2 Simi Valley Ballot Measures Sought : Slow-Growthers File Initiative Petitions

Proponents of slower development in Simi Valley filed petitions with the city clerk Tuesday to place two initiatives on the city’s November ballot.

If 4,000 of the more than 6,000 signatures on the petitions are validated, voters will have a chance to adopt the initiatives, which would restrict hillside development and overall residential construction in Simi Valley, a city of 93,000.

One measure would prohibit the grading of slopes of 10% or more for industrial or commercial development and slopes of 20% or more for residential development.

Housing Restrictions

The other would place year-to-year controls on the rate, distribution, quality and type of housing development in the city to prevent air pollution and traffic congestion and to preserve “the character of the community.” The initiative, however, includes no specific number of new housing units permitted each year.

The petitions were circulated by Citizens for Managed Growth in Hillside Protection, which was formed by a group of Simi Valley residents in February to prevent “urban blight,” member David Penner said.

The group also has asked the Simi Valley City Council to place on the November ballot a third initiative that would modify some of the wording in the two initiatives sought in the petition drives. The council, on its own, is empowered to place initiatives on the ballot.

The proposed modifications in the third initiative would make exceptions, suggested by the council, for projects such as housing for senior citizens.

But Jennifer Shaw, one of the group’s leaders, predicted that council members instead will “write their own” initiative and place it on the ballot. Council members would not discuss their plans.

Petitions Criticized

After members of the citizens group presented the third initiative at a council meeting Monday, their petitions were criticized by several speakers, who said people were confused by the proposals.

“We have signatures of 6,000 people who really don’t know what they signed,” Simi Valley resident Bill Nelson said.

In the five-week petition drive, about 6,500 signatures were obtained on the petitions to limit hillside development, and 6,300 signatures on the petitions to restrict general development.

“As far as I’m concerned, this is the most important issue that has hit Simi Valley,” Councilwoman Vicky Howard said.

But Councilman Glen McAdoo called the initiatives “bad law” and predicted they would “divide the community.”

McAdoo said Simi Valley, at the easternmost edge of Ventura County, should give one more chance to the existing Hillside Performance Standard, which now regulates hillside grading and prohibits construction on slopes of 20% or greater.

“Let’s revise it and come up with something that we can all live with,” he said. “Let’s work together.”

Shaw, however, referring to the existing regulations, said there are “so many loopholes in them that they virtually don’t exist.”