Council To Hear Inn’s Housing Plan
Thursday, August 23, 2012
By Tiobe Barron
When the Ojai Valley Inn & Spa sought permission to remodel and expand back in 2003, a condition of approval was that the Inn must also build 10 low-income housing units somewhere in the city. The Inn originally hoped to do this on a 2.39-acre parcel it owns on the northwest corner of West Ojai Avenue and Hermosa Road.
The agreement requires the Inn to bear the entire cost of the project; no public funds can be used. It was an attempt to reduce commuter traffic and air pollution in the valley and provide affordable housing for those working in the valley. According to city staff reports, the Inn has more than 250 employees who live in Ventura and Oxnard.
The Inn will present a plan at Tuesday’s meeting of the Ojai City Council that proposes 24 units be built across the street from the original site.
That proposal also includes the involvement of the Area Housing Authority (AHA) of the County of Ventura
Working with the AHA, the Inn determined the original site was not suitable for the development.
The two groups instead selected the three-acre parcel and bumped the number of units to 24 units.
“In order to have the project be viable, it had to be bigger,” says Ojai community development director Rob Mullane. “A 10-unit project didn’t pencil out” for the AHA and desired tax credit for the project.
According to city manager Rob Clark, “Our priority (in this arrangement) is Inn employees. The bottom line goal was to connect workers and their housing so they don’t have to commute on the highway every day.”
The Ojai Planning Commission reviewed the project July 18.
Commission vice president Marleen Luckman, said her group had concerns about the frontage view of the proposed project and whether there is adequate screening and landscaping Other concerns included the lack of a sidewalk along the project’s Highway 33 frontage and the lack of a left-turn option from the project parking lot onto Ventura Avenue.
“Although the project could potentially increase traffic a bit, hopefully this will actually reduce vehicle miles traveled by providing housing for Inn staff, some of whom commute to the Ojai Valley,” said Luckman. “There are plans for walkways to connect the apartments and the Inn so employees could walk to work.”
“One of the things I want to explore are design alternatives,” said Clark.
Those interested can comment on the project Tuesday at 7 pm. at City Hall.
Visit www.ci.ojai.ca.us for more information.
Ojai Resident – exactly! Clearly the Inn is handing it off because they receive tax credits and or funding, at the expense of the employees they previously committed to house. And as a tourist-based economy in our town, do we really want what I believe to be our very first THREE story building as the gateway to Ojai? Unfortunately, most of our community is unaware of this issue; in a vacuum, affordable housing sounds like a good thing, and it is. But not at the expense of the Inn employees were were supposed to benefit from this, and not at the expense of our vulnerable valley in terms of traffic and air quality. This is a terrible plan and I’m so glad that Mayor Clapp is stepping up to the plate to inform and protect her constituents, and to hold the Inn accountable for its prior commitment.
CJ — you are exactly right. It is hard to understand (unless it’s regulated) why the Inn would hand this to AHA. Look at Roth Apts., those people moved up to Ojai to live in that public housing facility and they commute back into the greater county for work. It would be exactly the same in reverse to what they are trying to address with Inn employees communting up. The key question to ask and push is how (and is it legal) will AHA guarantee current Ojai resdients and/or Inn empoyees are the residents given that AHA has a curren 3-year waiting list for all properties in the county. AHA is the WORST government agency to work with….they are a “police state” amongst government agencies. The City should have required an Ojai tie for all prospective residents — work or living — when they put this in as a stipulation to the Inn way back when. It’s an example of “trusting intentions” or not caring about what happens a few years down the road when they pass/approve projects.
What angers me about the Inn’s new proposal is that these 24 housing units would not be designated for Inn employees – instead, they would have to open the units for ANYONE, and I understand there to be an enormous waiting list in the county for affordable housing units. So we could end up with 24 units full of people commuting to Oxnard and Ventura, having no connection to Ojai other than inexpensive housing. By going from 10 units for Inn employees to 24 units with tax benefits, we create a scenario where we may well benefit everyone but Ojai, and not even Inn employees!
Annex Meiners Oaks and you will have plenty of low income dwellings. Maybe even tare some of the old ones out and build some new ones in their place.
Mr. Angry Cold Heart, they are going to rent like the rest of us.
Don’t forget to put 10% of all your money in the basket when they pass it around in church on Sunday!
Nice that someone that lives out town makes these choices for all of us
Rob Mullane
Rob is the Community Development Director for the CIty of Ojai. He has been involved in planning since 1996, and previous work experience includes positions at the City of Goleta, the County of Santa Barbara, and the University of Hawaii Sea Grant. Rob is active in the Guadalupe community, and has served as the City of Guadalupe’s contract City Planner since 2007. Rob lives in Santa Ynez, California, with his wife Jill La Fleur and step-son Jake. He enjoys travel and being outdoors and is an avid runner, cyclist, and surfer.
http://www.dunescenter.org/aboutus/directors.html
I will only support the original 10 units why 24 so someone can make a huge profit and tax brake. “not in these changing times”
I thought the solution was simple. Assemblyman Das
Williams was going to bring a bus full of illegals
from Oxnard to the Inn every day?
Let there NEVER be a light at Hermosa! Yikes, and think about all the people (up to 48 cars) that would be going through the neighborhood behind Vons if there won’t be a light. This project will be a bummer…
Unless the housing is provided for free to the workers you are creating another “Company Store” situation.
“In order to have the project be viable, it had to be bigger,” says Ojai community development director Rob Mullane. “A 10-unit project didn’t pencil out” for the AHA and desired tax credit for the project.
Now it isn’t about housing Inn employees, but about the tax credit. If the Inn employees choose not to live there can I get into the affordable housing too?
Hand up or Hand out? Make’m buy or rent like the rest of us! Poor underpaid OVI&S employees.
I wish I could feel this is a good thing for the community, but no. Has anyone tallied the amount of cars that drive OUT daily for living wage work? The OVI&S creates the largest revenue stream in the valley when times are good economically, but doesn’t pay its employees well enough to live in standard housing throughout the valley. Do we think creating hacienda housing is the answer to Valley economy? Guess what? The low income employees who will live in the housing will shop in Ventura and Oxnard to subsidize their large families, continue to use overburdened school resources on second language learning instruction, reduced lunch programs and childcare programs. If, we as a society keep giving hand outs and not hand ups we are depleting our society and giving away our quality of life. So much goes to so few in regards to this housing plan. If I had my druthers, ALL the residents in the housing project MUST be required to be U.S. Citizens, not green card holders. (No ethic specifics mentioned)There has to be accountability for paying into the system, not hiding money under the bed or wiring the money out our country. Especially in California, everyone must help pay into our economic system. We all need to use it sometime in our lives. I know of children who are growing up thinking its natural for our government to always supply them with housing, food, & medical as long as mom and dad don’t show too much money made. So mom and dad always get paid in cash. This is the same message the Inn is giving its workers. Ask yourselves, do you feel okay with this housing project? Hand up or Hand Out?