San Diego is doing its annual zoning code update and plans to loosen rules for opening charter schools, operating food trucks and building small housing projects.

The update would outlaw some home-based businesses based on security concerns.

It would also allow businesses to establish on-site gyms for their employees and soften parking requirements for historic buildings

San Diego may soon loosen rules for opening charter schools, operating food trucks and building small housing projects, but outlaw some home-based businesses based on security concerns.

The City Council is scheduled to discuss more than four dozen policy changes on March 6 that would also allow businesses to establish on-site gyms for their employees, soften parking requirements for historic buildings and allow larger signage on commercial businesses in residential areas.

San Diego is the only city in the region that updates its zoning code annually with a large batch of policy changes. Other cities handle such changes one at a time.

City officials say comprehensively updating the zoning code each year allows them to quickly make small modifications that streamline regulations and adjust policies that have had contradictory or unintended consequences.


In recent years, the changes have made it easier to open marijuana dispensaries, expanded where kennels are allowed and updated rules for electric vehicle charging stations, fast food restaurants and sidewalk cafes.

“A lot of good and needed changes here,” City Councilwoman Lorie Zapf of Bay Ho said of this year’s proposed changes during a recent meeting of the council’s Smart Growth and Land Use Committee.

Many of the changes focus on making it easier to build housing projects, including looser rules when fossils are found on a construction site, softening parking rules when part of a site is historic and simplifying approvals when small lots are consolidated.

Matt Adams, vice president of the local chapter of the Building Industry Association, praised the city for the long list of modifications.


“These are the type of changes that will make it more efficient to produce housing in San Diego,” he said.

The lot consolidation change, however, has been criticized by an umbrella organization for local community planning groups as something that could contradict the wishes of neighborhood leaders.

David Moty, leader of the Community Planners Committee, said some recently approved community plan updates – blueprints for development in specific neighborhoods – discourage lot consolidations.

Councilwoman Georgette Gomez of City Heights said those concerns could prevent her from voting for the overall package of changes on March 6.


“I want to make sure we’re not impacting the overall community character,” she said.

The proposed policy changes, officially known as the 11th update to the Land Development Code and Local Coastal Program, would also loosen rules for food trucks in two ways.

The trucks could begin operating without permits in residential, multi-family zones. And they would be permitted on certain commercial properties within a residential zone.

Zapf said it makes sense to loosen food truck rules now that controversy surrounding them has died down. She said city rules prohibiting food trucks in Little Italy, the Gaslamp District and some beach areas have successfully prevented unfair competition for brick-and-mortar restaurants in those places.


The proposal would also make it easier to open charter schools and boost the maximum enrollment for charter schools that get a neighborhood use permit from 300 to 600.

The San Diego Unified School District says one out of six students attend a charter school. City officials say that is putting pressure on the schools to find additional sites and expand existing ones.

The proposed changes also include allowing businesses to establish on-site gyms within their campuses.

That has been prohibited because industrial land in San Diego is relatively scarce, but city officials say the change makes sense as companies seek to give workers opportunities to conveniently focus on their physical fitness during the workday.


Another change would allow larger signage on commercial businesses in residential zones, such as bed and breakfasts, child care centers, schools, golf courses, driving ranges and instructional studios.

The city’s sign ordinance now restricts the size of signs in those areas. The new maximum sizes of signs would vary based on wall area, right of way and speed limit in the area.

One of the only areas the proposed changes would tighten is regulations for home-based businesses. Because police can’t conduct safety inspections in private homes, the city would prohibit the following businesses from operating there: firearms dealers, massage therapists, card rooms, nude entertainers and bingo.

“Not being able to inspect the business operations is a serious concern and a public safety issue,” a city staff report says.


david.garrick@sduniontribune.com (619) 269-8906 Twitter:@UTDavidGarrick