Mark Lee, managing partner at Peak-Las Positas Partners, first submitted an application to the City of Santa Barbara back in 1999 for his Veronica Meadows residential subdivision near Arroyo Burro Creek.
Although Lee drew sympathy and admiration from city council members during the Jan. 24 meeting, it looks as though he’ll have to wait until at least June for the project to move forward. His development, which includes the construction of a bridge encroaching onto part of a city-owned park, along with a design for a cul-de-sac road, was one of the early agenda items of the nearly five-hour event that was segmented into afternoon and evening sessions.
Veronica Springs, a proposed 25-unit community looked as though it would be adopted in December 2011 after council made an amendment in November to Santa Barbara’s Municipal Code 28.50, the “Veronica Meadows Specific Plan.” However, the adoption was moved to a future agenda so that all seven members would be present in order to obtain the necessary five votes to approve the ordinance. The California Coastal Commission (CCC) also introduced modifications to provide more protection for the environmental resources in the coastal zone, which included a larger creek buffer and monitoring of the uses allowed inside the buffer.
City staff believed it was important to garner public opinion concerning possible changes to the popular site, and proposed placing the project’s construction on the ballot for a special election in June, in which the applicant agreed to foot the bill. “This would have the full attention of our electorate,” said Grant House, Ordinance Committee chair, in support of bringing it before the public in the upcoming election. Even though there was some debate whether to add it to the ballot in June or in November, the motion passed – including part B, which asked that council wait on amending the “Veronica Meadows Specific Plan” including the CCC’s directives until the results of the election. Recently elected councilwoman Cathy Murillo and councilman Bendy White were the naysayers in a 5 to 2 vote of approval.
The evening session addressed a sensitive issue regarding the safety of residents in the City’s Mesa neighborhood, not far from the proposed Veronica Springs development.
“We urge you to protect our safety,” said one citizen during the public-comment segment concerning State Route 225 that, according to many of her neighbors in the audience, has long been a road that drivers travel at excessively dangerous speeds. The Public Works staff and Caltrans (which currently owns the 4.6 mile stretch) have been under negotiations for the state agency to relinquish the road to the city, in the hope that it will take additional measures to slow down the flow of traffic.
However, because of prohibitive costs such as repairing a retaining wall on Las Positas Road near Cliff Drive to the estimated tune of $800,000 and other future maintenance concerns, the council was not so eager to claim the route. “Now’s not the right time to accept this,” explained mayor pro tempore Frank Hotchkiss, referring to the city’s current poor economic climate. Except for Finance Committee chair Dale Francisco’s lone dissenting vote, council voted 6 to 1, to hold off on acquiring the highway, giving public works the authority to come up with a better deal.