Whose Town Is This?
By Bonnie Donovan
From the street to the skyline, Santa Barbara appears to be a free-for-all; local input has been tossed aside by outside groups and complicit city employees running roughshod over the rich traditions and the ease of traffic flow through town. The strong voice of expertise offered by boards and commissions over the years – which have served this town admirably since the earthquake of 1925 – has virtually been eliminated.
Much has been written about the careful planning of Santa Barbara’s downtown street grid, developed by “Captain” Salisbury Haley. As a result of concerted efforts over the past century, Santa Barbara's has retained her natural beauty combined with carefully planned architecture which includes orchestrated restraint on building heights.
With the onslaught of state mandates that now supersede local control via Builder's Remedy and the Wild Card system now being used – known as "Community Benefit" – all that care for this internationally renowned spot is gravely compromised.
Bulb-outs and Barricades
Traffic changes that affect downtown and surrounding streets greatly hinder our mobility daily. What happens when locals try to get their errands done, or do anything downtown these days? Examples: the barricades, the confiscated traffic lanes, the bulb-outs, the new one-way streets (with Sola apparently becoming a no-way street); let's not forget the other closure: State Street... are we supposed to be accustomed to that one by now? Has the shelf-life-of-discontent expired on that one?
Driving down W. Valerio at 6:30 am, still dark out, an unfortunate driver is seen standing outside his sedan after trying to make a left turn onto Calle Canon. His vehicle is straddling the very unnecessary rock-piled barricade at the sparsely traveled intersection, all four wheels dangling above the street. He's on his cell phone, hopefully a Triple-A member, but he certainly would not be getting to his job site on time. Probably closer to midday before his car is towed, damage assessed, and he gets to work.
These new barricades are not only hard to spot in the dark, but we also don’t understand the process for choosing different materials at these various intersections. On the East Side, they seem to be using inlaid brick, on the West Side, mounds of cemented river rock protrude above the curb line.
Trying to get to a hair appointment at Chapala and Micheltorena, traveling down De La Vina, hoping to turn left onto Sola to get onto Chapala… Oh no! it's one-way!
I'll turn right... oh no, it's blocked too! What? Why both ways?
Same on the East Side, driving up Garden, impossible to take a left or a right-hand turn, as reported by someone trying to get to Our Lady of Sorrows Church on Sunday.
For bicyclists? Whatever happened to "share the road"? Where are the downtown streets marked "CARS ONLY"?
Downtown Parking Fees
If the city follows through with its latest chatter regarding the discontinuance of the policy whereby the first 75 minutes are free for street parking as well as city parking lots, which has been in place for quite some time. It was formerly 90 minutes, and before that, free parking. Which was put into place for obvious reasons: ease of downtown access, supporting commerce, including the Public Library, Museum of Art, movie theatres, post offices, restaurants, shopping, etcetera.
Since most city parking lot users complete their business within the 75 free minutes, the city laments what they consider a loss of revenue.
If they adopt this change, it will now cost $3 to park on the street or use a city parking lot to run any of the above activities that were previously free. A trip to the post office? They're proposing to install those meters which are accessed by credit cards.
Remember, city parking lots are already subsidized by surrounding businesses. Are the parking lots losing money, or does the city simply want to generate more revenue for its projects?
Just what are those expenditures?
The ultimate plan seems to be to make parking lots less user-friendly, to do away with them entirely and turn them into ugly utilitarian six-story apartment buildings.
Bye-Bye Beautiful City
How does downtown sustain itself? Where do people shop, work, park? How do people get to their destinations? How many people actually make a living in downtown Santa Barbara? Almost no one. They need cars to get to jobs, schools – everywhere.
Tourists all coming on a bus or a mega cruise ship? What would be the draw of a Santa Barbara downtown corridor riddled with six-story buildings?
You think State Street looks bad now? Wait until you get a load of the 2,600 units they’re planning for the 8.7-acres at La Cumbre Plaza.
The first phase, where Macy's now stands, features 642 units. It staggers the mind! Fifty-four of these units will be priced as “affordable.” Macy's will be gone by 2028.
Say Hello to Congestion
What are we mandated by the state to provide? Do building heights need to be raised? Do these housing elements require a ratio of low income to market value units, and if so, what are they? Remember, upper State Street past Constance no longer benefits by side thorough-fares like downtown, where we have Chapala and De la Vina streets on the West Side, and Anacapa and Santa Barbara streets on the East Side. Upper State Street is just one artery. No side streets to relieve congestion there.
Present owners of Macy's and its adjacent parking lots – the Taylors – are the first ones to file the application of the La Cumbre Plaza tract. On January 17th a community outreach was held at the site with the same format seen at other outreach meetings that architect Brian Cearnal usually uses. Poster boards of the projects with fall-away post-it notes, available to the attending public – scribble onto the post-it note – What do you like? What do you want? Their brand of effective “community outreach.”
Reports will undoubtedly fall along these lines: "Everyone loves the project!"
The “Affordable Housing” for “Homeless” Scam
Let's travel back down State Street about ten blocks to State and De La Vina, where now stands the Quality Inn, 3055 De La Vina, formerly called the Mountain View Inn. Sweet, affordable, clean mid-State motel. The SB Housing Authority is about to make a move to purchase this property for a cool $13 million and has received a $6 million loan from the City of Santa Barbara, at 3%.
Where are the SBHA rental revenues amassed from the X-amount of federally funded properties around the community? In other words, this is all subsidized housing: Section-8. Why does Housing Authority continually ask for loans from the City when they already accrue enough rental revenues from the Federal Government? Rent largely comes from Section-8 housing. Where is all this money? Why aren't they using their own money to purchase these properties?
The Quality Inn: 32 units proposed for the homeless at $382,000 per unit. This property borders the Samarkand neighborhood. The point is, those 32 homeless cannot even afford low-income housing, because they usually have no income.
So, this isn't low-income housing; it’s no income housing.
Why are we providing housing for the homeless in a prime Santa Barbara neighborhood? Provisions should be made for the homeless, but not on State Street.
How long will we continue to hand out free apartments to whomever shows up homeless?
The Long Road to Uglification
Is the plan to turn every small motel on Mid-State into housing for the homeless, and then allow developers to build high-rise hotels near the beach, i.e., the four-story hotel proposed at 710-720 State?
Everyone who wants to live in Santa Barbara does not get to live here.
To quote Rob Fredricks, the face of SBHA – when questioned by Samarkand about the lack of transparency and the speed with which this project is being pushed through – he responded that the homeless who would take up residency there have... “suffered life circumstances that have put them in this situation.”
My father’s response to that would be along the lines of his generation that supports the idea that “the world doesn’t owe you a living” ...
Whichever way the homeless issue is finally addressed, clearly it doesn’t need to be along the prime corridor of State Street.
Santa Barbara is careening downhill fast. If we don’t apply the brakes soon, it will be too late, and the city that we know – and that the world knows – will be lost to forced, haphazard, and state-mandated development.
There are developers that don’t care, won’t care.
They’ll just take the money and run.
Always have.
DYK is a collaboration of contributing writers
Yes! Yes! Yes! You’ve nailed down in words what has been on our minds about the full throttle degradation of our once beautiful and well thought out City.
Here is one important remedy: YOUR VOTE. Yesterday we received our sample ballots in the mail. Do not vote for a single incumbent, unless that individual has been the consistent voice for sound governance. (Trustee Veronica Gallardo leaps to mind.) Support civic-minded candidates. I'd also like to add and as a poll worker: DO NOT mail your ballots in or use drop-off boxes. On Tuesday, March 5th, schlepp over to a precinct and physically drop off in a box witnessed by a poll worker. We can insist on secure elections when we walk the walk. Walk to the polling place. Compel Holland to retain in-person voting. Thanks Bonnie for another strong piece of writing.