The city has received three applications - including one from itself - to expand Gilroy's southern reach by more than 500 acres.

The move would bring the city's sports park and hundreds of acres of farmland and open space into Gilroy's urban services area, enlarging the city by about 5 percent and potentially paving the way for thousands more residents.

The three applicants are the city, as the owner of the sports park; Gavilan College, which wants to replace its golf course with more than 400 dormitories for students and faculty; and Shapell Industries, the firm that developed Eagle Ridge and anticipates building 670 homes east of Thomas Road and Santa Teresa Boulevard and south of Luchessa Avenue, according to documents filed with the city's planning department.

Shapell initially requested bringing in nearly 111 acres, but the city told the developer to make it 310 acres and will probably offer to split some of the application costs, according to City Planner Melissa Durkin. One reason for upping the acreage has to do with Shapell's plans for a new arterial road connecting the U.S. 101-Monterey Road interchange with the intersection of Santa Teresa Boulevard and Mesa Road near Gavilan College. City staff have asked Shapell to add the roughly 200 acres to its request to "create a more logical city boundary and incorporate all property involved in the proposed new road," Durkin wrote. Adding the acreage does not mean Shapell will develop it, but merely means changing the city's southern borders will happen at once.

Still, the filings of these applications - and the subsequent tweaking of them occurring now - are the first steps in a multi-step process that will pass through the city's planning commission, the city council and the Local Agency Formation Commission, a county agency that authorizes the annexation of land.

LAFCO approved Gilroy's incorporation of a 27-acre parcel of farmland at the corner of Monterey Road and West Luchessa Avenue in April, 2007, to make way for Oak Creek, a 236-unit subdivision that will include commercial and retail space. In October 2002, however, the city ran into a tangle with LAFCO, which rejected Gilroy's bid to annex the sports park into city boundaries even though the area is enveloped by car dealerships, hotels and homes. Preserving agricultural land is a priority for the agency, as evidenced by its 2002 decision, but afterward, the city council voted to build the park anyway, with the property technically on county land.

This latest trio of an application amounts to a second, much larger attempt to continue Gilroy's southward expansion.

"I believe it was a mistake for the city to build on land that was not already annexed … We need in-check, moderated growth versus everyone hopping on the bandwagon and increasing the city's urban services area for one project's particular purpose," said Planning Commissioner Ben Anderson, who will likely consider the issue along with his colleagues by spring or summer 2009.

"I am in favor of open space preservation," Anderson said. "And I am leery of anything Shapell wants to do."

City staff has estimated that about 66 acres of undeveloped/under-developed land already exists within city limits, but before appointed and elected officials have a chance to argue about expansion versus in-fill projects, the applicants must complete environmental impact reports. These reports address a project's expected affects on traffic, noise, air quality and water quality and other significant environmental issues. In a response letter to Susan Mineta of Shapell Industries, Durkin specifically asked her to show how the company's expected development will affect "prime agricultural land."

The city council already considered this when it passed the city's General Plan in 2002, a document that envisions Gilroy through 2020. This vision includes five so-called "neighborhood districts," and the 111 acres of land Shapell is interested in accounts for one of these districts. That means an addendum to the 2002 General Plan's environmental report could suffice for Shapell, but Gavilan College may need to file a more particular report under the state's Environmental Quality Act. Either way, both projects - while envisioning a specific number of residents - lack the highly detailed planning required of applicants seeking building rights, something that comes after all the land logistics are settled.

"They don't have to have that kind of definition at this stage because the approval they're seeking is just moving the city's urban services area line," not actually building, Durkin said. "Plus, it may be years before they actually develop, so any environmental report they do now could become stale."

Planning Commissioner Jim Gailey agreed that the sour housing market means residents won't see any development down south for years, but the long-time resident also said he will scrutinize any proposal that comes before the planning commission.

"I have misgivings seeing farmland that I walked on and hunted on as a boy being developed, but I also understand that reality is reality," Gailey said. "We need to make sure everything that's done is done according to the rules as laid down in the zoning ordinance and the city's general plan, but the city council makes that final decision."