Section 4.17 Public Facilities 4.17.1 Introduction This section assesses the potential impacts associated with public facilities that could occur as a result of future development accommodated by the proposed project, General Plan Amendment No. 960 (GPA No. 960). The emphasis of this section is on the various public services and facilities provided within unincorporated Riverside County, including fire protection, law enforcement protection by the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, solid waste management, schools, libraries and medical facilities. Wastewater (sanitary sewer) is discussed in Section 4.19 (Water Resources) along with other water supply issues; parks are addressed in Section 4.16 (Parks and Recreation). This EIR section examines the effects of build out of the General Plan on public services and assesses whether any adverse environmental effects would result from the need to provide additional public services or facilities as a result of the project’s revisions to the General Plan. This chapter also includes analysis of changes to baseline conditions that would result from future development accommodated by the project. The Riverside County General Plan does not include a section on public services, as it is not one of the seven general plan elements (land use, circulation, housing, conservation, noise, open space and safety) required pursuant to California Government Code (CGC) Section 65302. However, public services are addressed directly or indirectly in a variety of locations in the General Plan. A. Background on Data Sources and Methods The three most prominent characteristics of Riverside County affecting the delivery of services are its size, diverse topography and land use patterns. The focus of the land use patterns and development within Riverside County center mainly around Riverside County’s 24 cities. These cities not only provide housing for citizens but also establish a pattern that relates directly to the location of citizens throughout Riverside County, incorporated as well as unincorporated, and their need for public services and facilities. The importance of public service availability cannot be overstated, for as this determines in a fundamental way where and when urban intensity development can occur. For example, without a safe and efficient municipal water system, land cannot be transformed from open or rural to a more urban closely knit development pattern, in which someone other than the end water user must be responsible for obtaining and distributing the water that is used. Electricity and telephony are similarly important. In addition, public facility providers must closely monitor existing service capacities and future projections to ensure that capacity continues to be available or added as an area grows. For most public services, this future growth can be used to project future demand. Future demand is used by providers to establish long-range plans to ensure additional capacity is added at pace with, or in advance of, developing need. An example of this would be a school district beginning their planning for construction for a County of Riverside Environmental Impact Report No. 521 Public Review Draft § February 2015 4.17-1 new high school now to eventually accommodate the increased number of children that are entering kindergarten today and who will need the high school space in 10 years. Accordingly, public facility demands are most often determined on the basis of future demographic and/or socioeconomic projections, which can include population, dwelling units (residences) and employment sources (jobs), as well as growth rate predictions. Providers typically have usage factors they employ to calculate service needs based off these projections. For example, a water district may have water usage factors for a variety of land uses (such as 200 gallons per day for single-family homes and 180 gallons per day for multi-family homes). As a result, the future demand on a public facility can be modeled (estimated) for a variety of future scenarios, such as the “build out scenario,” which is a theoretical point in time when all of the land uses planned would have been built. As detailed in Section 4.1 (Environmental Assumptions and Methods), the theoretical build out point used in this EIR for the existing General Plan and GPA No. 960 is approximately the year 2060. It should be noted, however, that build out represents a theoretical point in time, fixed in order to allow comparison between two differing outcomes. The ultimate outcome, that is, what actually gets built in the real world, is subject to many complex and varying factors over time. Hence, the theoretical approximation is more of a likely best (or worst) case scenario, rather than a precise acre-by-acre prediction. Also, these calculations also do not take into account any future annexations of unincorporated county areas into existing (or new) cities or public facility districts, which could lead to other agencies being responsible for provision of the public services. This is appropriate because doing so means the public service needs of the unincorporated county are, at worst, over- estimated so that, in an abundance of caution, mitigation needs are similarly overestimated. Nevertheless, these theoretical build out projections are valuable because they provide a snapshot of how Riverside County might look if all of the land uses mapped in the existing (2008) General Plan were built as planned, and they enable a comparison of the possible outcome of the changes proposed by the project. In each of the subsections that follow, for each type of public facility, details are provided on how specific projections were developed, as well as the data sources and methods used. B. Proposed Changes to the General Plan Relating to Public Services As part of the project review process, land use and demographic data in the General Plan were updated and policies reviewed and revised where necessary. The existing General Plan addresses public facilities mainly in the Land Use (LU) Element. GPA No. 960 includes policies related to coordinating public facilities with future land use development. Texts of relevant existing and revised or new General Plan policies are provided under the applicable topic herein. For parks and recreation updates, see Section 4.16 (Parks and Recreation). The variety of LUD and policy area changes proposed, as per the descriptions in Section 3.0 (Project Description) of this EIR and associated Figure 3-1 (and corresponding maps within each Area Plan), may indirectly affect public facilities and services. Such changes would lead to either an increase or decrease in development potential (density or intensity). Introducing new people and structures into areas would increase the use of existing public services and add incrementally to the need for additional facilities and services as well. GPA No. 960 also includes new and revised policies which would be implemented at a future time in locations not foreseeable at present; for example, the new incidental rural Retail-Commercial policy, Indian fee land policies and others, as described in Section 3.0 of the EIR. Similarly, new maps for trails and county roads (General Plan Figures C-7 and C-1, respectively, plus corresponding maps within each Area Plan) indicate general road and trail alignments, but not specific locations since specific design and construction sites must be determined based on specific site topography, existing development and timing, as well as both existing and future levels of service to be met. Actual locations for these improvements would be determined based on site assessment of opportunities County of Riverside Environmental Impact Report No. 521 4.17-2 Public Review Draft § February 2015 and constraints. Likewise, other infrastructure and utilities, such as power transmission lines, water and sewer lines, and such, are also developed based on the providing agency’s existing and future levels of service and need assessments and forecasts; typically based on five-year capital improvement plans. Generally, however, such improvements are not proposed until either specific new developments or overall growth within an area triggers their need. Accordingly, specific locations and timing of future infrastructure, including power and natural gas transmission lines, water and sewer lines and pumps, as well as roads, schools and other public services are not presently foreseeable beyond the master countywide level (as addressed previously in EIR No. 441). These improvements would require site-specific analyses and mitigation when proposed as part of (or to serve) future development as the General Plan builds out. As such, future impacts and mitigation can only be assessed programmatically pursuant to the performance standards outlined in this EIR, as well as EIR No. 441, with project-specific analysis and mitigation developed at the later individual project stage. Nevertheless, this section presents theoretical estimates for both existing conditions and build out conditions. See each of the individual subsections that follow for specifics. 4.17.2 Fire Protection Services A. Fire Protection – Existing Environmental Setting The County of Riverside contracts with the State of California (the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, also now known as “CalFire”) for fire protection. Under CalFire “Riverside Operational Unit” management, the Riverside County Fire Department (RCFD) operates 95 94 fire stations in 17 battalions with about