A 102-page writ filed on Christmas Eve is seeking to stop the city of Santa Clarita’s approval of the Wiley Canyon mixed-use project, a plan the City Council signed off on in November.
That approval, according to the writ seeking injunctive relief, “followed a flawed administrative process” that violated the state’s environmental, planning and zoning laws, as well as the city’s own municipal code.
Jason Crawford, the city’s director of community development, said Monday the city could not comment on pending litigation.
The plan made for the former Smiser Mule Ranch calls for 232 condos in two-story buildings, and 120 senior assisted-living units to be built west of Wiley Canyon Road, between Calgrove Boulevard and Hawkbryn Avenue.
The senior units are coming via a 140,000-square-foot facility, which would also have 9,000 square feet, or less than a quarter-acre, of commercial space. The plan also calls for eight accessory dwelling units, a first of its kind, in terms of housing plans with ADUs, or granny flats, as part of the proposal.
“The project was approved despite undisputed evidence that it conflicts with the city’s adopted circulation policies, relies on an infeasible roadway configuration and exposes sensitive residential populations to unmitigated freeway noise, air quality and safety impacts,” according to the filing by R. Weston Monroe, a member of the Calgrove Corridor Coalition and an opponent of the project who spoke at several city hearings on the plan.
Monroe’s news release echoed concerns some shared during the public-approval process, which expressed concern about traffic circulation, particularly in the event of an emergency in the area considered part of a very-high fire severity zone.
There were a number of supporters who spoke in favor of the project, many citing the infrastructure being planned as a welcome addition for the surrounding neighborhood. Some complained during the hearings that, being Interstate 5-adjacent, the surrounding streets are frequently used as a pull-over spot for activities like dumping.
Some lamented the lack of sidewalks and felt the additional road changes would improve the area’s safety.
The project was approved at its fifth hearing, which city officials said they were required to do under a state law that limits the number of hearings a city can hold on a plan to five, in order to eliminate what legislators perceived as municipal delays to more housing being built.
In a news release Monday, Monroe said the city keeps approving “‘mixed use’ development that allows four-story buildings, despite inadequate commercial floor space to meet this criterion,” a complaint also recently shared by Planning Commissioner Lisa Eichman and Councilwoman Marsha McLean.
McLean said the project was significantly better than the first couple of plans for the former Smiser property.
A previous version called for 600 housing units, and planners said density bonuses could have meant the land qualified for more than 1,200 units.
