Laguna Beach debate heads to the canyon
Laguna Canyon entered the cross hairs Thursday night as City Council candidates squared off in the latest forum of the election season.
The Canyon Alliance of Neighborhoods Defense Organization, a group intent on preserving low-density and small-scale character of the canyon, organized the forum so the questions were geared to the area that includes a mix of homes and businesses in close proximity to open space and Laguna Canyon Creek.
Each candidate was given two minutes to answer questions from moderator and C.A.N.D.O. President Penny Milne in the first portion of the forum, after which council hopefuls responded to written queries from the audience.
In recent years, the canyon caught the eye of developers, including one who wanted to build a self-storage facility that garnered strong opposition and was never built.
The City Council in 2014 hired urban planning firm MIG to help update Laguna’s downtown specific plan, and later expanded the company’s scope of work to study zoning and land-use issues in the canyon.
The four candidates include incumbents Steve Dicterow and Bob Whalen and challengers Verna Rollinger and Judie Mancuso.
Among several recommendations, MIG suggests a maximum of 10 artist work/live units per acre and reducing maximum buildable area to more than 40% of a property, according to a report on the city’s website.
Dicterow, an estate planning attorney, said applying blanket rules for the the canyon would be difficult.
“In order to answer the question, we have to look at the specific spot we are talking about,” Dicterow said. “The closer to El Toro Road, is less dense ... I don’t think a flat, uniform suggestion from them would be something I would support.”
Mancuso, founder and president of a nonprofit that sponsors and supports legislation promoting care and protection of animals, said resident input should be critical for any proposed changes.
“Density scares me,” Mancuso said. “We have 6million tourists coming to visit us because we live in paradise. To create our own density is worrisome, so we first need to have a stakeholder group of all the canyon neighbors and the artist community to decide what can we live with. It’s not about what Judie Mancuso wants, but what do the canyon neighbors want.”
Providing affordable housing — to groups such as artists and seniors — in a city with soaring rents and real estate prices has been a city goal. But as the candidates acknowledged in the forum, the issue is complex.
“It’s difficult to identify without some increasing density,” Whalen said. “If you added some [headed toward downtown from Laguna College of Art + Design] you’re going to increase in density because right now it is zero. I think there are ways you can subsidize affordable housing, not necessarily with multistory structures.”
Whalen said scattered-site units could be one option.
Rollinger, a former Laguna city clerk who served on the council from 2008-12, said affordable housing is an “important,” though “difficult,” issue.
“The only way it will become a reality is if it is subsidized, the city underwrites the land or through grant funding,” Rollinger said. “I don’t think increased density is necessarily the result, and as a matter of fact, I would not support that. There are too many of us already.”
The Planning Commission and City Council will eventually review and identify priorities from MIG’s recommendations for the city to further study.
Twitter: @AldertonBryce
