Voters may get the chance to weigh in anew next year on policies that have defined growth and land use in Napa County for decades.

Proponents of two separate initiatives have filed papers with the county indicating they will circulate petitions to allow them to put the measures before voters in 2008. The measures will not appear on the February presidential primary, but may make it onto the same June ballot in which voters will decide on three seats for the Napa County Board of Supervisors.

The first calls for a strict 1 percent growth cap in the county and bans construction above three stories in the unincorporated county area. The measure is a direct strike at the proposed development on the 152-acre Napa Pipe site, where Napa Redevelopment Partners has unveiled plans for seven-story townhomes on what is now unincorporated county land.

The second petition would extend for 50 years the voter-approved Measure J, which requires a countywide vote of the people to change uses on agricultural lands. The original law is now slated to sunset in 2020.

Neither initiative has been given a formal title yet. To get the initiatives on the June ballot, County Counsel Robert Westmeyer said, both sets of proponents will likely have 75 days to gather the roughly 4,300 signatures they need.

Critics of the first initiative — modeled on the 1980 slow-growth proposal Measure A — say it could potentially damage the agricultural preservation spirit of the second — modeled on 1990’s Measure J.

Pipe bomb?

The proponents of the growth-cap measure include Napa attorney James Marshall and Nebraska-based political consultant Victor Ajlouny, who worked on Supervisor Harold Moskowite’s successful 2004 campaign to topple then-incumbent Mike Rippey. The two submitted an intent to file the petition on Thursday.

Both men said their main goal is to derail the Napa Pipe proposal by strengthening the existing 1 percent growth cap. A voter-approved initiative would bar a three-member majority of supervisors from overturning or allowing exceptions to the growth cap. Under the measure, it essentially would take a vote of the people to allow growth beyond 1 percent.

The Napa Pipe proposal, which calls for 3,200 townhomes, would likely add more than 1 percent to the county’s housing stock in any year in which a substantial number of the townhomes came on the market.

Further, Napa Pipe developers have plans for seven-story buildings, which they note are consistent in height with existing industrial buildings on the property, but are taller than any other structures in the county. The townhomes, as proposed, would be barred or scaled down under the planned initiative.

“That really is the impetus,” Marshall said, saying the Napa Pipe development doesn’t have the support of “a majority of residents.”

“Anything that goes beyond the General Plan and Measure A is beyond the will of the people,” he said.

Ajlouny said if a development the scale of Napa Pipe goes through, his perception is that no development is impossible in Napa County. “Once you break that barrier, what’s next?” he said.

Napa Redevelopment Partners leader Keith Rogal has said the development would benefit the county by providing moderately priced homes at a time when many young Napans cannot afford to live in the community in which they were raised. He has said the site, which would revitalize a nearly dormant industrial area and is near the location of thousands of jobs, is a good fit for the county.

Rogal did not return phone calls about the initiative by press time.

Some county officials have embraced the Napa Pipe project, in large part because it would help solve the county’s perennial problem in creating enough affordable housing to meet state mandates.

Politicians sympathetic to Napa Pipe’s goals of providing affordable housing said they see the initiative as a torpedo aimed to destroy residential development at the former shipyard.

“Somebody’s got an ax to grind and they’re grinding it,” said Napa County Supervisor Mark Luce.

Citing the fact that Napa County hasn’t had a historical problem with the 1 percent growth cap, Luce pointed to the height barrier as a clear sign the initiative is aimed at Napa Pipe.

“I think Napa Pipe is one of those rare projects where we can build housing that complements the preservation of agriculture and open space,” he said. “We need high-density housing, otherwise we’re going to encourage sprawl.”

Putting grapes first

The goal of the Measure J extension is not to derail any specific project, but to preserve the strength of agriculture in the Napa Valley.

The initiative is largely written as a copy of 1990’s Measure J, except for language that allows for affordable housing to be built where other suitable land can’t be found and the proposal to extend until 2058 the voter-approval control on zoning changes to agricultural land.

Documents filed with the county elections office show proponents of the initiative include grapegrowers and agricultural preservationists, including Napa County Farm Bureau members Volker Eisele, Ron Taddei, Al Wagner of Clos du Val, as well as former Upvalley Supervisor Mel Varrelman.

Many so-called Measure J votes have appeared on the ballot over the years, with voters rejecting developments in Oakville, Pope Valley and Carneros while allowing Bistro Don Giovanni in north Napa to expand. Another such vote, known as Measure K, is slated to appear on the ballot in 2008, regarding a proposed expansion of the Stanly Lane Marketplace.

Unlike Marshall and Ajlouny, Eisele praised the Napa Pipe proposal’s goals, saying even if it was only half as large as proposed it could secure enough affordable housing to satisfy state demands for years.

The need for affordable housing is one reason the Measure J-modeled initiative doesn’t seek an extension beyond 50 years, Eisele said.

“You cannot in perpetuity deal with the housing issue,” Eisele said. “Fifty years you can anticipate ... I’m sure if we would have said eliminate the sunset — as much as the voters might like it — it would have provoked a legal challenge.”

The initiative provides that the Board of Supervisors can make specific findings to rezone agricultural land to make it eligible for housing, as in instances where land is proven unsuitable for agriculture and is not likely to be annexed by a city or town.

As in Marshall and Ajlouny’s proposal, Eisele said the Measure J extension is designed to protect the law from being overturned by a three-member, pro-growth majority on the board of supervisors.

Eisele said if the proponents miss the petition deadline for the June election, they will shoot for the November 2008 ballot instead. Agricultural preservation in Napa Valley is too important not to try again, he said.

“It made us world famous,” he said. “I can tell you 40 years ago no one knew who we were.”