Profiled 2024
The City of Indian Wells, population 4,757 (2020), is located in Riverside County, California, roughly 12 miles southeast of Palm Springs. In 1994 or 1998, the city adopted a transfer of development rights mechanism which now appears as Section 22.04.130 in Chapter 22.04 Hillside Management within Title 22 Resources Management in the zoning code.
Section 22.04.090, Development Guidelines, establishes objectives for development in hillside zones aimed at protecting the natural appearance and ecology while minimizing excavations that could degrade views of the city’s hillsides. The section emphasizes that these guidelines are not rigid prescriptions. As a way of motivating property owners to voluntarily comply with these guidelines, Indian Wells allows development potential that could cause adverse environmental impacts to be transferred to a more appropriate area.
Sending areas are limited to lands designated as “hillside” area in the General Plan Conservation/Open Space Element Figure COS-1. The TDR allocation ratio is one unit per 40 acres when the receiving site is located within the hillside area or 1.5 units per 40 acres when the receiving site is located outside the designated hillside area. To be granted TDRs, all development potential must be permanently extinguished from a sending parcel; if only a portion of a property is proposed as a sending site, a subdivision must create a separate parcel for preservation. Following extinguishment of development, the sending parcel can only be used for open space, watershed, game reserve, hiking/equestrian trails, property maintenance, and scientific study approved by the City Council.
Receiving sites can be part of the sending property, an adjacent property, or property with a land use designation of Medium Density Residential or higher as long as the transferred development potential does not exceed the zoning district’s density designation by more than 20 percent.
The code explicitly allows sending area owners to sell or give development rights to any governmental jurisdiction or qualified nonprofit organization and permits that governmental or non-profit entity to sell, retain, or transfer those rights.
The city encourages transfers by welcoming negotiation for permit streamlining, fee reductions/waivers, relaxation of development standards (including density increases), and other incentives. Indian Wells also clarifies that density bonuses arising from transfers are not counted as a part of the base on which density bonuses granted for providing affordable housing or other such density bonuses are calculated. The City Council approves transfers on its consent calendar however these items can be removed from the consent calendar and scheduled for public hearing.