Santa Paula Blog

This is my last post (the 1,153rd) for the Santa Paula Blog. There are no plans yet for the future of this blog, but I hope it does continue with another author(s). I am off to Evanston, Illinois to become their City Manager and should have a new blog up and running there soon.

Thanks to all who have followed the Santa Paula Blog since its inception in November, 2004. It has been one of the most rewarding parts of being City Manager. Best wishes.

Wally Bobkiewicz

The 42nd Annual Citrus Festival starts tonight. See the Festival website for more details.

I thought folks would be interested in Police Chief Steve MacKinnon's report on the efforts of our Fireworks Task Force:

"This is the fourth year where a special Fireworks Detail was deployed to enforce illegal fireworks. From July 1st through the Fourth two teams made up of a fire fighter and police officer patrolled the city in unmarked police vehicles each evening attempting to locate fireworks violations. The teams reported only one fireworks-related call on Wednesday (1st) and Thursday (2nd) had no calls at all. There were 7 fireworks calls on Friday evening (3rd) and 42 fireworks calls on the Fourth. Most responses to calls or complaints resulted in the officers being unable to locate where the violation was. Based on past history, this is not unusual.

Of these calls the detail only cited persons in four separate incidents. In addition, there were multiple calls where fireworks were seized (and destroyed) but it was decided no enforcement action would be taken. During those calls the detail took the time to educate the residents about the safety and legal concerns.

This year’s detail found the workload was significantly lighter than in past years. It is unclear if this is the result of the poor economy, the information campaign that described the potential for a steep fine imposed, or the lack of a city fireworks display (where potential violators went to other cities where displays were available). For example, there were over 100 fireworks complaints last year on Fourth of July alone."

The Downtown Merchants Association will be presenting their annual "Hot Summer and Jazz" event Saturday on Main Street from 6 PM to 10 PM. Music will be provided by Bryan McCann and the Groveheads. Local artists will be displaying and selling their art as well as food will be available from many area restauarants.

See flyer for information about the Santa Paula Hospital Community Health Fair this weekend celebrating the 3rd anniversary of the re-opening of the hospital.

The 9-1-1 system is working again. It was out of service for about nine hours yesterday and came back up just after 8 PM last night. Fortunately, we know of no problems of people needing help not getting help. We had extra police patrol cars out last night just in case people needed to flag down a police officer for assistance if they could not get through by phone.

The outage was caused by a break in a fiber optic cable in Camarillo. See details in the Ventura Star article here. Our 9-1-1 telephone system operates a little differently than the regular public telephone network and is connected to a central point in Camarillo to allow for redundancy if the local phone network is disrupted in Santa Paula. If that occurs, Santa Paula 911 calls can be answered by Ventura County Fire's dispatch center in Camarillo. Yesterday, because the outage also affected the County Fire dispatch center, there was nowhere for the calls to forward.

Another 9-1-1 factoid: Santa Paula Police dispatchers answer all Santa Paula 9-1-1 calls. If the call requires fire or emergency medical service, the call is immediately connected to Ventura County Fire which dispatches all Santa Paula Fire Department calls. County Fire serves as the dispatcher for all fire and emergency medical calls in Ventura County expect those from the City of Oxnard.

The City Council hired the executive search firm of Bob Murray and Associates Monday to conduct the search for the new City Manager. Information about the recruitment process and info on how to apply can be found on the Bob Murray and Associates website.

I have received several inquiries about the work being done at Laurie Lane and Harvard Boulevard. It is a staging area for the contractor that is working on water pipeline project in the area.

Continental Wind Power announced today that they have chosen the City of Santa Paula to locate their wind turbine manufacturing plant. They plan to open office space here in the next month or so and announce the specific location of their new plant in the next 60-90 days. The plant should generate 300 jobs over the next few years. In addition, they are encouraging their supplies to locate facilities in Santa Paula as well. The plan should be operational sometime next year.

1. Council will interview executive search firms to select one to conduct the recruitment of the new City Manager.

2. The Council says thank you and good luck to the following employees who will be retiring in the next few weeks: Trini Bonilla, Becky Bolanos, John Dunn, Audrey Ellington, Liz Garcia and Tony Villanueva.

3. Updates on the Citrus Festival and the Citrus Classic Balloon Festival.

4. Review of revised Plaza Amistad project (now known as "Paseo Santa Barbara). See details in this blog posting. The Council will also consider settlement agreement to end ongoing litigation with Cabrillo Economic Development Corporation.

5. Council will consider appointments to the Planning Commission and the Design Assistance Committee.

Full agenda can be found here (PDF). This is the last Council meeting until August 17, 2009.

The City of Santa Paula will not be sponsoring a fireworks display this year as we continue to work to keep the City's budget in balance during challenging financial times.

United Way of Ventura County invites the community to participate in its 2nd annual Day of Action taking place on Sunday, June 21— the longest day of the year. This event differs from United Way’s more well-known volunteer engagement activity — Day of Caring — which takes place in the fall.

Day of Action was created in 2008 by United Way of America as an opportunity for local United Ways across the country to declare their intention to improve lives in measurable and lasting ways by mobilizing people around a common goal: Advancing the Common Good. With more daylight hours than any other, June 21st is the perfect day and way to show, by example, what it means to LIVE UNITED.

This year, Day of Action will be an opportunity for Ventura County residents to support the local efforts of Ventura County Together — a new countywide coalition formed to address the increase in basic needs; specifically food, shelter and access to health care that county residents are experiencing as a result of the current economic downturn.

United Way of Ventura County is asking the community to donate any of the following items throughout the day on Sunday, June 21 for Day of Action: • Food: Tuna, canned meats, canned soups, canned beef stew, canned fruits, canned vegetables, canned beans (pop-top cans when possible) • Shelter: Personal care items for the homeless including deodorant, hand lotion, chapstick, athletic socks, diapers (especially the larger sizes) • Health: Supplies for the free clinics such as band aides, boxes of latex gloves, 2 x 2 gauze, toothbrushes, toothpaste

A large collection bins will be placed at Century 21 Buena Vista 123 N. 10th Street, Santa Paula for local dontations. For information regarding Day of Action, contact United Way of Ventura County at (805) 485-6288, ext. 226.

The City and Cabrillo Economic Development Corporation issued the following press release last night:

"The Cabrillo Economic Development Corporation and the City of Santa Paula announced today that they have reached an agreement on plans to develop the site located at 210 W. Santa Barbara Street in Santa Paula.

While the original design, known as Plaza Amistad, featured 150 units, the redesigned development, now known as Paseo Santa Barbara, will feature 90 affordable rental homes which will benefit low-income residents of Santa Paula. Paseo Santa Barbara will serve to enhance housing choices for Santa Paula residents by increasing the availability of rental housing affordable to Santa Paula’s working families, including agricultural workers. Marketing will be targeted first to residents of the City of Santa Paula. In addition, CEDC property managers will provide all City public safety employees with early notification of the opportunities to rent at Paseo Santa Barbara. The new development will increase the child care capacity in the community by providing a child care center that will serve as many as 40 children. CEDC will provide a center for after-school programs such as homework clubs, tutoring and leadership development classes, and will provide space for programs and services for local youth service organizations. The child care center site will be 0.3 acres and will be located near Paseo Santa Barbara at 141 Dean Drive.

Features of the new development include 11, two-story, Craftsman-style apartment buildings on the 6.48-acre site, and will include 1-, 2- and 3-bedroom apartments. A community center, a community park and property management offices will be located in the center of the site, surrounded by apartment buildings. Residential parking spaces will encircle the perimeter of the development.

“Through a series of meetings and good faith efforts to resolve differences on the scope of this project through mutual respect and open dialogue, we believe we’re reached a compromise that will enable CEDC to build a residential community that will benefit people in the Santa Paula area who need affordable homes in which to live and thrive,” says Tom Malley, CEDC Board Member. Mr. Malley, along with CEDC Board Member Dennis Mitchem and CEDC Real Estate Development Director Karen Flock, negotiated the settlement for CEDC. The City of Santa Paula’s negotiating team included Mayor Ralph Fernandez, Councilman Bob Gonzales and City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz.

“The community response to the initial design for the property was very clear, they wanted the density of the housing reduced. We are pleased that through negotiations with CEDC we were able to achieve this. The project now better meets the needs of the community and we will continue to work with CEDC in order to provide the best project for our City,” says City of Santa Paula Mayor Ralph Fernandez.

The project will serve the City with an economic stimulus that is much-needed in Ventura County’s current economy. The Paseo Santa Barbara development represents a total economic investment of $35 million. Additionally, CEDC has agreed to make an annual $16,727 public service fee contribution to the City of Santa Paula and will pay the following additional fees:

$1,632,000 local development impact fees to the City of Santa Paula
$1,153,676 permit fees to the City of Santa Paula
$225,000 school fees to Santa Paula elementary school district
$240,000 school fees to Santa Paula Union High school district.

The development will serve to reduce overcrowding in the City, because CEDC has agreed to work with prospective residents to identify existing substandard or overcrowded housing. Subsequently, the City could ensure that substandard housing is brought up to code and overcrowded housing conditions are not perpetuated. CEDC has successfully conducted this type of effort in other jurisdictions."

1. Public hearing on proposed increase to Water and Wastewater rates. A public notice was sent to all customers in late April and provided for a protest vote against the rate increase. In order to not allow the rates to increase, we would need to receive over 3,000 protest votes. To date, we have received about 300 protest votes.

2. Consider continuing hearing on Plaza Amistad to June 29, 2009.

3. Discussion of Santa Paula/Fillmore greenbelt amendments. The last time the City Council discussed this item, they requested additional information on the terms of other greenbelt agreements in the County and pros/cons on resolution versus ordinance greenbelt agreements.

4. Update on Santa Paula Creek dredging project.

5. Discussion of process to recruit for new City Manager.

6. Interviews to fill vacancies on the Planning Commission.

For more details on the meeting, see the full Council agenda (PDF).