Vista

A group of slow-growth advocates on Thursday filed a petition with the Vista city clerk calling for a ballot initiative that would cap residential development.

The initiative, sponsored by Vistans for Honest Government, proposes an annual building limit of 569 housing units.

If the city clerk determines that the petition, bearing more than 5,000 signatures, has enough valid signatures to qualify for the ballot, the City Council will have the option of either adopting the measure as law or setting a special election, probably for sometime in March.

Patsy Filo, a leader of Vistans for Honest Government, said she doubts that the council will approve the initiative, but feels that it would stand a good chance with the voters.

Although a similar slow-growth measure in Carlsbad was defeated earlier this month, Filo said the Vista initiative will prove more palatable. The Carlsbad proposal, she said, “was not put together as well as ours.”

The slow-growth initiative is not the first such campaign by Vistans for Honest Government. Earlier this month, an effort by the group to abolish the city’s redevelopment agency was defeated. In addition, Filo and two other slow-growth advocates failed to win seats on the council in the Nov. 4 election.

Nonetheless, Filo said such recent setbacks would not have a bearing on the outcome of the slow-growth measure.

“I don’t think it has anything to do with how we finished in the race,” she said, adding that the city needs growth controls because of crowding in schools and on the roads.