Two colossal housing projects totaling 1,127 units are headed for Santa Barbara’s La Cumbre Plaza, but massive fears are growing that without a specific plan that allows the city to plan both projects at the same time, the area could turn into chaos.

“How are you going to get this all to work?” Santa Barbara Planning Commissioner John Baucke asked at a review hearing Thursday. “I really am concerned that this is going to be a disaster.”

Concerns erupted over a planned 443-unit housing project at the site of the former Sears building. In the same shopping center, another development team wants to build 648 apartments at the site of the Macy’s building and parking lots. The developers are working separately, and not coordinating, and instead are in a race to finish their project first.

Among the controversies that arose Thursday were concerns about impacts to local schools, traffic circulation throughout the plaza, open space and a play area for families, and the possible loss of public right-of-way.

Anne Hubbard, superintendent of the Hope Elementary School District, expressed serious concerns about how the new housing units would impact the three elementary schools in the district. She said it would create an impact of “multimillions of dollars.”

“When I look at these numbers, I have a lot of fear in my heart about what that is going to mean to the school district,” Hubbard said. “I have yet to really grasp how the school district will be supported. We will have a need for about 28 additional classrooms.”

In addition to Baucke’s concerns about circulation, Commissioner Brian Barnwell hammered the Orange County developers over their fuzzy plans for how the roads in the plaza would work and whether the public still would be allowed to use the roads once homes are built.

“It breaks my heart. It truly, truly breaks my heart,” Barnwell said. “There are so many things wrong with the current project.”

He seemed frustrated by recent state law that states that discretionary review cannot surpass five meetings, a move by the state to incentivize communities to approve housing quicker.

Barnwell, a former member of the Santa Barbara City Council, said the circulation plan for vehicles, bikes and people was deficient. He said that from the drawings the roads in La Cumbre Plaza that would be open to the public look more like private driveways for residents.

He expressed concerns that the road that passes in front of The Habit in La Cumbre Plaza should be maintained as a public road; otherwise, it would become accessible only for the residents. The mall has a lease until 2077, so essentially the stores and shops between the Macy’s and Sears buildings would remain no matter what is built around.

“I would like us to be more stalwart in defending Santa Barbara,” Barnwell said. “We are keepers of the flame.”

Barnwell said the city needs to rethink how it approaches the project and see it as a new downtown area. At one point, he quickly sketched the distance between Carrillo to Sola streets, block by block, on top of a site plan of the proposed development to show they were roughly about the same size — to illustrate the enormity of the La Cumbre Plaza development.

“This will become a major center of both residential use and commercial use, so we need to acknowledge that,” Barnwell said.

Planning Commissioner Lesley Wiscomb agreed.

“We have two very large projects at La Cumbre Plaza,” Wiscomb said. “How do they intertwine in terms of environmental review?”

Supervising transportation planner Jessica Grant said it will be a goal of the city staff to increase mobility at the site.

“We’re trying to make it so that someone as the resident, after the developers are long gone, can walk around this whole campus,” Grant said. “Really, that’s your outdoors. That will be the kids’ outdoor space, and that needs very much a lot of attention.”

The city finds itself caught in the middle of competing projects — the two largest in Santa Barbara in decades — because of a sabotaged specific plan effort that eliminated the city’s chances to plan the whole area as one.

Santa Barbara initially pushed for a specific plan and took a $1.1 million grant proposal to the Santa Barbara County Association of Governments. Two subcommittees of SBCAG recommended that the Specific Plan get funded, but for mysterious reasons, the then-chair of SBCAG, Das Williams, led a charge in 2023 to deny the finding and convinced a majority of the board to instead use the money to fund North County projects.

The decision at the time stunned the city planners who were expecting approval and who were looking forward to overseeing a specific plan that would have included 2,000 housing units and an increased number of affordable apartments than what is proposed under the separate developments now.

Specific Plans are intended to guide development within a certain area, and help ensure that a development is compatible with the city’s overall goals. They also offer more flexibility for the developer.

A Specific Plan allows the city to plan for things such as water, traffic circulation, congestion, parks, schools, open space and a variety other impacys from development.

Of the current 1,127 units currently proposed, only 137 would be set aside for below-market rents.

Board chair Devon Wardlow said she would like to see more affordable units.

“I am very disappointed,” Wardlow said. “This is a project that is delivering over 400 units. It is an opportunity that we could get significant affordability, but because the requirement is only 10% — that seems to be what you all are going to propose — I respectfully ask you and urge you to consider increasing the level of affordability.”

Further tangling the already confused situation, attorneys for the developers behind the Macy’s project sent a letter to the Planning Commission raising concerns about the Sears’ developers plans for access through La Cumbre Plaza.

“Following the expiration of certain lease and easement agreements in 2028, the owner of the Sears property will no longer hold any access rights in or across the State and Hope property,” the letter from Graham Lyons of the law firm Mullen & Henzell wrote.

“Accordingly, public access from State Street to the Sears project site will not be available through the State and Hope property. The Planning Commission and ABR should be aware that vehicle and pedestrian access for the Sears project, as well as parking, will need to be located entirely within the Sears project site.”

Dave Eadie, the senior vice president of entitlement and development for Kennedy Wilson, the Orange County developers, said he was not aware of any letter at Thursday’s meeting.

Baucke responded with a chuckle: “I’d be concerned if I was you.”

Baucke also did not like the architecture.

“It’s architecturally Santa Barbara, but the massing is something you would see in West LA or Costa Mesa or Orange County,” Baucke said. “The building should be broken into smaller buildings.”

The project went to the Planning Commission on Thursday for a concept review. The commissioners gave direction that they hope the developers will incorporate into the project before submitting a formal application.