The Continuing Hurrah : Simi Valley’s Happy Leader Wants to Stay Put for Now Despite Criticism

Simi Valley Mayor Greg Stratton, a 12-year veteran of the City Council, is frequently asked if he is interested in running for higher office.

His answer is usually the same: “I’m very happy as mayor.”

Stratton admitted that he toyed with the idea of running for county supervisor last year.

“If I had wanted to be a supervisor, I think I could have been,” he said.

But he said he had two children in college at the time.

The job “doesn’t pay that well,” he said. Supervisors earn about $50,000 a year, considerably less than Stratton’s salary as manager of the computer software department at Teledyne Systems in Chatsworth. He also earns $660 a month as a council member.

And he is already immersed in his job as mayor, he said. In addition to preparing for the council’s Monday night meetings, Stratton said he is usually busy attending civic functions or ribbon-cutting ceremonies around town. He says he spends 30 to 40 hours a week on city business.

“My wife (Ede) kisses me goodby on Monday mornings and says, ‘I’ll see you Friday night,’ ” he said. “At times, I think she feels like a widow.”

Stratton, 45, first ran for City Council in 1979 when members Bill Carpenter and Ginger Gherardi were recalled. Stratton said the two were singled out for raising sewer fees, which did not please residents.

“It was not fair,” he said. “The whole council wanted to increase the fees.”

He said the governing panel was afraid at the time that recently passed Proposition 13, which placed a ceiling on property taxes, would wipe out the sanitation district’s revenue.

Moreover, he said there was a strong movement in the community to allow as much development as possible.

Stratton, a member of a neighborhood council at the time, said that prompted him to jump in the council race.

Once elected, Stratton immediately went to work helping to establish guidelines in the city’s General Plan that restricted development in outlying areas. He said the result was that several large subdivisions were significantly scaled back.

“For those who think there has been too much development, they don’t understand what could have been,” he said.

Too much development is what some of Stratton’s critics say is the biggest problem facing the city now. They said their quality of life is threatened by new housing tracts and a 950,000-square-foot shopping mall.

They said Stratton is no longer interested in controlling growth and has little concern for the environment.

“He’s absolutely pro-growth . . . and completely ignores environmental issues,” said John Etter, an environmental activist and 19-year resident of the city. “He’s become too focused on revenue and on Simi Valley becoming a large metropolis.”

Etter said he is convinced that Stratton wants Simi Valley to become as visible as possible and that he wants to win over developers because of his own future political aspirations.

“He’s got his sight set on something higher,” Etter said.

Stratton denies the charges, saying he was a strong supporter of the city’s 1986 slow-growth ordinance. The voter-approved ordinance limits the number of building permits to less than 200 a year.

He said he was also instrumental in getting the city to work with the Rancho Simi Recreation and Parks District to acquire a 183-acre parcel, once the site of the former Corriganville movie ranch at the western edge of the city, to develop as a park.

He also takes credit for helping forge a complex development agreement involving entertainer Bob Hope that would preserve more than 10,000 acres of Hope’s mountain property in the Santa Monica and Santa Susana mountains. The deal is contingent on the County Board of Supervisors approving a 2,600-house development on nearby Ahmanson Ranch.

But Etter said Stratton also supports a developer’s proposal to build 1,400 residences in three vacant canyons north of Simi Valley and another’s plans to build a regional mall in the hills north of the Simi Valley Freeway. Etter said that the city doesn’t have the population to support the mall and that it will only hurt local businesses.

Stratton said the Whiteface project north of the city would be a senior citizens community, which he said is needed because of the city’s increasing number of older residents. He said a senior citizens community brings far fewer traffic problems than other developments.

As for the mall, Stratton said the city needs the sales tax revenue it would bring. He cited recent statistics that show that the city experienced a 20% decline in revenue in the last six months, while Thousand Oaks, which has a mall, saw a 1% drop.

“I think our community needs a mall,” he said. “Obviously, there are the financial aspects of it. But a mall is also an important part of a city. It is the downtown of modern America.”

Stratton said he simply disagrees with those who want the city to remain as it is.

“Development is going to occur,” he said. “If it doesn’t, the city is going to dry up and die.”

Despite Stratton’s views, Nancy Bender, executive director of the Chamber of Commerce, said he is by no means focused solely on development.

“I wouldn’t call him pro-growth,” she said. “I would say he’s pro-Simi Valley. He looks at what the benefit would be to the entire community.”

Bender said the chamber feels that the present city growth ordinance is too stringent. But she said that is a result of the entire council, not the mayor.

Bender, who served on the council from 1980 to 1982, said the reason Stratton has done well with voters is “because he’s very open-minded. And that’s all people ever want.”

Councilman Bill Davis said he thinks that Stratton’s greatest strength is his handling of the city’s budget. Simi Valley has about $13 million in reserves, more than any other city in the county.

“He enjoys sitting down with a calculator and going through the budget,” Davis said. “I wish for God’s sake he was working on the state budget. The Legislature would not be having the budget problems that they are having.”

Former Councilman Glen McAdoo, who often argued with Stratton over financial issues, took a different view.

“I didn’t find Greg to be any better at the budget than anybody else,” said McAdoo, adding that the whole council was fairly conservative on fiscal issues.

But McAdoo said he felt that at times Stratton was too conservative, like the time he opposed lending the Public Cemetery District in the city $350,000 to upgrade its burial grounds.

Stratton objected to the loan because the district had not come up with a plan to reimburse the city. The district got the money anyway.

Others complain that Stratton has placed too much emphasis on building upscale housing developments such as Wood Ranch, rather than more affordable housing.

Stratton, who lives in Wood Ranch, where houses start at about $300,000, said he believes that Simi Valley is still more affordable than many other cities in the region. He said he also believes that projects such as Wood Ranch have made the city more attractive.

Stratton said he is satisfied with the way the city has developed and the role he has played in shaping it.

People first moved to the city because it was cheap, he said, and now they move to the city because of the quality of life.

“I know people who have moved out here from the San Fernando Valley who think they’ve come to God’s country,” he said.

Supervisor Vicky Howard, a longtime friend of Stratton’s, said he has a strong political base in Simi Valley and eventually will run for higher office.

“He may deny this, but I always felt that he would,” Howard said. “I think he might eventually go for something on the state or federal level.”

Lately, some have speculated that he might run for the state Senate. A panel appointed by the state Supreme Court has recommended new legislative boundaries that would exclude the home of Sen. Ed Davis (R-Valencia) from the 19th District, which would include Simi Valley, Thousand Oaks, Moorpark and Oxnard as well as parts of western Los Angeles County.

“If an opportunity came up, I would have to take a look at it,” he said. But after hesitating for a moment, he added: “Right now, I don’t see any opportunities.”

Stratton said he thinks that his good friend, Assemblywoman Cathie Wright (R-Simi Valley), a former mayor of the city, may run for the job.

“I don’t want to get in a blood bath with Cathie,” he said.

Neither is Stratton interested in challenging other political allies, including Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley), also a former mayor of the city.

But Howard said she thinks that one day Gallegly might hand off his job to Stratton.

“That’s very possible,” she said. “I’ve always thought that might be the case.”

In fact, Stratton succeeded Gallegly once before--he replaced the congressman as mayor in 1986. The voters reelected Stratton to a two-year term as mayor last year.

Stratton said there is only one higher office that he would definitely be interested in.

“If Bush decides to dump Quayle as his vice president, I’m available,” he said.