Growth Is Focus of La Canada’s Election to Fill 3 Council Seats

La Canada Flintridge residents will vote Tuesday to fill three of five City Council seats in an election in which seven candidates are debating the city’s growth in general and a proposed retail shopping complex in particular.

On one side are Planning Commissioner Judy Breitman, real estate investor Elizabeth Blackwelder and architect Peter Kudrave, who strongly oppose the present design for the La Canada Village retail complex. Although they agree that the city would benefit from commercial redevelopment along Foothill Boulevard, they have said residents want a smaller shopping center.

On the other side are incumbent Joan Feehan, former Councilman Jack Hastings and Public Safety Commissioner Jim Edwards, whose campaigns have emphasized their leadership and experience. Their longstanding support of the proposed Sport Chalet shopping center has prompted critics to label them old-guard representatives of pro-growth.

The seventh candidate, dentist Melvin Ricks, appears to straddle the line. A maverick candidate, he is trying to use the public outcry over the Sport Chalet issue to his advantage by offering, if elected, to streamline the city planning process for future redevelopment.

The other incumbents--Councilman O. Warren Hillgren and Mayor Edmund Krause--are not seeking reelection.

The emergence of a group calling itself Citizens for Responsible Leadership appears to have drawn the dividing lines in the race. Only Edwards, Feehan and Hastings appeared March 20 at that group’s forum. There they answered a set of prepared questions taken from a survey that the group sent to more than 6,000 residents, gauging citizen response on a number of community issues.

The four other candidates refused to attend, calling the meeting a closed-door inquest and saying the group is biased.

Citizens for Responsible Leadership has since taken out a full-page advertisement in a community newspaper, criticizing the four for their refusal to participate.

According to chairman Sid McVicker, Citizens for Responsible Leadership is an informal group of about 80 people whose purpose is to keep the public informed on important issues in the campaign.

Critics of the group have said most of the people listed on its letterhead were actively involved in earlier campaigns for two candidates.

“They all endorse Feehan and Hastings and support the Sport Chalet,” said Councilman Chris Valente, one of two council members elected two years ago in a campaign based on removing the city’s old leadership. “In fairness, they should come out and say they are pro-Sport Chalet.”

Members of the group have said they find the criticism surprising.

“The pro-development label has us in hysterics,” said Sue Schecter, a member of the organization. “When these people make these blatant remarks, they are either playing to the audience or making them without much forethought.”

McVicker and Schecter have acknowledged that most of the members have worked together in the past and have gotten to know Feehan and Hastings professionally and socially. Schecter said she considers this a strength of the group. Members’ experience working closely with candidates over the years makes the group a more effective barometer of their capability for effective leadership, according to Schecter.

At the group’s March 20 meeting, Hastings, Edwards and Feehan expressed support for the proposed Sport Chalet center. Each has acknowledged complaints from some residents that the retail complex would be too large. But all three have said they believe that the developer should be allowed to move forward with the project, first suggested five years ago by Sport Chalet owner Norbert Olberz.

“I support the Sport Chalet in the form it was passed by the Planning Commission,” Hastings said.

The continuing controversy over the proposed La Canada Village shopping center has polarized the candidates and threatened to obscure all other issues in the often-turbulent campaign.

The $25-million project would permit construction of a large retail complex on 11.75 acres at Angeles Crest Highway and Foothill Boulevard. In addition to the Sport Chalet, the 163,995-square-foot shopping center would include a large restaurant, a market and a number of shops.

Arguments over the city’s general plan have become a consistent line of demarcation separating the candidates. Breitman, Kudrave and Blackwelder, who have called for downsizing the Sport Chalet project, have said the city needs a new master plan. Edwards, Feehan and Hastings support the existing general plan.

Adopted in March, 1980, the general plan sets guidelines for land-use, traffic flow, housing and community development. In accordance with state law, the city may opt to make the plan more specific, setting design criteria for specific areas of the city, such as the Foothill Boulevard retail corridor.

Blackwelder, Breitman and Kudrave have said the acrimonious debate over the size of the Sport Chalet development would never have become an issue had the criteria in the general plan been sufficiently specific.

“As an architect and a developer, I favor the development of the Sport Chalet property,” Kudrave said. “However, no three individuals predisposed toward unrestrained development should have the power to unilaterally shape the future of our city. The recent controversy clearly demonstrates the failure of our town’s outdated zoning and the inadequacy of its general plan.”

“I do not believe our city plan is focused enough,” said Blackwelder, who is president of the Trails Council. If elected, Blackwelder has promised to re-evaluate the document “to protect our city from further harmful development.”

Feehan, Hastings and Edwards have said they believe that it is already a clear guide to sensible city growth and redevelopment, designed to allow builders and redevelopers some latitude in their designs.

“We don’t need a new general plan,” Hastings said. Instead, he said the city needs to draft implementation standards to reach those goals that the plan sets forth. Hastings said the goals in the document are as valid today as when it was written.

Ricks, the seventh candidate, has consistently avoided identification with the candidate groups. In his campaign, he has called for a city government that is more sensitive to the rights of residents and more responsive to their wishes. If elected, Ricks has promised to improve communication between the council and city commissioners, and to make it easier for homeowners to make improvements to their property.

The Sport Chalet was not his primary motivation in running, and he has said publicly: “I’m on both sides of the issue.” Ricks said he is running for office to clear his reputation after a lengthy series of legal squabbles with the city.

In a press release, Ricks said: “I am running for City Council in order to expose the gross injustice that was heaped upon me and my family. I have nothing to hide. My main reason for running is to make sure this never happens to anyone else.”

Ricks has been the subject of several city lawsuits stemming from alleged building code violations on his property. Ricks contends that he is completely innocent of any wrongdoing, and has said he believes that some members of city government have “deliberately plotted to destroy my good name.”

“Give them the brush” has become Ricks’ campaign slogan, painted on his truck and imprinted on the toothbrushes he hands out at public appearances.