Firm Hopes to Build Homes in Canyon

Two years after Santa Paula voters rejected a similar plan, a developer is preparing to place a measure on the November ballot that would extend the city’s boundaries to accommodate a large housing project.

Backers of the proposed Ranch at Santa Paula notified city officials last week that they will begin circulating a petition necessary to qualify a ballot initiative. The developer must collect 1,073 signatures, representing 10% of the city’s registered voters.

If the measure is approved by the electorate, Arizona-based Pinnacle Development Group would be allowed to build in Adams Canyon.

The project calls for 1,980 single-family homes, 180 condominiums, 90 apartments, two schools, hotels and a retail shopping complex--creating an upscale suburb northwest of the mostly Latino and working-class city of 29,000.

“The last time, the argument [against the ballot measure] was, ‘You’re going to get a bunch of rich white guys to come in here and they’re not going to do anything for you,’” said Pinnacle President John E. Lang, whose firm was not involved in the debate two years ago. “That’s not what we’re trying to accomplish. We want a win-win for everybody.”

Supporters say the project would bring needed tax revenue, jobs and amenities to a cash-strapped city that struggles to pay its police officers, maintain its roads and keep its businesses alive.

“They want to do something positive for this community,” said City Councilman Don Johnson, who owns the local newspaper.

The majority of the City Council felt that way in 1998, when it included Adams Canyon in the city’s annexation plans. Then in 2000, the state agency that guards against urban sprawl reversed its position and blocked the expansion.

But there are long-standing opponents of development in 5,413-acre Adams Canyon. Slow-growth activists warn of environmental damage and object to a doubling of the city’s geographic size.

A group of social activists also has argued for years that development in the canyon would change the character of a city that is now two-thirds Latino by importing upper-class white homeowners. In the process, those activists say, the poorer parts of the city would be abandoned and the increasing political power of Latinos diluted.

Those same activists helped prompt the U.S. Department of Justice to file a lawsuit against the city in 2000, alleging that its at-large voting system has perpetuated racial discrimination by preventing Latino candidates from being elected to the City Council.

The racially and politically charged case was resolved last year. As part of the city’s settlement with the federal government, voters will decide this November whether to switch from the current system to one that would divide the city into council districts.

Also in 2000, voters approved a SOAR growth-control ordinance that allowed the city to extend its boundaries into 2,173-acre Fagan Canyon. But the ordinance requires voter approval for development of Adams Canyon.

To win voter support for Pinnacle’s development plan, Lang has pledged to spend more than $1 million on a public relations campaign.

Lawyer Richard Francis, who crafted the SOAR ordinance, said Pinnacle’s effort is disingenuous. The developer has yet to complete any environmental review or detailed planning that might give the community enough information to decide whether the project is a good one, he said.