Residents Defend Golf Course in Azusa

A proposed development that would add 4,300 people and two lakes to Azusa’s northwest corner, but take away the golf course that is the neighborhood’s major attraction, has run into strong opposition from residents.

Azusa Greens Golf Course and a neighboring rock quarry along the San Gabriel River would give way to 1,540 new town houses, condominiums and apartments, some office and industrial buildings and 51 acres of recreational lakes, under the proposal that made its debut before the Planning Commission on Wednesday.

The commission postponed until Sept. 18 its decisions on a general plan amendment, zoning changes and approval of a draft environmental impact report for the unnamed project.

Critics at the three-hour public hearing said the environmental impact report failed to address some of the effects of the development, such as its impact on school enrollment and public safety services.

Johnny E. Johnson, developer and major owner of the 150-acre site, said the golf course that now encircles clusters of houses and condominiums near Sierra Madre Avenue no longer supports itself. It is open to the public but is used heavily only on weekends, mostly by out-of-town golfers, he said.

“It was laid out in 1964 with the ultimate view that the land could be developed for residential use,” said Glen Watson, Johnson’s attorney and business partner.

Watson and Johnson said the golf course’s financial decline coincides with the end of rock and gravel mining in the adjoining quarry.

Johnson said he is sole owner of Azusa Greens. He, Watson and another partner, Orrie Rodeffer, jointly own the rest of the land proposed for development, including the quarry that is leased to Owl Rock Co., Johnson said. The partners have a 20-year-old agreement with the Los Angeles County Flood Control District and the city of Azusa to turn the two gravel pits into water conservation spreading grounds that will replenish area wells, Johnson said.

Johnson’s proposed development would create parklands and bike paths around the two lakes that will form when water is diverted to the pits from the San Gabriel River.

Johnson said he hopes development will begin in two to three years and will continue over 10 or 12 years. The golf course would be phased out gradually, he said, beginning with a southeast portion that is scheduled for construction of town houses. Plans call for 30-foot greenbelts between new rows of housing units. Most of the golf fairways’ trees would be preserved, he said.

Multiple-family residential areas are planned for most of the golf course area, in a small section between the two lakes and in a southwest section that borders an industrial area.

One small area is slated to be a neighborhood shopping center and the southwestern section of the golf course is planned light manufacturing.

A spokesman for American Cyanamid Co., who said a chemical plant operates 24 hours a day at 1001 Todd Ave. next to the project area, protested that placing 730 residential units nearby would be bad zoning.

Twenty residents who spoke at the commission meeting, many representing homeowners’ associations, asked who would maintain the proposed greenbelts, what recreational uses are planned for the lakes, where visitors to the lakes would park their cars, and how schools would handle an anticipated 500 new students.

Bob Gray, a member of the Board of Education of the Azusa Unified School District, said all the elementary schools in the city’s northern area are filled to capacity because of other recent development. The district has no money to bus students to schools in the city’s southern area, which have empty classrooms, and it has no money to build a new school, he said.

“The 500 students from (Johnson’s) development would fill a school larger than any we have now,” Gray said.

Planning Commission members asked that the residents’ questions be addressed in the draft environmental report when it is presented again at the Sept. 18 meeting.

The environmental impact report is required when general plans and zoning are changed. The proposed general plan amendment would change the golf course and quarry areas from community facilities and conservation zoning to medium- and high-density residential, commercial and industrial zoning.