Developers Uneasy About New Approach by Planners

Developers are cautiously waiting to see how long their Santa Clarita Valley projects will be delayed now that Los Angeles County planning commissioners have promised to be stricter about examining the effects of home building in the area.

Some builders fear the new approach by the Los Angeles County Regional Planning Commission will favor smaller projects with fewer residential units over larger, planned developments. Smaller does not always mean better, the developers say, and rejecting large projects just because of their size could lead to piecemeal growth that, in the long run, will do the valley more harm than good.

Some builders say the commissioners’ approach, spelled out last month in a resolution that vowed to enforce development ordinances more vigorously, is too stringent. They say it will pit developer against developer in a region where building opportunities have been plentiful.

City Not Satisfied

City of Santa Clarita officials, meanwhile, say the resolution lacks teeth.

Developers and observers of the local building scene do agree on one thing. They say it is difficult to predict how the commission’s resolution--a mere 280 words--will affect the lives of the 120,000 residents of the Santa Clarita Valley. So far, the resolution has put into limbo proposals to build about 32,000 homes and apartments in the valley.

“There is tremendous uncertainty,” said Connie Worden, a Santa Clarita planning commissioner.

Mike Kotch, president of SCOPE, a citizens watchdog group that promotes what it calls responsible growth in the valley, said: “I think everybody is uncertain, both within the development industry and among the residents of the Santa Clarita Valley.”

The Regional Planning Commission took the action because it is facing a backlog of 29 applications from developers who want to amend the area’s general plan to build a variety of commercial, industrial and residential projects. The general plan is the area’s blueprint for development and must be amended if a proposed project deviates widely from land uses in the plan. Changing farmland into a site for condominiums, for example, typically requires an amendment.

The backlog formed last year when the county Department of Regional Planning stopped processing amendments to study how the general plan was being used and how it affected the valley.

When the study was presented to the commissioners in April, the results were startling.

Population Projection

The study found that if all pending plan amendments were approved, the Santa Clarita Valley’s population in a few years would surpass 270,000 people--the population projected for the year 2010, overtaxing roads and city services.

A few of the proposals before the commission call for industrial or commercial projects but most envision residential developments ranging from 21 units to more than 11,000. About 32,000 homes and apartments would be built if all the amendments were approved.

Robert Lacoss, a spokesman for Santa Fe Development & Mortgage Corp., said he hopes the simultaneous review of the 29 projects does not lead the commission to favor smaller developments over larger ones. It would be human nature, he said, to lean toward what appears to be a less complicated proposal.

His concern is understandable. Santa Fe, a Newport Beach firm, needs a plan amendment because it wants to build 2,131 houses and condominiums on land where the general plan now allows only 300 homes. The development would be located near the Antelope Valley Freeway and Via Princessa Road on the southern border of Santa Clarita.

“I hope the result of this isn’t to encourage piecemeal design and discourage large-scale, well-planned communities,” Lacoss said. “It’s pitting developer against developer.”

Comprehensive Approach

Worden, the Santa Clarita planning commissioner, agreed that it would be better to have larger well-planned projects than a hodgepodge of smaller ones that do not take a comprehensive approach toward roads, schools, park sites or other civic needs.

Large planned communities in Valencia are spared some of the traffic congestion that plagues the eastern part of the valley where growth was haphazard, she said.

Many developers also fear that the commission’s new review procedure will add more lengthy delays to an already cumbersome development process, said Richard Wirth, a spokesman for the Building Industry Assn.

The largest project put on hold by the commission is the 11,000-home North River development in Valencia proposed by Newhall Land & Farming Co. Gloria Casvin, a vice president of the company, said delays are always unwelcome because they can inflate costs.

“The worst thing for us is uncertainty,” Casvin said. Newhall Land had hoped the commission would hold a hearing on North River early next year.

The commission’s resolution will not halt all development in the valley, however. It does not apply to projects needing zone changes, which are different from general plan amendments.

Moreover, some critics wonder how well the commission will evaluate the pending amendments because it did not create new criteria to judge their value. In fact, the commissioners rejected a proposal by Commissioner Clinton C. Ternstrom to do so.

Essentially, the commissioners promised in a “resolution of intent” that they would more rigorously apply existing standards used to evaluate the merits of plan amendments. Commission President Betty Fisher said the panel is warning builders that it will be more stringent in granting amendments than it was in the past.

But Santa Clarita City Councilwoman Jan Heidt said the commissioners erred by not creating standards to judge how changing the general plan affects roads, schools and the quality of life in the Santa Clarita Valley.

Kotch, president of SCOPE, agreed that the commission should have backed up its resolution with specific new guidelines on the amendments. For now, he said, everyone will have to wait to see how county staffers implement the commission’s wishes.