Simi Valley Looks to the Future With With 2020 Vision

If 1996 was Simi Valley’s year of promise, 1997 might just be the year that delivers.

Over the past year, Simi Valley officials were brimming with hope that developers would start moving half a dozen projects through the permitting pipeline.

This coming year, those developers have permits in hand, subcontractors in mind and groundbreaking dates on their calendars.

In 1996, Simi Valley’s residents were just beginning to brainstorm on Vision 2020, Mayor Greg Stratton’s ambitious, citizen-driven master plan for guiding the city’s future.

In 1997, Vision 2020 will become a reality as they finish intense workshop sessions and hammer out a 24-year plan to guide the City Council in shaping everything from school curriculum and police services to hillside protection and trash.

The new police station has been but a sheaf of concept drawings on an architect’s drafting board.

This coming year, builders will give that dream bones of steel and concrete--with city officials saying the $12.6-million station should open in the first half of 1998.

Of all of these plans, one could make the deepest impression on Simi Valley: Vision 2020.

In study sessions, more than 115 volunteers chewed over every facet of Simi Valley life: schools, recreation, planning, design, elder care, transportation, police.

They gave equal time to the one subject perhaps most indicative of Stratton’s intent in launching Vision 2020: community atmosphere.

“That’s the real objective, and the hard part is it’s very difficult to quantify that,” Stratton said recently.

“We all talk about small-town America as the ideal place to live, and it is if you have a job,” Stratton said. “The problem with small-town America is it suffers from the problem of what do you do for an employment base. We have the advantage of being able to take all the best of small-town America, combine it with access to a major metropolitan source of jobs and culture and the like, and get the best of both worlds.”

But that precious small-town atmosphere could change, as builders and developers reshape the face of Simi Valley this year with a slew of building projects--from world-class golf courses to massive housing projects that could push the city’s controlled growth ordinance to its very limits.

“We expect to see a lot of activity next year,” Assistant City Manager Don Penman said. “It’s going to be busy.”

Here is just a sampling of the looming construction frenzy:

* The Long Canyon housing development and Wood Ranch Elementary School. Long awaited by parents whose children must crowd into Madera Elementary School, Long Canyon finally won approval earlier this month from the City Council. Grading is to begin in January, and construction on the first 214 houses in a planned 652-home subdivision will begin in April, says developer Tom Zanic. Construction of the school is expected to start in the coming year, with hopes of admitting children in the 1998 school year, Deputy Supt. Susan Parks said.

* The controversial Marr Ranch project. This upscale clutch of 250 homes hugging the base of Simi’s eastern hills is set to move through the planning stages, after developer Robert Friedman’s environmental impact report won approval last month from the City Council. But it could meet further resistance from neighbors who argue it violates the city’s hillside protection ordinance.

* The Cochran Street extension. Developers this year are expected to seal deals with landowners and storekeepers to transform 40 acres of private land into a 300,000-square-foot shopping center anchored by at least three “big box” retail stores. The City Council has agreed to pay $1.6 million to extend Cochran Street alongside the site, and the Planning Commission has set a public hearing for Jan. 8 to review the proposed change to the neighborhood’s Specific Plan.

* The Alamo Street shopping center. A Westlake Village developer is expected to close escrow and begin construction on a pedestrian-oriented shopping center to be built on 15 acres across the boulevard from City Hall.

* The Whiteface golf courses. Earth moving is set to begin this spring at the northern end of Tapo Canyon Road on two 18-hole golf courses designed by renowned architect Pete Dye. “With Pete Dye’s name on it, people from all over Southern California will come and play here,” Penman said. “It’ll be providing not just a recreation amenity for the community, but bringing attention and notoriety to the community. It’s expected to generate 50,000 to 100,000 rounds of golf per year.”

* Revitalization of the Tapo Street business corridor. The City Council has committed $500,000 toward improving the beleaguered district’s landscaping, street lighting and pavement, and Tapo Street merchants are already using advertising and direct-mail campaigns to try to lure more shoppers to their stores.

And a handful of proposed developments are taking shape in drafting departments and corporate boardrooms that will add to the boom.

Several developers are considering building two to three large industrial buildings--400,000 square feet of space in all--to help boost the availability of factory space, Penman said.

“Right now, the vacancy rate is under 5% in the industrial market in Simi,” Penman said. “They have a financial partner that wants to move ahead, and the market seems ready for it. . . . It’s good, because it shows there’s enough confidence in the financial sector that they’re providing money to build buildings like that.”

“Things have been somewhat slower over the past few years, and now we’re moving into that new cycle of a lot more increased activity,” Penman added. “We believe it will be well-managed and contribute to the community. . . . We’re not expecting to see things the way they were back in the mid-80s,” when growth ran rampant and prompted the City Council to pass the growth-control ordinance, he said.

As Simi Valley grows, its planners are working on tightening design standards so they can better govern exactly what the city’s newer buildings look like.

Simi Valley can also look forward to a reconstituted school board, and perhaps a decrease in the bickering that has marred past board negotiations with the City Council, Stratton said.

Stratton said he blames last year’s interagency static on garbled communications between the council and the Simi Valley Unified School District staff--not the school board.

“I think maybe now we’ve got this behind us,” he said.

Stratton said he also hopes the city can put one more difficulty behind it in 1997: the memory of the devastating 1994 Northridge earthquake.

As the quake’s three-year anniversary approaches in January, Simi Valley still has homes that have not been repaired, neighborhoods that have not been rebuilt, Stratton said.

“There are areas where houses have been abandoned, and we have to decide what should be done. We want to make sure we don’t leave any rundown houses that could become problems,” Stratton said. “We’re going to have to finally close the book on the earthquake by going back and doing the checks and making sure the damages have been repaired.”