NEWBURY PARK : Townhome Project Receives Panel’s OK

A 13-townhome development planned for an overgrown Newbury Park property was approved by Thousand Oaks planners despite concerns that the complex would have no place for children to play.

The project, which aims to attract middle-income families, will occupy a two-acre lot near Haigh Road.

At a public hearing Monday night, planners spent several hours trying to decide whether the number of duplex and triplex buildings should be reduced to make room for a play area.

While planning commissioners expressed concern that the three- and four-bedroom townhomes needed more than a narrow grass strip for the development’s estimated 25 children, they also had to weigh the pleas of neighbors who wanted to limit noise in the area.

After a vote to eliminate one of the 13 townhome units failed, Commissioners Forrest Frields, Mervyn Kopp and Irving Wasserman voted to approve the project without an expanded play area. Commissioners Linda Parks and Marilyn Carpenter voted against the development.

Noting that a similar project was approved at the previous week’s meeting, Parks said she believed the commission was not adequately looking at the needs of families.

“If we had more mothers on this commission, I don’t think the votes would be coming out like this,” she said.

But Kopp said he believed Parks and Carpenter were looking for excuses to deny developments.

“It would be nice to ask the developer to come in and provide all kinds of things,” Kopp said. “But at some point that just becomes unreasonable.”

Construction on the project is expected to begin at the end of the summer and will take about a year to complete, the developer said.