Thousand Oaks Reviews Capital Improvement Budget

Hoping to beautify the Civic Arts Plaza, build another golf course, redo the teen center and do as much else as possible with taxpayers’ money, the City Council on Tuesday began the lengthy process of reviewing the city’s two-year, $57.8-million capital improvement budget.

With help from the citizens’ Community Budget Task Force, council members pored over hundreds of pages detailing proposed improvements from adding 16 traffic signals or stop signs throughout the city to repairing the city-owned Arts Council of the Conejo Valley building.

The council and the budget task force discussed the draft budgets for the 1997-98 and 1998-99 fiscal years. City officials will return to the council later this spring with the final budget, amended to reflect Tuesday’s debate.

The capital improvement budget, not to be confused with Thousand Oaks’ operating budget, is the city’s blueprint for spending on facilities and infrastructure. That includes such things, for example, as widening intersections of the Ventura Freeway and Moorpark Road as well as upgrading the Goebel Senior Center.

The preliminary budgets are part of a larger, five-year spending plan for capital improvements throughout the city. It calls for the bulk of the money, $42.4 million, to be spent in the 1997-98 fiscal year, which begins July 1, and $15.4 million to be spent the following year.

The largest proposed expenditures are:

* $4.1 million to build a new hiking/biking trail along the Arroyo Conejo, improve the city’s bus system and pay for a transportation center.

* $4.9 million to rehabilitate and improve existing buildings, such as the Civic Arts Plaza and the Thousand Oaks Teen Center off Janss Road.

* $5.5 million to refurbish manholes and improve waste-water lines, and help maintain the Calleguas Creek watershed.

* $5.6 million for housing-related projects, such as helping the affordable housing group Many Mansions acquire and rehabilitate apartments.

* $9.5 million to fix city streets and improve the Moorpark and Hampshire road interchanges with the Ventura Freeway.

* $19.7 million to remodel the aging Los Robles Greens golf course and to build a new course and trail network at Hill Canyon.

The budget includes more projects than Thousand Oaks can afford. That is because part of the money for the Hill Canyon recreational area, as well as the affordable housing, is expected to come from future bond issues.

In response to numerous complaints from residents, Councilman Andy Fox proposed that the city consider doing additional repair work on the streets dug up by GTE to provide cable service. Fox said that although GTE has done an adequate job in repairing the streets, residents do not like the visible scars left in the roadway.

Thousand Oaks has sent a letter to GTE asking it to share in the cost of the added work, which would essentially make the streets look the way they did before the cable installation and provide a surface that is more long-lasting and less prone to potholes.

“It seems to me to be absolutely unfair to have the city shoulder the burden for all of this,” he said.

Public Works Director Don Nelson said city engineers will examine which roads need additional work, as well as what type of surface should be used and return to the council in the summer with suggestions.

Also in response to residents, the council discussed adding freeway sound walls to its list of budget items. The discussion came after several dozen residents petitioned the council for a buffer wall to block out the sounds from the Moorpark Freeway.

“Noise is becoming a growing concern for many residents, much more than we had imagined,” said Councilwoman Elois Zeanah. “The residents that petitioned us for a sound wall along the 23 Freeway are feeling that.”

But some council members pointed out that providing sound walls is the responsibility of Caltrans, not local government.

“The minute we pick this up, they will never do the work,” said Mayor Judy Lazar.

Nelson said that since there are plans to widen the Moorpark Freeway through Thousand Oaks, installing sound walls should be part of that discussion.

Council members eventually approved a motion by Zeanah to examine what areas in the city need sound walls and to investigate whether any state and federal funds might be available to pay for them.