Controversial Bixby Ranch Plan Gets OK

Following years of wrangling and despite a crush of opposition, the Seal Beach City Council early Wednesday approved the Bixby Ranch Co.’s plan to build homes and a retail center on one of the city’s largest remaining parcels of open space.

The 4-1 vote came after two marathon council sessions lasting a total of 10 hours, and after more than 3,000 residents signed petitions against the north Seal Beach project, which they said would bring unwanted traffic and noise.

“I’m disappointed,” said Erwin Anisman, president of the Rossmoor Homeowners Assn., which lobbied against the project. “In spite of everything, we’re ending up with big-box retail.”

But City Council officials said a key factor in favor of the project was the revenue it would bring: Of Orange County’s 31 cities, Seal Beach ranks second to last in the amount of money it receives from sales taxes, according to Councilman Paul Yost.

The Bixby Ranch Co. plans to build a retail shopping center and a residential facility for seniors, and expand the current golf course on its 218-acre property off Seal Beach Boulevard.

There was one concession to angry residents: A proposal to build a 3,500-seat church was set aside in favor of building 75 homes expected to sell for more than $300,000 each.

An attempt to replace the retail center with 98 luxury homes--an alternative favored by many residents--failed on a 2-3 vote.

The property is one of the largest undeveloped parcels in Seal Beach, bigger than the Hellman Ranch development that environmentalists have been fighting. It is also one of the last remaining remnants of a once-massive cattle ranch spanning 14,000 acres across Orange County.

Bixby Vice President Ron Bradshaw said construction on the Old Ranch Towne Center could begin as soon as January. The first stores could open within 18 months.

Residents of Los Alamitos, Rossmoor and Seal Beach’s College Park East neighborhood opposed the retail center because of the more than 13,000 car trips a day it would generate, and because they feared it would drive nearby Rossmoor Center out of business.

Bixby officials, however, said a $1.2-million fee they will pay in connection with the project will go toward traffic improvements, including widening Seal Beach Boulevard, to address residents’ concerns.

Council members said changes they required, such as eliminating the church in favor of homes and shifting the retail center to divert customer traffic away from the residential community of Rossmoor, addressed many of the critics’ concerns.

“I don’t think we disregarded what the public was asking for,” Yost said. “I think we did our best to incorporate all the concerns and issues the public had.”

Councilwoman Patricia Campbell, who represents College Park East, was the lone dissenting vote. She preferred Bixby’s fall-back plan: to develop its property as much as possible without a zone change, an option she believes would create less traffic.

In this city of 26,000, where the battle over the Hellman Ranch resulted in death threats against some city officials, the Bixby plan has been a political lightning rod for almost nine years.

Bixby’s last proposal, to build 98 luxury homes and 125 affordable housing units, was withdrawn in 1995 after it looked as if the council would reject it because of public opposition. That “mixed-use plan,” however, was cited as preferable by many residents after they saw the current plan that involves more commercial space.

Residents who favored the older plan even tried to kick Campbell out of office earlier this year, forcing a recall election that failed, because they believed she was instrumental in killing that proposal when she was a planning commissioner.

The council’s vote, which came past midnight Wednesday, was a preliminary approval of the company’s plan. It is subject to minor revision until it is given a final vote, which is likely to come at Monday’s council meeting.