Can we get there from here?

Last night, after hearing from nearly twenty public speakers, the City Council voted 6-1 to proceed with the completion of a plan for the Victoria Corridor, the busy stretch of the street from the 126 south to the 101.

Following earlier direction from the Council and the Planning Commission, staff recommended a focus on a "workplace" alternative among the three options outlined in our draft. The 2005 General Plan puts a premium on "high wage, high value" jobs as the key to our future prosperity. City staff agrees with sentiment from the Ventura Chamber of Commerce that that Victoria is a key to retaining and attracting the businesses that provide those jobs.

Certainly the biggest point of discussion before the Council is how to handle the traffic on the eight-lane street. The plan calls for a long-term approach that would essentially narrow the street to six lanes to improve walking, biking and transit usage along that stretch (parts of the street are wide enough to also include additional "slip" or "access" lanes to provide turning into and out of business driveways as well as on-street parking.) While many people welcomed the change as a way to improve the street, there was much more skepticism about whether the plan was practical, given the amount of "cut-through" regional traffic that now uses Victoria to switch from the 126 to the 101.

The Council motion, made by Councilmember Fulton, included expanding the traffic and street design study that would be a necessary part of environmental review of the draft plan. The environmental planners will look at a range of alternatives, including leaving the traffic pattern as is, expanding the roadway further and incorporating bike lanes as well as the proposal in the draft plan. Victoria will get a very careful look at the feasibility and impact of making changes to the street.

While the plan is being analyzed and refined, the Council also adopted (by a 5-2 vote) to require new or remodeled retail projects over 50,000 square feet to be subject to a conditional use permit.

To learn more about the plan and to follow further developments, click on the City's website at:

http://www.cityofventura.net/victoria

Councilmember Fulton, who made the motion to proceed with further study of the plan, has posted his perspective on his blog at:
http://fulton4ventura.blogspot.com/

Which way on Victoria?

Nearly 50,000 cars use it every day, but most people simply take Victoria Avenue for granted. It's where the County government is headquartered and where many of us shop for everything from garden supplies to bagels. Thirty years ago, it was the edge of town. Now half of Ventura's 105,000 residents live east of it.

Some people were disappointed when a 99 Cents Only Store replaced Ralphs (which moved to a new center down the street.) Even more have been alarmed by the prospect of Walmart moving in (although a sizable share of the population are looking forward to the retail giant coming to Ventura.) But few residents worry about the future of the street.

Yet it can't be taken for granted that the offices and stores along Victoria will always be full. The way we shop is changing more rapidly than we realize. It isn't just music stores that are feeling the pinch. According to a recent annual grocery industry study, by 2010, less than half of $1 trillion annual grocery and consumables sales will be in traditional supermarkets.

Think about it. For fifty years, almost all of us have been going to the local supermarket at least once a week -- and supporting the small stores and service businesses next door. But already we buy grocery items at Target, Rite Aid and Trader Joes -- and many drive to Oxnard to Costco and Walmart. With new grocery competitors on the horizon, like Whole Foods and Tesco (a British convenience store chain that is planning on spending half a billion on new West Coast outlets), the standard pattern for buying milk and eggs is fragmenting.

The same is happening with offices. More and more Americans are working from home and global outsourcing is further eroding the market for conventional office space. Tenants are still focused on convenient locations and low rents -- but they are also looking for attractive work environments to retain and attract a young and restless workforce.

If you need a reason to think about Victoria, look no further than Thompson Avenue. Once the thriving coastal route, today new car lots are almost all gone and the tourist motels have become low-income housing. When the real estate market shifts, investment flows away, leaving an obsolete landscape behind.

On Monday, the City Council and Planning Commission will be discussing a draft plan for Victoria's future. Some voices are saying: let's not monkey with success -- the private market can take care of Victoria for the forseeable future. Others are speaking up for the General Plan vision of gradually transforming the area from a traffic-dominated arterial to one that has a greater mix of pedestrian-oriented uses in order to attract high-value, high quality office and retail jobs.

Whatever view prevails, the street will change in the decade ahead. The question is: what role does the community play in guiding that change?

For more background, see:

http://www.cityofventura.net/victoria/

Big step forward for the Harbor

Last night, the City Council unanimously approved a project that demonstrates the exciting positive changes under the 2005 General Plan.

The Ventura Port District owns 27 acres of vacant land in the heart of the harbor area. Seven years ago, they chose Sondermann-Ring to develop 300 units of new apartment housing, along with 20,000 square foot of commercial space and 104 new boating slips.

The developer spent years negotiating with the Port District and the surrounding commercial and residential neighbors to win their support for a design that was finally submitted to the City back in 2004. But while acceptable to the Harbor stakeholders, it didn't reflect the new higher quality of design standards the City was seeking. The project consisted of three gated enclaves, with 10 massive, identical buildings. The only public access to this prime coastal area was a single driveway serving the apartment complex.

To find consensus, the developer and the City agreed to split the cost of a "design charette" to look at ways to improve coast access and turn the apartment complex into a "coastal village."

The redesign regrouped the project into 5 blocks each lined with sidewalks and wide parkways with street trees. Instead of a single building form repeated 10 times, there were now 22 different buildings and some of the apartments were mixed into the commercial part of the project, creating a new neighborhood gathering place at the core. The parking structures for the boat slips were lined with rowhouse apartments.

The new design reflects the General Plan's vision of raising standards for new development. Not only will the project inject new life and resources into Ventura's Harbor area, but it will also provide attractive and much needed "workforce housing." The project also includes "affordable housing" with 15 units set aside for moderate income families and 12 for low-income families. In addition, the project will add a 2.5 acre seaside park and a pedestrian promenade along the waterfront.

Finally, the City negotiated a $3.25 million contribution toward building a new Fire Station to improve emergency response times south of the 101 Freeway.

For a closer look at the BEFORE and AFTER changes in project design, click on:

http://www.cityofventura.net/srp

Smart Growth

Here in Ventura, we are striving to create a perfect world – or at least community. We want to encourage new investment in older neighborhoods, provide housing for our local workforce, discourage sprawl, protect the environment and make great places. By the way, we’d like to do all this without impinging on residents’ views of the hillsides.

High standards. Wednesday's joint Council/Planning Commission meeting was the first of a daunting set of tests for the City Council, City staff and for the entire community. Here's what's coming in the next few weeks:

Monday, January 19th: The Council considers the Sondermann-Ring proposal for 300 units of housing in the Harbor (along with 20,000 square feet of "neighborhood commercial." This project has been under consideration for nearly seven years, but design and traffic issues are still being debated.

Tuesday, January 29th: The draft plan for the Victoria Corridor goes to a special meeting of the Council and the Planning Commission. Our 2005 General Plan calls for gradually transforming that 8 lane boulevard full of rush hour traffic into a much more pleasant mix of offices, stores and places to live. The new plan is designed to achieve that goal over time.

Tuesday, February 6: The draft Wells-Saticoy Community Plan will be reviewed by the Council and Planning Commission, detailing new housing and retail development, while strengthening the existing neighborhoods and workplaces in the area.

Monday, February 12: Two projects come before the Council for public hearings -- one a controversial lot split on Mound Avenue and Citrus Place, a new neighborhood in Wells-Saticoy that will include detached homes, townhomes and apartments and a small park.

In Ventura, development projects almost always evoke strong emotions. Often residents are suspicious of change in their neighborhoods. Yet, as a whole, most Ventura citizens support new business, homes for our growing population and new investment in older areas of the City. Our citywide vision calls for most growth to happen inside our community instead of pushing outward to cover our hillsides and surrounding farms.

It is impossible to please everybody. With each decision on new plans or particular projects, the Council must find the right balance -- "smart growth."

Of course, not everyone agrees on that goal. Some simply favor no more growth, leaving the City exactly as it is today. And others aggressively push for unrestrained growth, complaining that government is limiting property rights, driving up the costs of homes and missing opportunities to add jobs and increase revenue for needed public services. But I've found the vast majority of Ventura citizens I talk to don't support either extreme. They support the 2005 General Plan vision:

"Our goal is to protect our hillsides, farmlands and open spaces; enhance Ventura's historic and cultural resources; respect our diverse neighborhoods; reinvest in older areas of our community; and make great places by insisting on the highest standards of quality in architecture, landscaping and urban design."

While these lofty goals are difficult to achieve, however, our efforts to reach them represent an historic opportunity. Recently, despite deep and abiding disagreements, the ten cities of Ventura County and the County itself, came to unanimous consensus on a formula for apportioning growth targets mandated by the State. The process was contentious, protracted and fraught with the potential for meltdown. But common sense prevailed, precisely because everyone was aware that without flexibility and collaboration, we would all lose by fighting each other.

If Ventura can work through the next few months and weeks of tough decisions, we can demonstrate that smart growth is not just an empty slogan, but a real force for achieving our lofty goals. We won’t find perfect answers, but if we can find workable ones, Ventura can move forward after years of stalemate.

What do you think?

Midtown renaissance

Over the past fifteen years, Ventura's Downtown has undergone a remarkable revitalization as new businesses and institutions have brought new life to our historic civic center. The same effect has been taking place in the older neighborhoods to the east in Midtown as families have invested in sprucing up their homes in older neighborhoods. Yet the commercial strips of Main and Thompson have lagged. While there are certainly many bright spots of small independent businesses, there are also plenty of vacant storefronts, vacant lots, low rent motels and marginal land uses like used car lots.

In 2005, Ventura adopted a visionary General Plan to stop sprawl from eating up farm land or paving over our hillsides. It called for directing new investment back into aging strip commercial areas like Main and Thompson in Midtown. It also called for rewriting the zoning rules in those areas to ensure that new development would "enhance Ventura's historic and cultural resources; respect our diverse neighborhoods; reinvest in older areas of our community; and make great places by insisting on the highest standards in architecture, landscaping and urban design."

Recently, a handful of proposed projects in Midtown have been the subject of debate over the scale of new development. To address this concern and implement the goals of the new General Plan, on Thursday, City staff are presenting a draft "code" for Thompson and Main to update the old zoning in the area.

It calls for lowering currently allowed height limits along significant areas of the corridors (although not all.) It spells out in detail the kinds of setbacks, architectural standards and quality of design needed to ensure that new development respects the surrounding older neighborhoods. It bans new automotive businesses like gas stations, car lots and muffler shops. It requires new projects to be designed to promote walking and use of transit to minimize traffic in the future.

For more info on the proposal, see the full report and draft code at:

http://www.cityofventura.net/midtown/20070117staff_report

Of course, no discussion of this topic would be complete without noting the involvement of the community in this effort. We have partnered with the Midtown Community Council to hold two neighborhood workshops on the topic. And the Bungalow Neighbors group has been active and vocal in pushing for lower height limits along the corridors. While not everyone has the same perspective, public awareness and participation in coming to consensus on the future of the corridors is vital.

The public is invited to attend and speak at a joint Planning Commission and City Council workshop this Wednesday, January 17th in the Community Meeting Room at City Hall, 501 E. Poli.

Growing up in Ventura

"While thumbing through the latest issue of Sunset Magazine, I was pleasantly suprised to see a picture of the house my parents built in 1929," was the first sentence of a letter I received at my home yesterday.

Our Spanish bungalow was featured in the January issue for our "water-wise front year alive with texture and blooms." Bill Gray, who lives in Walnut Creek, recognized it as the home on Santa Barbara Street where he and his two brothers grew up.

"My father, Rollin W. Gray, was vice president and manager of the Title Insurance and Trust Co. branch . . . at one time he was president of the Board of Education in Ventura," Mr. Gray informs me. "In the 1930's the block across the street was agricultural. It consisted of a lima bean field and a lemon orchard."

"The only change to the building that I can see (from the magazine) is the gate to the front porch," he notes. A keen eye. The new wood gate was built by Jeremy Walker. I met him and his wife Michelle on our first Halloween in Ventura in 2004. They live on Hurst near our home and I complimented them on their "work in progress" front garden as they filled my kids bags with treats. I learned they had their own landscape design and contracting design firm, Blooming Gardens.

I mentioned was interested in replacing our front lawn and hedge with a native plant garden. Michelle was excited about tackling the challenge. She created a wonderful design and almost before we knew it, we were the honey bee and hummingbird hit of the neighborhood. Eventually a free lancer for Sunset heard about the project and one day a local professional photographer arrived to "shoot" our home and family. Months later, we found ourselves in Sunset as an example that "water-conserving gardens can be as colorful as any other."

And that put us in touch with the original family that lived in our home for fifty years. "The contractor was James Bullis who delivered the house and lot for around $5,000," Mr. Gray recalls. Mr. Bullis must have been an active developer, since I've seen at least two other homes that look identical to ours from the front. I've been tempted to knock on their doors and see what the differences (and similarities) are inside. Now that I know some more about the history of the home, I think I will.

Should I be alarmed?

Today the City Council and the Police Chief received a query from one of our citizen customers, the owner of a local small business regarding the recently announced changes to how we will respond to security alarms. It raises questions we are going to be hearing often in the next few weeks, particularly as the alarm industry tries to, well, alarm the public.
The business owner writes:

"I . . . was a bit dismayed to read in the paper, along with all my local burglars, that the police department is no longer responding to Burglar alarms. I . . . pay for a Security, and Fire Alarm system. It has been less than a week, and" (a neighboring business) "was just broken into and had some computers taken. Her alarm went off, and had they responded to the alarm, they may have stopped the crime from happening. I feel that this step has been taken as a kind of payback for the sales tax increase not being put into effect. So the police department is actually now effectively not going to protect businesses? Are they only going to respond to 911 calls? If so, how do those calls differ from a security alarm. There are many false 911 calls. To be fair, you would have to stop responding to those also, since they have false alarms and you are understaffed. I know you get my intent. It is a bit disheartening to have always felt confident in my police department of the past, and now I feel they are going to let my business security suffer to make a point."

A reasonable concern. First, the recent burglary cited has nothing to do with the new policy, which is not yet in effect. The newspaper article made clear that the policy doesn't go into effect until January 15th. Second, if the alarm went off during the night, it would still be responded to under the new policy (the change would be that the Police won't respond from 7 AM to 7 PM without verification.)

But is the Police Department really punishing the community? Are they endangering taxpaying residents and businesses out of spite?

Hardly. Our Police Department is one of the leaders in California in accountability -- in setting clear goals and measuring performance. Those goals and measures are no mystery -- check them out for yourself:

• Ventura PD Strategic Plan


• City of Ventura General Plan

Those efforts are working. Property crime was down 7.5% last year. But response times for critical emergencies still lag and there has been a disturbing rise in gang crime. 62% of the voters supported a sales tax that would have added additional resources, including 14 more officers, to tackle these challenges. It fell short of the needed 2/3rds. But the problem is still there. We are taking a number of steps, including shifting budget priorities in the coming year. One of the modest steps that will be implemented by the Police Department is changing its alarm response policy to discourage false alarms. Over time, they believe the false alarm problem can be drastically reduced and that will free up resources for higher impact enforcement, resulting in everyone being safer.

Of course, you won't be hearing that from the alarm companies who want to protect their business model. And as the father of three, I can understand why both residents and businesses would be concerned. But don't be alarmed -- the Police Department is continuing its focus on making Ventura a safer community.

All for one, one for all

At today's meeting of the Ventura County Council of Governments, the board of elected officials representing all ten cities (and the County itself)unanimously approved a compromise "regional housing needs allocation." Although every community had reservations about their individual share of the overall estimate of new housing units to be built over the next nine years, the elected officials put those aside to find common ground.

What does this mean? It means at least three things:

• Each jurisdiction was willing to cooperate to achieve a greater goal -- ensuring that the decisions on growth management policies will remain in our County and not be subject to regional politics.
• Ventura County cities can work together, respecting each community's unique geographic, legal and community situation
• Ventura Council of Governments is carving out a place where the cities and the County can overcome the competition and historic rivalries that have long divided the County

The numbers are likely to be controversial, since growth is so controversial throughout the County. But with strong State and regional pressure on Ventura County to address the larger housing challenges facing California, today's VCOG vote represents a recognition that we are better off united than divided.

Today also marked the first meeting of the year and the election of this year's VCOG chair. Our own Ventura Mayor Carl Morehouse was the unanimous choice to lead the organization.

How do we apportion growth in our County?

Today at 3 PM, the ten cities of our County (and the County itself) will send representatives to the Ventura Council of Governments (or VCOG using the initials so beloved by bureaucrats.) The goal will be to find an equitable (or at least acceptable) plan to “share the pain” of allocating future growth of housing in our County over the next nine years.

The arbitrary number of 28,451 “units” is Ventura County’s share of our region’s share of the total estimated growth expected in California between 2005-2014. The formula for arriving at this number is, of course, widely and bitterly disputed. State government promotes building more housing to ease the cost of owning a home, reduce long commutes and address overcrowding and slum housing.

Of course, we the people reserve the right to have other opinions. The contrasting views are what makes life interesting in a democracy. Here’s what two Ventura County Star readers had to say about a story on Monday about the VCOG “Regional Housing Needs Assessment” controversy:

· “Thousand Oaks could easily add the required units with smart redevelopment. Thousand Oaks Blvd could become a people friendly sector with mixed use buildings replacing single storey strip malls . . . All VC cities need to shift from the master planned big suburban developments they've been approving to smaller, friendly, centralized units that meet the needs of less affluent residents, while adding charm and community possibility.”

· “One problem with all who push to add housing in our county is the total lack of understanding regarding future availability of water and only minimal comprehension as to impact on traffic, schools, law enforcement, etc. I've found most long range planning to be seriously flawed --- and most is purposely skewed to sell the ideas of adding more people to our county.”



Both viewpoints are alive and well in the County and each of our communities. Is there an answer?

Without a shared vision of our future, that will be difficult. But if we don’t find a way to at least bridge our differences, we lose local leverage. The Southern California Association of Governments (with the truly distasteful initials SCAG) already has a formula that apportions where new housing should go – and without agreement on an alternative, that’s the one that will be used. Of course, individual cities have the right to appeal their “allocation” – but there is no guarantee that they will do any better appealing to decision-makers representing the six county region. In fact, not surprisingly, the other five counties think Ventura County should take a lot more of the growth than the numbers we are unhappy with.

So stay tuned. Today’s meeting will be a key test for whether, as Ben Franklin said about the Declaration of Independence: “We must all hang together, or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately."

Spark of Love

The holidays are over, but the New Year is a brighter one for 385 families in the Ventura area because of the generous contributions collected by our Fire Department. This year, toys and sports equipment brightened Christmas for 1900 kids.

The highlight of this annual effort was the special deliveries made to 24 families. Some kids are in foster homes, some have one or both parents in prison and one family lost a brother this year to cardiac arrest. Another child recently received a heart transplant. Santa arrived on a big red fire truck and the spirit of giving shone brightly.

Citizens give City high marks for services

From emergency response to routine services, we not only serve you as our customers, we're also responsible to you as citizens. Of course, this dual responsibility has some tensions. Our citizen customers have a high expectation that their taxes buy them the government they individually want (and believe they deserve), even though obvious legal, financial and political limitations make it impossible for us to please all the people, all the time.

In that sense, the unspoken mindset of many of our customers is that local government is a like a vending machine. You put your money in the slot and expect to receive the goods and services you desire. Of course, most of our services aren’t like that – you get clean water, whether you select it or not, just like you get public art, whether you select it or not. You may not get the service (or the law or the decision) that you desire.

Now if you put your money into a vending machine slot expecting to have a cold can of Coke come rolling out – and you get something else (or nothing) -- you are pretty steamed. Perhaps you curse the machine. Or give it a shake. Or kick it. Not a pleasant experience for those of us who see ourselves as serving the public, yet routinely encounter hostility, ingratitude and disrespect. Whether it is the police dispatcher trying to calmly handle an irate caller, the planner at the counter trying to explain code restrictions to a homeowner or the city manager reading the on-line newspaper reader reactions to our new policy on responding to burglar alarms, we often wonder how our customers rate the overall job that we do.

Of course, it is vital for any organization, public or private, to know how well we are serving our customers. For the second year in a row, as part of the City Council's push for greater accountability, we recently commissioned a well-respected polling firm to ask residents what they think of our services and how we deliver them. Here are some of the highlights of that survey:

Nearly nine (9) out of ten (10) residents (88%) are either “very” or “somewhat” satisfied with “the job the City of Ventura is doing to provide city services.” In fact, more than four (4) out of ten (42%) are “very” satisfied, a big jump from the 33% in that category last year.

This general satisfaction was borne out when we asked about thirty-one (31) individual service areas. Every one of them had a level of at least 65% satisfaction, with most services topping 85%. In most cases, that level had either held steady or increased, with several showing significant improvements, including: stormwater pollution management (perhaps a reflection of the City’s success in getting a $1 million grant to treat stormwater before it flows onto our Downtown beaches); flood control, recreation program for teens, recreation programs for seniors and maintenance of streets and roads – the last a particularly positive sign, given the high level of public clamor on that issue in recent years.

Residents also have a positive view of city government’s responsiveness and integrity. By a margin of 64% to 24%, residents say “city leaders can be counted on to make the right decisions on matters of local government.” When it comes to accountability, the ratio is much higher, 78% agree that the City is accountable to residents vs. 20% who disagree. On perhaps the most crucial of all, 85% say they “trust the City of Ventura” vs. 13% who don’t.

Not that we can’t improve – both perceptions and performance. Only 15% “strongly agree” that “the City government listens to its residents when making important decisions (48% “somewhat agree”)”. Despite the failure of P6, 63% want to increase the level of funding for public safety – and most support promoting economic development (72%), spending reserves (52%) and even going back to the voters again (68%).

The entire 88-page report, which was summarized at the December 18 Council meeting, is available on our website at:

http://www.cityofventura.net/residents_surveys/2006