The Santa Clarita City Council frequently hears from local residents on issues pertaining to economic development, public safety and transportation — and sometimes a combination therein, during its biweekly Tuesday meetings.
While the City Council is on hiatus until Aug. 25, city staff are working to develop the plans and goals they set, with three tending to dominate the discussion more than any other.
A number of questions remain from property owners regarding Placerita Canyon concerns, the Santa Clarita Courthouse and the Valencia Town Center property, which also have been mentioned by residents and the City Council as priorities.
But on three specific issues, the City Council requested staff to report back with some potential solutions, which are all expected to be part of the conversation this fall at City Hall: helping businesses hurt by a Bouquet Canyon Road closure; e-vehicle safety; and affordable housing.
Bouquet Canyon
In Feburary, the city of Santa Clarita shut down Bouquet Canyon Road for 11 months to facilitate its re-alignment, part of the work necessary to make possible a 375-home Lennar project just up the road. It was a plan the City Council approved in November 2020.
The impact on two commercial and business centers just south of the closure, north of Plum Canyon Road, has been nothing short of devastating, business owners say.
Some have reported losses in the tens of thousands of dollars. Another said they had to throw away a storeroom of food. A longtime pizzeria is looking to relocate because it can’t survive four more months at this rate.
The city has tried to help with social media videos as part of a “Shop Local” campaign, but at the end of the day, the convenience stores have said they need convenient access, and the restaurants want their foot traffic back.
After months of hearing residents’ concerns, the City Council ordered staff to look at financial assistance in July.
It’s not known when the issue will be brought up, but both Mayor Laurene Weste and Councilwoman Marsha McLean, who also were on the council in 2020, mentioned helping the local businesses first when asked about the priorities.
Weste mentioned the immediacy factor in helping the businesses that were hurting.
In terms of when it comes to the dais for council discussion, McLean said that would ultimately be up to the staff and when they would be ready to present options.
“We have discussed this at the last meeting, and staff is coming back with a report on how this might work — have the businesses show or prove their losses, and then have the developers step up, since the developer is going to be rewarded once the road is done,” McLean said Friday.
City Manager Ken Striplin said at that meeting that Lennar has failed to return any calls from city staff.
The nation’s second-largest home builder has not issued any public statements since a community meeting where the closure was announced and then roundly criticized by a city auditorium full of people at the Santa Clarita Activities Center in January.
A member of the city’s economic development staff indicated at a recent pop-up event that one possible scenario could be an assistance program similar to what was offered during the COVID-19 shutdown.
E-bike enforcement
Weste agreed that e-bike and e-motorcycle regulation was also a high priority for the council this fall, with residents spending hours over the past 18 months asking for everything from more signage to more rules to more enforcement.
The city has faced several lawsuits in that time related to various claims, including the signage and the city’s failure to regulate what goes on throughout its trail system.
Striplin has repeatedly mentioned enforcement operations with the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station and outreach with entities like local school districts, in order to address the concerns with e-bikes and e-motorcycles, which have included everything from speeding to vandalism to assault.
The city has asked the staff to come up with something more in the fall.
Weste hinted Thursday that it could look like more outreach in addition to an “accountability” portion
“We have some uninformed and pretty young e-bike users that need some training and understanding, and we need to come up with rules because this is a new phenomenon in our state, in our area, certainly,” Weste said. “We need to find ways to make it work safely for everybody, and get programs in place for training and understanding the rules of the road or the rules of the bike path, as it may be.”
Affordable housing
A formal policy on affordable housing is something the city has talked about for years, and city officials have identified increasing it as a necessity, as the state has continued to remove control from local government in housing decisions.
McLean said she hoped it would promote a better understanding of what affordable housing is and how it might help the community, as the topic is one that often draws backlash when it’s brought up locally.
“Regarding affordable housing, we need to define what is ‘affordable,’” she said Friday. “I think people have the wrong impression on what affordable (housing) … affordable to me means the average person who wants to be able to buy a home should be able to buy a home at a reasonable price — but people come out against affordable housing, and they just have the wrong impression of what that means.”
In terms of crafting the policy, the City Council approved a $129,200 contract for HR&A Advisors, N.Y.-based consultants who will draft the policy for council review, thanks to funding from the city’s allocation from the Los Angeles County Affordable Housing Solutions Agency.
The city asked the firm to assist with the development of an affordable housing strategy plan, creation of a developer grant program, and technical assistance related to LACAHSA program implementation and compliance requirements.
