Planners Balk at Valencia Homes Pact

In a blow to plans for a 4,378-unit series of housing developments in Valencia, the Los Angeles County Regional Planning Commission voted Thursday to recommend rejection of a contract that would guarantee the project’s developer the right to build for 16 years or more.

Dale Poe Development Corp. is seeking the contract with the county to strengthen its chances to borrow money for capital improvements for the project, which the county already approved in 1985.

But Thursday’s 5-0 vote leaves the project “up in the air,” said David H. Breier, an attorney representing Poe. The county Board of Supervisors has final authority over granting the contract.

Poe will need financing for nearly $12 million in improvements in the next year, mostly for the widening of two bridges, Breier said. The project is planned for an area near the Golden State Freeway and McBean Parkway.

Despite the county’s previous approval of a permit to build the development, lenders could be uncomfortable if the county does not fully commit itself to the project, Breier said.

Members of the commission thought the contract was too open-ended, said Donald Culbertson, head of zoning changes for the commission.

Nor did the commissioners want to make an agreement before the county has approved specific plans for the housing tracts, he said. Such plans, known as “tract maps,” outline how the project will satisfy such health and safety concerns as sewage and traffic, he said. Right now, only about a third of the Poe project’s tract maps have been tentatively approved, he said.

Commission members “don’t want to give somebody a blank check for the projects if all the tract maps haven’t been approved,” Culbertson said.

Breier said the commission’s vote was a mixed message from the county because the Board of Supervisors in 1986 approved the idea of making such long-term agreements. But developers don’t know how they can persuade the county to agree to the contracts, he said.

Construction of the first phase of the development was expected to begin within a year, but the collapse of the proposed contract with the county could cause delays, Breier said.