Tonight’s City Council meeting
was one of adjustments—to codes, to fees, to fire zone boundaries, to
development policy—and consequently, it was pretty boring[1]. Everything has changed, but usually not
meaningfully so. The main reason to
endure the meeting was to keep an eye on candidates for the 2014 City Council
election, but even this proved disappointing as everyone acted exactly as
usual. The only carrot I can dangle for
you, dear reader, is absurdity: a councilmember’s request for good vibes, going
to jail for cracks in your driveway, and a debate of the (il)legality of forts
in oak trees await you.
Mayor Bob Kellar mistakenly
thought that tonight would be a short meeting.
Hopefully, he observed, “We have a small gathering tonight; good…we
might get out at a reasonable hour.” (The
meeting would last over two hours).
The invocation was provided by
Councilmember Marsha McLean. She
mentioned yesterday’s Memorial Day ceremony and said that reading about Bowe
Bergdahl really touched her, making her reflect on her own son’s time overseas
in the military. Bergdahl is a US Army
Sergeant who has been held prisoner in Afghanistan since 2009, and she made a
sincere request to think about Bowe in hopes that “somehow” our “good vibes”
would reach him. Perhaps she was trying
to avoid the word “pray” for some reason or another, but that’s essentially
what she was hoping people would do.
Next, Santa Clarita received a
plaque and some cash from Southern California Edison. Apparently, the City of SC has reached the “Silver
Tier” for energy usage reduction. By
using 29% less energy in municipal buildings than was used in past years, some
$154,900 in incentives have been paid to the City since 2010. Tonight’s check was specifically awarded for
fixing up street/parking lot lighting efficiency.
During Public Participation, Alan
Ferdman spoke about several subjects but was most upset at comments from a
recent meeting about the draft EIR for a chloride treatment plant/strategy. He said that he proposed an option not in the
EIR (it combined multiple strategies) that would save the City millions of
dollars. However, his idea was shot down
when the representative described data and numbers in the draft EIR—which cost
$5M—as overly optimistic or incorrect.
Ferdman was justifiably upset about this as was Councilmember TImBen
Boydston, who spoke next. He noted that
the first sentence of the EIR described a problem that is a fiction (i.e.,
chloride damaging avocados and strawberries).
In short, five-million dollars seems to have been lavished on a document
that its own authors and adherents admit is factually flawed. After this grand lament, the other members of
the council gave their own updates on local issues and debated whether they
could draft a letter asking for more time to review the EIR. City Attorney Joe Montes said no—drafting such
a letter would have to be agendized—and this annoyed all.
On the Consent Calendar, a second
reading and adoption of changes to municipal code drew comments from Ferdman,
Boydston, and others. After the
discussion at the last meeting, it was feared that painting a house the wrong
color or having cracks in one’s driveways could be treated as a
misdemeanor. Boydston said that cracked
cement should not be a criminal but rather an administrative issue. The response was essentially one of “don’t
worry about it; we’ll be reasonable”—which is pretty hard to formalize in the
code. He recalled asking a “former City
Manager” (there’ve only been three—we know of whom you speak) to look through
code enforcement documents to see if they were reasonable, and he was flatly
denied the opportunity. Mayor Kellar,
whose ideological grounding is often baffling, said he could understand this
encroachment on freedom—as Boydston painted it.
Kellar said that cracks in a driveway could lead to legal liability and
decrease and that they need to be fixed to protect the safety of citizens. Ultimately, everyone would vote for the code
changes except Boydston.
Cam Noltemeyer spoke on an item
to slightly increase solid waste disposal fees, but the wind was taken out of
her sails when Councilmember Ferry pointed out that the fees might be slightly
lower (or at least about the same) as they were 8 years ago. Noltemeyer’s complaint about the annual levy
of open space assessments had more grounding, but since the issue has largely
slipped from the public’s mind, City Manager Ken Striplin merely responded by
saying the assessment had been passed as was legally prescribed, which is, at
best, an over-simplification. These
items and the rest of the Consent Calendar passed.
Up next, there was a brief
discussion of changes to fire zone boundaries and classifications, which can
affect some costs associated with home ownership. But since the new map didn’t leave much room
for change or discussion since it came from CAL FIRE, it was adopted. Boydston gently ribbed Mayor Kellar, saying
that the new map classified Kellar’s ranch in a higher-risk area and, for that
reason, Boydston joked he was in favor of it.
Kellar responded with a gracious chuckle, but the meeting had already
stretched on too long for his taste.
The final bit of business this
evening was the first reading of an update to development code. There were many changes, and TimBen Boydston
mentioned that he had spent some 10 hours going through them with members of
staff. There was a little concern about
changes to Santa Clarita’s famous oak tree ordinance. Lynne Plambeck was concerned that two
paragraphs justifying the importance of oaks in the city had been
struck-through, but Councilmember McLean, who also a fan of these paragraphs,
said they were actually just underlined to indicate they had been slightly
moved around. On the topic of oaks,
Boydston asked whether someone could build a tree house in their backyard oak
tree (the short answer is “no”), and this saddened him. Mayor Kellar then provided an anecdote about
a treehouse—complete with plumbing—built atop a local oak tree that had to
eventually be modified so as not to hurt the oak. After these discussions of oaks, forts,
childhood, and treehouses, there wasn’t much left to discuss. And with no public participation remaining,
the meeting ended.
[1]Here is the agenda, for your reading pleasure.
