Supervisor Kathy Long Balances Smart Growth & Open Space Preservation in Ventura County

The Local Government Commission is sponsoring the sixth annual New Partners for Smart Growth Conference in L.A. in February, and the theme is "building safe, healthy, and livable communities." How does your work in Ventura County offer prototypes for implementing smart growth in cities, counties, and around the state?

I am very proud of Ventura County. I think we have been a prototype statewide based on the growth decisions we have been making since the mid-1970s. Those decisions have directed growth into the cities so that the county's unincorporated area holds 12 percent of the county's population, and agriculture is still our number-one industry. That, along with voter initiatives that set curb lines around the cities, has directed the growth in the cities. Those strategies fit the Local Government Commission's sustainability model for living in cities where you have access to infrastructure, transportation, a job core, etc.

The Local Government Commission's focus for the forum this year brings healthy communities into the conversation. Our sheriff likes to boast that Ventura County is one of the safest counties west of the Mississippi, and we have historically been in the top-five for a county of our size in public safety. In the health arena, which again the Local Government Commission is focusing on, the question is: What are we doing in the internal design of the communities? We have walk-able living areas, clean air, and encouragement for exercise. But a lot of work has yet to be done to really have a healthy community.

A conference last year at the California Endowment entitled "Unhealthy By Design" focused on the need to promulgate new rules, regulations, and formats for public development that would foster healthy communities. What is Ventura County doing to create incentives for building healthier communities?

I think a few of the ten cities in the county are ahead of the curve in some respects, including the city of Ventura. I believe that all of the cities are looking at what they can do to create a healthy environment and remove those barriers. Those barriers come from archaic codes and designs that allowed automobiles to take over the landscape. We have to work with our fire department, which has concerns about the width of streets. We have to work with our disabled communities, who have concerns about mobility within the city core, and we have to work with our Building and Safety and zoning folks so that we promote park and recreation space in conjunction with housing and mixed-use designs.

What is the Local Government Commission's goal for the New Partners for Smart Growth conference?

With these forums we try to bring in the experts and the best practices and look at who is doing it right and making progress. I have found in all of our forums in the past that you can be assured that you will come away with at least one new idea, multiple contacts of people who are putting those best practices in place, and the feeling of, "You know what? We're doing it right."

In Ventura County we are on the right path. We are fortunate that our predecessors and the residents of this county were visionary. So, we are doing things right; we just have to continue to work on these tough issues, which have evolved as a result of population growth, markets, etc.

Two breakout sessions focus, respectively, on the challenges of joint-use and school-based community planning and on eminent domain, which harkens to the Prop 90 debate. How do those issues play out in Ventura County?

Prop 90 was not supported, but the vote was very narrow, which shows that there is concern from residents as to how eminent domain is used in our communities. I think that there was concern in this county that Prop 90 would have invalidated all of the voter initiatives that set the curb lines around the cities, protecting us from urban sprawl and protecting open space.

The eminent domain issue will continue to draw great attention. It made the ballot because there were enough people who have great concerns about the taking of property rights without fair process and valuation. I am pleased that that issue is on the agenda for our forum, and I expect it will continue to be on the agenda at forums statewide for the next couple of years.

Regarding joint-use schools, we have had community dialogue over the last couple of years about the concept. Because of our commitment to not sprawling out, we know that we need to look at developments that accommodate commercial use and school use. Those aren't new ideas, but they are ideas that have finally generated enough interest to be on the front burner.

The pressures for growth in California are obvious to everyone, especially in L.A. County and Ventura County. What is the nature of the tension between the need for more housing and growth and the need for smart growth?

It's not a secret to anyone: the market, the cost of property, and the cost of housing have skyrocketed. We feel those pressures. Our internal growth has been somewhere around 3 or 4 percent, which is manageable, but we know that additional pressures are coming to our county because of built-up, built-out areas surrounding us and the frustration of folks who live in those communities who might want to get away from the intense density and development.

We are struggling with the need for adequate housing, both for low-income residents and farm workers, and even for our general workforce-firefighters, nurses, and medical technicians. I think we have moved in our community dialogue to where the general constituency knows we can't continue with the old blueprint of large-lot, single-family homes and still accomplish the balance of farmland and open space that they have mandated by their vote. We have to look at higher densities and go up.

In March Karen Schmidt of Save Open Space and Agricultural Resources (SOAR) told TPR, "the intention of SOAR was not to stop growth but rather to focus on good development within the existing city footprints before gobbling up the greenbelt buffers and farmland that are such an important part of the quality of life and community identity here." How difficult is this balance between cities, farms, open space, and development in Ventura County? Is SOAR working properly?

After the gnashing of teeth, when people evaluated what the voters said we must evaluate, we have been making better decisions internal to the city and incorporation lines. That community dialogue and buy-in for mixed-use sites, advanced siting for schools, and higher density has lead to better decisions.

We have some challenges right now with property values and the market, because what is being built right now is high-end housing units, not housing to accommodate the lower-end market and our workforce. We haven't yet been able to get our resident constituency committed to density. But when projects with merit have been put on the ballot, voters have supported them.

Interestingly enough, the initial fears were that SOAR would create a division between rich and poor and chase everyone out of the county while depressing our market. That has not happened. In fact, our market is every bit as strong, if not stronger, than in Orange County or San Diego County. The difference is that we have clear and defined open space and agriculture is still our number-one industry. So it is working, but it still has some challenges.

The "Compact for a Sustainable Ventura County" was just launched with grants from the Ventura County Civic Alliance and the Ventura Council of Governments (VCOG) to study the long-term vision for growth in Ventura County beyond the expiration of SOAR two decades from now. What might that study reveal?

I can't elaborate too much because I am not the supervisor who serves on the VCOG. I am aware of the grant, and it is exciting that we have it so that we can have the community dialogue that will be necessary to look beyond 2020.

With the state housing program and with the governor's work on a blueprint for strategic growth, I think we will be in a prime position to use those dollars to cast the net out further into the community to do a hands-on and charette process that asks, "What do you see for the future of the workforce, the retired community, and the young people of Ventura County in the next 20 years?" It is exciting to have the groups working together-both the public policy leadership and the constituency who we represent. The old model of working from the top down isn't working any longer. We need to work on this collectively.