24-Hour Supermarket Proposed for Simi Alarms Neighbors

Deborah Wilson’s back yard in Simi Valley is a tiny slice of Eden. Wilson often seeks refuge there, relaxing poolside on pink patio furniture, surrounded by a wall of 30-foot Italian cypress trees.

“This place is my pride and joy,” she said. “I feel safe and peaceful here.”

Now a proposal to build a $10-million, 24-hour supermarket on a vacant lot just beyond her patio has alarmed Wilson and many of her neighbors.

They fear such a project would destroy their neighborhood’s tranquillity--bringing noise, crime and litter, and destroying their property values.

“When I think of it, it really chokes me up,” Wilson said. “The stress I have to go through, thinking about crime, it’s almost too much.”

Twice in 10 years the city has rejected commercial projects proposed for the grassy lot at the intersection of Alamo Street and Sycamore Drive near the Simi Valley Freeway.

But last month the Planning Commission decided that a market would benefit most city residents.

Despite opposition from a crowd of nearly 100 residents, the panel voted 3 to 1 to build a Smith’s Food & Drug Center. And it agreed to change the land’s zoning, which allowed as many as 60 condominiums, to permit the commercial development.

On Monday, the proposal goes to the City Council for final consideration. A 344-page staff report was distributed several days earlier than usual to give the council time to prepare for what promises to be a heated debate.

Councilwoman Sandi Webb said although she has not decided whether to support the proposal, she is dismayed that some residents fear a market would increase crime in their neighborhood.

“I feel a little sad when people want us to deny a project for that reason,” she said. “Crime is something we just won’t allow anywhere, period.”

Councilman Bill Davis said he plans to listen carefully to residents’ concerns before deciding how to cast his vote.

“Right now I can see both sides,” Davis said. “It looks like a good project, but I can see the concerns as well.”

There are 10 supermarkets in Simi Valley, two within a mile of the proposed Smith’s. A study conducted by Smith’s predicted that the store would employ 184 full-time workers, generate an additional 114 jobs elsewhere in the city and spend $2.34 million a year on local goods and services.

Fred A. Madjar, a development consultant for Utah-based Smith’s, said the company has gone out of its way to accommodate residents, altering the project to better suit the neighborhood’s needs.

The redesigned project will push the supermarket closer to the freeway and provide a one-acre landscaping buffer on the 9.5-acre property. Also, Smith’s will install security fencing and plant large trees along a 35-foot-wide strip separating the back of the market from nearby houses.

“I both professionally and personally don’t understand the concerns of the neighbors,” Madjar said. “Not all commercial projects are bad. This is a good project.”

But for Wilson, the supermarket plan is far from acceptable. Driven from homes in Los Angeles and Burbank by fear of crime, she and her husband scoured outlying areas, selecting Simi Valley and the modest wood frame house where they have lived for two years.

“It doesn’t matter what they’re going to do to try to make it better for us, it isn’t enough,” Wilson said. “It won’t stop the noise or the stink of the delivery trucks.”