Supervisors Vote to Ease Some Building Rules in Ojai Valley

The Ventura County Board of Supervisors this week relaxed construction rules in the Ojai Valley, bowing to protests from hundreds of landowners who claimed that a clerical error by planning officials had stymied their building plans.

Despite strict limits on residential development for the area, the board on Tuesday ordered staff to prepare an ordinance that would make building permits available to anyone with proof that they had begun seeking approval for a new home before May 5.

It was on that date that county planners discovered that they had mistakenly issued too many permits for the smog-prone valley and immediately ordered a freeze on construction there.

To help remedy the situation, the supervisors last week agreed to allow 104 residents who had already received clearance to proceed with their plans, even though their homes would exceed annual limits set by the county to curb air pollution.

But that failed to quell the fears of another 100 to 200 prospective builders who contended that county planners had told them that there would be no problem in obtaining the necessary permits.

In what the planning staff Tuesday called a “conscientious, reasonable” solution, landowners were given a list of 23 documents, any one of which could serve as proof that a builder had been seeking approval prior to the moratorium.

Those documents include grading permits, letters of commitment from a water company, sewage disposal reviews, payment of school district fees and flood control clearance.

“Imagine how frustrating it would be to go to the counter in October and be told there was no problem,” Supervisor James. R. Dougherty said, “and then come back in November and be told, ‘We’re sorry.’ ”

As of Tuesday, there were 178 applications for Ojai Valley building permits on the county Planning Department’s waiting list, but officials didn’t know how many of those would qualify for permits under the new rules.

At the board meeting, however, about two dozen builders--who now might have to wait until 1993 to obtain permits--complained that the proposed remedy did not go far enough.

Many said they had sold their homes, purchased lots in the Ojai Valley and even obtained construction loans, but did not have any of the 23 documents required by the county.

“I’m a couple hundred thousand into a project and virtually have something of no value right now,” said Brad Hughes, a real estate agent who plans to build on a vacant parcel he owns in the area.

“I don’t think it’s morally fair . . . and I don’t think it’s legal,” agreed Andrew Pollet of Oak View. “It was the error that prompted and encouraged people to buy lots and expend large sums of money.”

But many would-be builders would have been thwarted by the Ojai Valley Clean Air Ordinance anyway, said planning officials.

Planners said they discovered the error May 5 after recalculating numbers during a routine discussion of the clean-air ordinance, which called for 156 residential permits to be issued for the Ojai Valley in 1989.

Number Exceeded

When they realized that number had been exceeded, they immediately stopped issuing permits. Even so, 104 landowners in excess of the limit had already received clearance to build this year, planners said.

To accommodate those additional homes, officials said they will have to borrow from future allocations, which call for 94 homes to be built annually in the area for the next five years. That would entail using the entire allocation for 1990, as well as a portion of the 1991 allocation, to absorb the excess permits issued this year.

Accommodating any others who will qualify for permits under the new ordinance will probably entail borrowing from allocations well into 1992 and perhaps beyond, planners said.

Russ Baggerly, a spokesman for Citizens to Preserve the Ojai and the Ventura County Environmental Coalition, conceded that there would be an adverse impact from the boom in construction over the next couple of years, but said it would level out over time.

“Obviously, there was a mistake,” Baggerly said. “But they’re doing their best to deal with the problem.”