engaging with the developer led to an even closer collaboration. The Rancho Viejo Partners provided Design Workshop's expertise to the county in order to further its planning process, based on the principles coming out of the first village. This collaboration contributed to the content of the Santa Fe Community College District plan and subsequent zoning plans.

Collaborative Process

Kolkmeyer and McGowan had people to convince. There were existing residents living in three small rural subdivisions within the district, with similar large-lot subdivisions surrounding about half of the district's perimeter. There are five major land holdings in the district, four held by developers. Rancho Viejo is the largest and the first to begin development. Major cultural facilities in the district are the Santa Fe Community College, the 200-student Institute of American Indian Arts, and Santa Maria de la Paz, Santa Fe's largest Catholic church. Together they provide approximately 400 jobs.

The county created the Community College Plan through a true collaborative process. A planning committee was formed, not by political appointment but by inviting everyone in and around the college district to participate. Numerous people joined the committee, including the major landowners, residents from existing neighborhoods, city and county staff, and citizens-at-large interested in issues like sustainability.

After 30 years as a city and county planner in Santa Fe, Kolkmeyer understood the importance of an open objective process where everyone is heard. He also realized it was critical that he and his staff be free to openly advocate good planning principles and sell the county's positions on issues like the environment, water conservation, and affordable housing. Kolkmeyer asked facilitator Carl Moore, a Santa Fe resident and a former communications professor who had helped residents of other communities envision their future, to facilitate key decision-making meetings and to help maximize open and constructive communication.

The planning committee addressed community values and problems facing developers, helping to create a plan that combines idealistic community development principles with supporting ordinances and regulations the developers understand and support. The developers and their consultants contributed professional services, funding for outside experts, land analysis maps, and working papers on all aspects of the plan. Much of the money that a developer would normally spend planning his or her individual project was directed instead at providing content and experience in support of the College District Plan. Several basic principles emerged from this process.

The Land

The district plan started with the land. Protecting the intrinsic value of the natural landscape was the most dominant value held in common by members of the planning committee. They were unanimous about protecting these qualities. The result is a land-based zoning plan and land analysis process first espoused by Ian McHarg in his book, Design with Nature . The foundation of the physical plan is a map that simplifies the land system into three basic land types: relatively flat grassland meadows; hillside slopes; and arroyos, the mostly dry gulches of the high mountain desert that serve as its drainage system.

The series of distinctive arroyos that cross the college district provide the structure for the master plan. The arroyos are the core of the landscape's beauty. They are wildlife habitat corridors and their pervious soils help recharge the aquifer under the district. The arroyos are zoned as open space; combined with some low mountains and the parks program, they bring the amount of open space in the development to 50 percent of the district's total acreage. They will remain undeveloped except for road crossings, walking trails, and improvements to manage drainage and aquifer recharge.

Between the arroyos lie elevated, flat grassland meadows that are free of development obstacles. These open meadows require the least site disturbance and grading to accommodate development. Villages will be located on these meadows and their form determined by the shape of the meadows. Village zones will accommodate the highest density that the market and height and setback standards will allow. At a minimum, 3.5 dwelling units per acre are required in village zones.

Hillside slopes transition between meadows and the lower arroyo bottoms. Some of these slopes are covered with juniper and piñon, and others are grasslands. These hillsides are zoned as fringe area where low-density development is allowed, as long as it is designed to blend into the hillside and wooded landscape. This transition from higher density village areas to dispersed development on hillsides creates a progression of density from urban to rural.

Although planners often prepare land analysis maps, the practice of basing zoning on those maps is uncommon. Yet, that is exactly how the college district zones were established. The zoning map features only eight categories, and the delineation of four of these is determined by the shape and character of the land.

The land systems map that defines zoning boundaries was prepared using USGS maps at a contour interval of 20 feet. The land-based zoning process allows the code enforcement staff to adjust zoning boundaries based on more detailed land analysis mapping, which is required at the time villages are designed and development plans are submitted.

Planning committee members agreed on the value of the landscape, but it took the group considerable time to understand land-based zoning and to recognize that all land is not equal. Arroyos, floodplains, and mountains have less development value than level open grassland meadows. They also came to realize that development lands on all properties can have more value if arroyos and mountain areas remain open.

The land-based zoning approach motivated large landowners to prepare site analyses of their individual properties during the district planning process. They looked at the land in more detail and identified potential problems with the approach that were adjusted by the planning committee. As they gained appreciation of the natural features of their land, the process evolved beyond simple open-space protection to an awareness of the potential of the natural environment to create community development value.

Villages

The overriding purpose of the villages is to establish a development pattern that creates community. Pursuing this purpose, county planners investigated nearby traditional New Mexican settlements, including La Cienega (the home of famed landscape architect J.B. Jackson), Cerrillos, Madrid, Canada de Los Alamos, Galisteo, and the city of Santa Fe itself. They studied land-use patterns, roads, agricultural and institutional uses, and community and economic activities, including art and culture.

County planners observed that traditional villages used one or sometimes two of three centralizing techniques: a plaza, a crossroads, or a main street which, La Farge had noted, created the "reason for the place." These centralizing features and the strong tradition of village settlements that stem from the Law of the Indies are part of New Mexico's heritage and are the basis for the college district's pattern of contemporary, mixed-use villages.

Kolkmeyer has described the goal for the college district as "new ruralism." While some of its densities and facilities might by definition be "urban," and while the area might eventually become part of the urban fabric of Santa Fe, the founding principles would be rural in design.

The College District Plan includes 11 village areas that are sized and configured by the land. These have discernible edges and are separated by arroyos or parks. Villages are required to fit the land. They are designed to be highly walkable, with village or neighborhood centers within a half-mile walk of all homes. Each village is to be economically and architecturally diverse and include 15 percent affordable housing.

Density and Centers

When the decision was made to develop the first village at Rancho Viejo, the College District Plan did not exist, the market was untested, and a long-term water supply was uncertain. Rancho Viejo Village was designed and developed as a freestanding village with no guarantee that there would be future villages. Its capacity of 350 homes is what the land system would yield using the development criteria that would eventually become the foundation of the College District Land Use and Zoning Plan. Infrastructure was designed and financed to stand alone if necessary without income from future development phases.

The lack of certainty about the future made it difficult to program the village center. The plan created an urban pattern of tree-lined streets and sidewalks that radiated from a central plaza. The strategy was to have future commercial, institutional, and two-story residential buildings conform to this framework. Space was provided for a small church or other public building to anchor the end of the plaza. The plaza was built upfront, and construction has started on the first commercial building and two-story townhouses that will enclose the plaza.

Creating high densities and commercial centers are challenges in the college district. The minimum village density of 3.5 dwelling units per acre in village zones can accommodate approximately 19,000 dwellings, a gross density of 1.1 units per acre. Some people question how such low density can be considered an alternative to sprawl. The answer lies in organizing and configuring that development into higher-density villages that create community and increasing density above the minimum requirement as the district matures. The minimum allowable gross density in the Community College District is 1.1 units per acre. If the College District can achieve an average density of five dwellings an acre in village zones, this would generate 24,000 units or 1.5 gross units per acre in the district, which is about the same density as the City of Santa Fe.

The greater question is how to secure the higher densities required to support commercial, community facilities, and transit — and how to do so in a manner that creates public spaces, amenities, and activities, so that residents will support density as the district grows. In other words, to use density to avoid rather than perpetuate NIMBYism. The developer has already successfully worked with the residents of the first village to resolve such concerns as building height in the higher-density village center and the design of the center itself.Village centers are designed to be mixed use and take their form from the traditional local patterns of main street, crossroads, or plaza. They must be higher density than residential neighborhoods and have a minimum floor-area ratio of 0.35 square feet of building for every one square foot of land area. Twenty-five percent of the building area is required to be residential, and they are to have public spaces that reflect the spirit of the public plaza. They are not to be buffered from adjacent neighborhoods but connected by streets and walkways. Densities will be highest in centers and transition to village edges and surrounding fringe areas in order to locate the greatest number of people closest to community facilities and services.

The district plan intends village centers to flourish economically and provides the flexibility to wait for adequate population and traffic to support commercial development before it is constructed. If population and passing traffic are inadequate to support retail — for instance, in smaller villages — institutional and residential uses are considered an acceptable substitute.

Village centers are designed to be mixed use and take their form from the traditional local patterns of main street, crossroads, or plaza. They must be higher density than residential neighborhoods and have a minimum floor-area ratio of 0.35 square feet of building for every one square foot of land area. Twenty-five percent of the building area is required to be residential, and they are to have public spaces that reflect the spirit of the public plaza. They are not to be buffered from adjacent neighborhoods but connected by streets and walkways. Densities will be highest in centers and transition to village edges and surrounding fringe areas in order to locate the greatest number of people closest to community facilities and services.

The district plan intends village centers to flourish economically and provides the flexibility to wait for adequate population and traffic to support commercial development before it is constructed. If population and passing traffic are inadequate to support retail — for instance, in smaller villages — institutional and residential uses are considered an acceptable substitute.

The strategy is to establish an urban pattern for centers, around which commercial and community uses can develop over time. A developer can't simply label 10 acres next to an arterial as commercial and set it aside for the future. There must be a commitment to an urban framework of roads, sidewalks, and building zones in which street-oriented, village-center uses can develop and change as the community grows. For each village, a development plan is required to create these connections and integrate a center. Adequate water also must be set aside for centers. This strategy is not unlike the traditional evolution of small towns in the United States.

A county-sponsored economic analysis forecasts that the district population will support three typical grocery store-anchored commercial centers. The goal is to exceed these projections by increasing minimum densities in the district, designing centers to attract outsiders, building on the tradition of successful, small, out-of-the-way restaurants in Santa Fe, and by additional life in the villages created by mixed uses and people working at home. Incidentally, Santa Fe has the highest percentage of the population working at home, 6.9 percent, of any metropolitan area in the United States, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

To date, creation of these centers has been slow, partly because of the challenging issues surrounding water in the West. All stakeholders are confident of a positive outcome, but the details of long-term water availability still are being worked out. According to Santa Fe's legal water limits, Rancho Viejo had water for approximately 672 units. Additional water is available in a large aquifer under Rancho Viejo to which the landowners have rights. But creating the necessary county water company to deliver the water requires the cooperation of the City of Santa Fe and the state water engineer in a long and complex process that is progressing but not yet completed. The landowners have enough water to support full development of the site. But Rancho Viejo concentrated its initial water allocation to establish single-family neighborhoods. Although a long-term water plan is in progress, the lack of such a plan has hindered aggressive development of the townhouses, apartments, and mother-in-law units that are encouraged by the district plan.

Employment and Institutions

Economic development is a high priority of the county. Close proximity of work and home, and creation of community institutions are fundamentals of the district plan. The preference is to have as many employment and institutional uses as possible integrated into village centers. The plan recognizes that some commercial uses are incompatible with village centers and there is a need to attract larger employment and institutional uses. To that end, institutional centers and campuses are allowed uses in village area zones. As the names imply, the intent is to create centers and campuses that become identifiable places and that follow the same principles of fitting the land, a mix of uses, walkability, and internal centers that guide the residential villages.

Thanks to generous land contributions from the Rancho Viejo partners, the district has a great foundation of community institutions, including the campuses of the Santa Fe Community College and the Institute of American Indian Arts, in addition to the evolving campus of Santa Maria del la Paz.

OUTCOMES

The first townhouses at Rancho Viejo Village have sold well, indicating a market for density. During the summer of 2004, construction began on townhouses and the first commercial building, which will house retail and office space. More than 600 people live in 300 units in Rancho Viejo Village currently, with its affordable housing component set to be completed by the end of 2004. Nearby Windmill Ridge Village, which will be twice as big, is about two-thirds complete; its final phase is slated to begin in the spring of 2005. Planning for the next village area already has begun.

Residential diversity was always a goal of the project. Rancho Viejo Village is planned for eight different residential types. Cluster housing, mid-priced and higher-priced single-family, and estate homes are already constructed and have been dispersed throughout the village. Townhouses, two-story live/work units, and lofts above retail are to be created in the village center. Each of the single-family residential types has various models. Residential prices initially ranged from $135,000 to $350,000. The current price range is from $100,000 for affordably financed homes to $450,000 for larger homes on the edges of arroyos. Houses in the higher-density areas are built in clusters or serviced by alleys. SunCor has become the production home builder at Rancho Viejo to make certain that houses fit the village pattern and meet the company's quality objectives. Sidewalks, separated from the curb, parallel every street in the higher density areas. No house is more than five minutes from trails that run through the arroyo open space.

The highest density is in the village center and transitions to estate homes tucked into the wooded hillside at the village edge. Residential streets are oriented to provide a combination of distant mountain views and solar orientation that optimizes energy conservation. In the beginning, there was no thought of solar architecture but the orientation was provided for the future, when energy conservation might be considered. Now, approximately 70 percent of the homes in the first two villages have an energy-efficient orientation with no compromise to the community plan. And future homes in Rancho Viejo will be constructed to the U.S. Department of Energy's "Build America" energy standards.

In the seven years since the village center was first conceived, there have been changes and adaptations, and even serious difficulties that had to be worked through. On a purely physical plane, the design has shifted in line with new planning codes, sometimes very much to its own benefit. The county adopted a new standard for arterial highways in the College District Plan. This reduced the right-of-way on the road adjacent to the village center from 130 feet to 60 feet and encouraged creation of Main Street-type commercial uses fronting the street. This change will allow some of the commercial to be pulled from around the plaza and onto the adjacent street. The change makes commercial more viable and makes the plaza more residential.

But not all features of the plan were clear to Rancho Viejo Village residents from the beginning. Neighbors who enjoyed open space and distant views across the undeveloped lots in the village center were outraged when the developer announced construction plans for those lots and introduced plans for a church. Residents complained that salespeople had promised no two-story buildings in Rancho Viejo. There were concerns about church parking, and one person hated the idea of a church and the image of a cross in the community. Affordable housing also was questioned. A citizen committee was formed, and petitions and surveys were circulated. Although the planners and developer understood the village center as a fundamental element of Rancho Viejo Village and the College District Plan, the vision was not yet shared by the residents.

To handle this crisis, Rancho Viejo's Taunton drew lessons from the college district collaboration, offered to invite Moore to conduct a planning workshop with residents and the Rancho Viejo Partners and promised to develop the plan that emerged. Moore interviewed residents and company officials, and designed a process to fit the situation. He invited everyone willing to commit to participating in five two-hour workshops. "Knowledgeable outsiders" — people who had a perspective about planning but did not have a stake in the outcome — also were invited. Kolkmeyer presented the College District Plan and its reasons for higher densities and affordable housing. The group was asked and agreed to accept some givens for the number of units and affordable dwellings and the principles of the College District Plan. The homework phase taught everyone the history of the village and acquainted them with various opinions held by residents and the developer. This group became known as the Homework Group. Participants were asked to describe their ideal village and then worked as groups to draw village plans. At every step, Moore made certain that everyone had a voice in the process and that the group reached consensus on every question or concern. The results were given to Design Workshop so its team could design a final development plan for the village center. It was reviewed by the workshop group and, with a few minor modifications, was approved. Every member of the committee signed a poster that described the plan and principles.

The new plan changes some aspects of the old plan but does not change the principles of creating village centers. Some people gave up their views across the village center. Buildings still surround the plaza, but they are not all two stories, and the distance between some existing homes has been increased and planted with trees. The former church site will be given to the homeowners' association and the community will determine its use. The group's vision of a special place that defines the village's identity and perpetuates community is as strong as any previous statement by the Rancho Viejo Partners or any part of the College District Plan. The main difference is that the residents now own the vision and have resolved to help make it happen.

Perhaps the most inspiring outcome of all deals with sustainability. Rancho Viejo's water management plan conserves water by harvesting drainage for irrigation of common areas and domestic landscapes, including standard installation of cisterns with each home. The system has been so successful that Rancho Viejo Village beat Santa Fe's stringent water-use limits by 40 percent in 2002, its first full year of operation.

LESSONS LEARNED

In creating this innovative planning process, the collaborative team learned two sets of lessons: one about how to develop and the other about how to run the public process that drives development.

The Development Approach

Rancho Viejo Partners' management was faced with meeting profit expectations of a publicly held company and also producing development innovations to meet the values and needs of the local community. Seven lessons emerged from this development approach that may be helpful to other community advocates. The team that helped bring Rancho Viejo into being believes that to make this kind of community happen, landowners, developers, planners, and designers must work together and they will benefit most by:

Starting with the right people. Bob Taunton and Ike Pino, the first two general managers at Rancho Viejo, understand both development and the issues facing government. They listen and communicate with respect. Taunton started as a planner for Parks Canada and the City of Calgary and later had his own development company. Pino was a former city engineer and city manager for Santa Fe and understands the community.

Making the right land deal. The Rancho Viejo business plan is designed to fit the local market and political environment. It reduced front-end carrying costs and was structured to provide the flexibility to respond to local conditions. It also provides for greater long-term returns to the Rancho Viejo Partners and their families.

Testing before committing. The developer was open to testing new approaches but careful not to make long-term commitments until they were proven. Building Rancho Viejo Village allowed the developer to test the notion of the village concept before it became the basis for the College District Plan.

Not backing up on county approvals. There had been a history of Santa Fe County developers going through the political approval process and then repeatedly coming back to county staff to make incremental changes. Rancho Viejo has worked hard to stand by its commitments.

Innovating one step at a time. It's impossible for a developer to simultaneously make change in all areas the public would like and still make money. Rancho Viejo has implemented major innovations like water use reduction, affordable housing, energy reduction, and creating village centers, but the developer worked systematically to prioritize and change one or two elements at a time. The company convened the team at the beginning of each new development phase to identify lessons learned and changes to be accomplished in the next stage.

Meeting schedules. It's important to get a firm grasp of the time required to program, design, and go through the public process and develop a single phase. Development teams should start early enough to meet the schedule. If a new idea is not adequately thought out to meet a development schedule, they should put it on hold until the next phase.

Building capacity. Rancho Viejo continually worked to build the capacity to develop in new ways. Bob Taunton and Joe Porter came together once a month to evaluate progress, discuss the capabilities of both their organizations and identify what was required to improve their abilities to make change and increase productivity.

Making Public Processes Work Effectively

The College District and Rancho Viejo planning process has been one of people working together to accomplish what they could not accomplish individually. The collaborative experience touched many people and continues to do so. Moore participated in and observed the process for five years and has identified some principles that contributed to successful community decision making at each stage of the College District Plan and Rancho Viejo processes. He suggests:

Picking the right convener. The degree of seriousness and quality of participation was influenced by the person who convened participants. The most successful collaborations were those convened with commitment and clarity by those responsible for the process.

Inviting everyone. Inviting everyone in the College District to participate opened the process to a wider group of people, political positions, information, and ideas. Commitment to the full learning and planning process was the only requirement for participation.

Following the arrow of community change through concentrating on learning, planning, choosing, and changing. Group decision making occurred continuously throughout design of the College District Plan and the initial Rancho Viejo villages.

• Planning, choosing, and changing started with individuals and groups expressing values and visions for the future. Next, groups prepared drawings of scenario plans and then the group as a whole was led through a process to identify one set of ideas they preferred and areas where they differed. Finally, participants identified required change.

• Learning. Taking time to learn may have had the most dramatic impact on success. There is no doubt that people made better decisions and became more responsible in their positions the more they invested in learning and understanding the interests of others. Highly skeptical developers became ardent supporters of the plan, and county officials began to look beyond existing codes to value-driven standards and regulations.

Trusting Democracy. In Moore's opinion, most experts — including planners — do not trust democracy and, consequently, over-manage public processes. In this case, county staff opted to get help in structuring the process by bringing in an outside facilitator. And while the developers worked to influence the outcome as members of the planning committee, they did not control the process but chose instead to invest in it. The Rancho Viejo Partners spent $400,000 assisting the county planning department, conducting geo-hydrologic evaluations and paying legal fees. Other property owners spent proportional sums providing information and expertise. The success of these efforts depended on an open process where all participants could express their opinions and provide information, but where the group determined the outcome.

Allowing a mess. At times, complicated problems become messy. Messy times are a problem only if no method exists to get through them. The clear purpose of every step of the College District process, the defined method for achieving this purpose and the objective third-person guidance through the process allowed messy times to be productive.

Enlarging the shadow of the future. Development teams should use the future to motivate action. They should not ignore the past, but they shouldn't get stuck there. Venting baggage from the past — and everyone has it — was important, but the emphasis was on the future.

Setting things up so all people can express themselves. Moore's advice about how to conduct the process made communication more efficient. Having him facilitate key decision meetings allowed those with special interests, like the county staff and developers, to express their positions openly and participate equally in the process.

Drawing a picture, literally, of how the process will work and what will result. Collaborative processes were identified upfront, illustrated on posters, and updated by the group when change was necessary. Rancho Viejo Village, as a demonstration project, served as an image of the future.

Bringing the work to closure. The process resulted in decisions and commitments on which participants could act. The College District Plan zoned the district and revised the county's development code. The Rancho Viejo Village process resulted in a poster of the process and a list of the efforts required to achieve the change and a signature block for all participants to sign off on.

CONCLUSION: LEARNING GOOD DEVELOPMENT

The suburbs are a manifestation of the process that creates them. Changing the suburbs requires changing this process and relearning how to develop. It requires channeling a community's creativity, human energy, and economic resources in a common direction to transform development from a "dirty word" into a method to create communities that meet our expectations. It should never be necessary to force the pace of development beyond what the market can comfortably support or what is politically acceptable.

If the Community College District, of which Rancho Viejo is a part, becomes recognized as a model for smart growth, the success will be due in large part to the smart governance and business plans forged by Santa Fe County and the Rancho Viejo Partners. The landowners and the College District Plan have made the leap from rural subdivisions with individual wells and septic tanks to fully serviced villages with minimum densities of 3.5 dwellings per acre. They establish a master plan and zoning for the creation of centers and higher densities in the future, two of the most difficult challenges facing today's new community development industry nationally. The solution to sprawl lies in the collective ability of government, commerce, and citizens to take the next big step and create higher density centers that are special places.

Controversy over growth thrives in Santa Fe, which is known as the "City Different." Initially, there was no confidence that the county could manage growth or that Rancho Viejo would be any different from surrounding large-lot subdivisions. But Santa Fe County and the Rancho Viejo landowners avoided the typical zoning battle by finding enough common ground to forge an alternative future. A new planning and regulatory approach has been created for the Santa Fe Community College District that provides the capacity to accept 50 years of growth. The first two Rancho Viejo villages are under construction and walk the plan's talk. The experience indicates that building a culture of working together may be more important than the resulting ordinances and villages — that the enduring relationships have the potential to make everyone's lives better.

Joe Porter is a founding partner of Design Workshop, a 150-person community planning, urban design and landscape architecture firm with offices in North and South America. Porter has focused his entire career on designing new residential and resort communities. He has taught at North Carolina State University and Louisiana State University and is currently an adjunct professor in the master's program in landscape architecture at the University of Colorado at Denver. He is past president of the Landscape Architecture Foundation, the national philanthropic arm of the American Society of Landscape Architects. Porter has a bachelor's degree in fine arts from Utah State University and a master's degree in urban and regional planning from the University of Illinois.

Jack Kolkmeyer is a professional planner with more than 30 years of experience in community development, urban/regional planning, education, and media communications. He has worked and studied in the Caribbean, West Africa, Europe, and the midwestern and southwestern United States. He is currently the Director of the Planning Division for Santa Fe County, New Mexico. He describes his work in both the public and private sectors as "community problem solving." Kolkmeyer holds a B.A. in English literature and creative writing from Ohio University and an M.P.A. in public affairs and urban and regional planning from the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University.

Carl M. Moore is the proprietor of The Community Store, a Santa Fe firm that provides consulting services to communities, governments, and nonprofit organizations. Moore has consulted with groups in 35 states and 10 countries. He is professor emeritus at Kent State University. He earned his bachelor's degree from Texas Western College, his master's from the University of Arizona, and his doctorate from Wayne State University. Moore has been honored as Peacemaker of the Year in Ohio by The Mediation Association and in New Mexico by the New Mexico Center for Dispute Resolution.