Growth-Control Limits Backed by 80% of Simi Voters

SIMI VALLEY —  Voters have decided firmly that they want this city to grow quite a bit faster than it has in the past--but not too fast.

More than 80% of Simi Valley’s voters Tuesday approved Measure Q, a city-backed slow-growth ordinance that would grant 64% more new building permits per year--raising the annual number of new permits to 544. Semiofficial vote tallies show 14,238 Simi residents voted for Measure Q while 3,366 opposed it.

Measure Q renews Simi Valley’s 10-year-old slow-growth ordinance, limiting the number of new houses, condominiums and apartments, and businesses that will be built over the next eight years.

And it will allow this city of nearly 104,000 to grow comfortably by another 40,000 residents even if builders cover every square foot of land now zoned for building--but all at a controlled rate.

“It was a tough campaign,” joked Mayor Greg Stratton, referring to a measure that generated neither campaign signs nor bumper stickers nor hard-bitten competition as did countywide measures.

Stratton said the vote only confirmed information gathered during the drafting of a multifaceted city plan called Vision 2020 earlier this year “that the community strongly supported growth-control measures. In many cases, they didn’t know we had them, or didn’t think they were strong enough. But [Tuesday’s vote] makes you feel good.”

Backers of Measure Q have argued that Simi Valley cannot absorb large numbers of new homes, businesses and people quickly enough without growth controls. The measure would also make Simi Valley more attractive to businesses and home buyers who want to settle here, they said.

But builders had opposed the measure, saying it unfairly limits commerce.

Growth controls restrict development during good economic times, say officials of the Building Industry Assn. But such measures during hard economic times also stifle business that would help keep struggling building firms afloat, the association has said.

Association members worked with city staff to hash out some details of the measure, such as the way the city would determine which applications receive building permits.

But the measure will not lock the city in to a fixed number of new building permits per year--whether greater or less than market demand. Measure A’s limit of 332 new permits per year was changed several times during the 10 years it was in effect.

And as Measure A nears its expiration date in July, city officials point out, it seems to have done its job well: Officials in 1986 predicted that Simi Valley would swell to 110,000 residents by this year, while the real population is about 6,000 people below that estimate.