Panel to Study Relocation of Skills Center : Pasadena: The citizens committee will review plans to put the center on a city-owned site in a largely residential area.

Mayor Jess Hughston on Tuesday appointed a 10-person citizens committee to study a controversial proposal to build a permanent home for Pasadena City College’s 22-year-old Community Skills Center at a city-owned site in East Pasadena.

The skills center, which provides job training and English-language instruction, is now at McKinley Junior High school. The plan for its relocation will also be scrutinized by city staff members.

The Board of Directors voted 6 to 0 to consider the matter after hundreds of skills center supporters appeared at Tuesday night’s board meeting, many wearing green buttons reading, “C.S.C. Just Say Yes.”

Hughston abstained, since he is an instructor at Pasadena City College, which plays a part in operating the center.

But a number of people who live near the proposed site also showed up to protest having the skills center in their largely residential area.

“We do not object to the skills center; we do not object to the people who go to the skills center,” said Pat Rowan, of the Daisy Villa Homeowners Assn. “But every time we say we don’t want the traffic, we don’t want the environmental impact, we are treated as if we are attacking motherhood.”

Rowan said more than 800 neighbors have signed petitions against the skills center, compared to only 118 residents who have signed petitions supporting it.

In response to the homeowners’ concerns, directors also instructed the committee and staff to investigate building homes on the 8.5-acre site.

The site, at 3000 East Orange Grove Blvd., lies underneath Southern California Edison power lines, east of Sierra Madre Boulevard. It is a narrow strip of land that stretches from Orange Grove south to Foothill Boulevard.

Plans call for two 25,000-square-foot buildings on the site and a parking lot for up to 600 cars. A student cafeteria and a child development center would also be included.

College officials said building costs have not yet been determined. They hope that state funds can be used to finance the construction.

About 7,000 adults attend the skills center each year. “Literally thousands of lives have been changed,” said Jack Scott, president of Pasadena City College.

The center is a joint project of the city, the college, which staffs and operates it, and the Pasadena Unified School District, which has provided a site for the last 10 years at McKinley Junior High at 325 S. Oak Knoll Ave.

However, the district has informed college officials that it may soon reclaim the McKinley site for use as a middle school.

City officials turned to the East Pasadena site because it is the only publicly owned piece of land that can accommodate the skills center, City Director Kathryn Nack said.

“We have been looking for eight years,” Nack said. “Each (of the three agencies) has scoured their property and has not been able to come up with anything of that size.”

But resident Kenneth Moye said the skills center would create traffic problems, with up to 4,000 auto trips a day through the area.

Other residents said they feared that the skills center will need to expand in the future and that the residential land surrounding the site would be converted to parking lots and fast food restaurants to accommodate the students. Some complained that they would lose their back-yard view of open space.

But after hearing their opposition, City Director John Crowley appeared to lose patience with the residents, saying, “I’m getting a little bit of a sense that you don’t want any change at all.”

Opposition from neighborhood groups put a stop to previous city development plans for the site as an auto mall and a retail store.

The current proposal will be studied until February, 1991, when final hearings are planned.

Those appointed to the citizens committee are Robert Ahfeldt, Vincent DeStefano, Christopher Love, Lucille Lyon, Tom May, Michael McEvoy, Robert Monk, Kenneth Moye, Tim Price and John Takvorian.