City Council Candidates Debate In Calabasas

CALABASAS, CA — Calabasas City Council candidates got into the weeds on Woolsey, wireless, affordable housing, and more pressing issues facing the city during a virtual Sept. 29 Candidates Forum.

During the hour and a half debate moderated by communications consultant and former CSUN journalism professor Lori Baker Schena on Zoom, the four candidates answered eight questions submitted by members of the public.

After two-minute introductory statements, the four candidates were asked to name the three main challenges or problems facing the city. Mayor Alicia Weintraub, who has served on the Council since 2015 and as mayor since December, named keeping residents and businesses safe during the COVID-19 pandemic, managing the budget during the pandemic without cutting back on services to residents, and disaster preparedness.

“There’s not a ‘fire season’ anymore - fires can happen any day, any time, and we have to continue doing everything we can,” she said.

Dennis Washburn, who currently serves on the planning commission and served on the council from 1991 to 2011, said he agrees with Weintraub’s priorities. He advocated for creating “Fire Life Safety Action Zones” along the city’s scenic corridors, which would be similar to existing Watershed Protection Zones, that would involve re-evaluating the needs of these fire-sensitive areas.

Susan Fredericks-Ploussard, a dentist with a practice in Westlake Village, said she would like to see a collaborative effort between cities in the Las Virgenes Unified School District to control COVID-19. She also cited a reduced budget as a top issue, saying, “We’re going to have to sit down and really plan for where we’re going to have to strip some services or widdle back.” Fredericks-Ploussard also called the Woolsey Fire a “disaster”, and said the city needs to “have it more together, because it’s not a question of if there’s a fire, it’s a question of when, and how bad that fire is going to be.”

Peter Kraut, an engineer who has served on the planning commission since 2016, said one of his first priorities would be to hire a grant writer who could locate state and federal funds to pay for areas like “traffic mitigation, fire prevention, public safety, and emergency preparedness.” Kraut said that his second goal is to improve the city’s wireless service, which he cited as critical to public safety, through upgrading underground infrastructure, and his third is to incorporate public input on the 2021 housing element for the city’s general plan.

“This document needs a lot of public input to determine what we’re going to build and where, and what we’re not going to allow to be built, and where not, and the first step in that process I believe is to get more city residents involved in the process,” Kraut said.

Candidates were then asked the steps they would take to prepare the city for another large fire. Washburn said the city needs to focus on new technologies like fire protection gels, and again advocated for the creation of Fire Life Safety Protection Zones with accompanying strategic plans where “we develop our own list of needs and interests and the costs for doing those things and have those plans ready so that when the fire or the earthquake or the floods or the landslides - all of which we’ve had to deal with - hits, we’re ready.”

Fredericks-Ploussard said what she perceives as a poor response to the Woolsey Fire was one of the main reasons she decided to run, and described being stranded from her home for a week. She said she has been told that the city’s fire safety plan is only available to city staff, and called for complete transparency. She cited a Fire Safety Fair in Topanga as something the city should replicate.

Kraut said that like so many other issues facing the city, fire safety comes down to communication and funding. He said the city needs to incorporate a detailed communication strategy and plans for opening emergency roads for evacuation into an updated emergency plan. “We have fire roads through our hillsides that could be used if needed in an evacuation, but our fire department needs to be the one to open those, and somebody needs to be there directing the residents,” he said.

Kraut also called to restrict development in hillsides and open spaces, which he said would alleviate efforts of the fire department. He called on again to hire a grant writer who could locate funds for these undertakings.

Weintraub disputed Fredericks-Ploussard’s earlier claim that the city’s Emergency Operations Center was never activated during Woolsey, saying it was activated straight away and she sat there for a week. She also pointed out that the city held a well-attended “Wellness and Preparedness Expo” in December, and said more need to be planned. She said she will soon meet with neighboring cities and emergency personnel to decide whether Calabasas should be divided into emergency evacuation zones the way Malibu recently was. Weintraub also said that the city needs to upgrade its wireless connectivity, and make sure more residents are signed up for important communications.

The third question asked how candidates would respond to projections that the Malibu-Lost Hills Sheriff’s budget would increase to $5 million over the next three years. Fredericks-Ploussard said she is not in favor of cutting the budget, but advocated oversight of the finer points of the budget, like whether Lost Hills needs to purchase riot gear.

Kraut said that while he favors expanding social programs, he does not support reducing the sheriff’s budget. He said that he has heard that residents want more police presence, and said that as a councilmember, he would negotiate with the department and the county supervisors in charge of the sheriff’s budget to make sure that it is what the city requires.

Weintraub said that enhancing and protecting public safety is her top concern, and also said she does not support “in any way” cutting the sheriff’s budget. She said she has been successful in the past at spreading around costs that don’t benefit the city. Weintraub also said she is proud of the relationship she has helped foster with the station, noting that the city has helped fund new supplies for them, and they have helped with projects like stopping street racing on Mullholland Drive. She also advocated for neighborhood watch organizations and public safety technologies to protect areas the deputies cannot reach.

Washburn said the city needs to audit its needs, especially since its public safety is served by several different agencies. “We’ve allocated more than adequate amounts of money to deal with public safety and security in our community: now we have to make sure it’s effective and efficient,” he said.

Candidates were then asked what they would do to meet the state mandate to provide 350 affordable housing units to support qualifying tenants, including specific proposed locations. Kraut said he does not believe new projects should be built in a high-fire severity zone, so he proposed working with the planning commission to find creative solutions to build new housing, like converting empty commercial space to residential units. He said that it’s also important that the Development Code and the city’s General Plan are in sync with each other.

Weintraub said the community most needs senior housing and housing for people who work in Calabasas but may not be able to afford to live there. She said the city is looking to annex Craftsman’s Corner just north of the 101 Freeway, which she feels would be an ideal area for this type of housing, and also advocated for creative solutions like reusing office space. Weintraub also reiterated the importance of construction not affecting open spaces or being built in high fire-risk areas.

Washburn said technology can help quickly build fire-resistant houses more that will end up being affordable enough for the city’s workers to live there.

Fredericks-Ploussard pointed to Senate Bill 182 addressing safe building in high fire areas. She said the city needs to re-examine its General Plan “through a completely different lens” given climate change, and said she doesn’t think much more can be built in the city. She also advocated for senior housing and for Craftsman’s Corner as a potential site.

Candidates were then asked how they plan to prevent homelessness from taking hold in Calabasas the way it has in neighboring cities. Weintraub said she set up a homeless task force, worked with a homeless services agency, set up a number on the city app residents can call if they see someone homeless, and helped hire a homeless outreach coordinator who travels through Calabasas and neighboring cities to help people experiencing homelessness get the services they need. She said that the city has been able to remove encampments from high fire-risk zones because of the above steps.

Washburn says the city should expect many more homeless residents, and should do the appropriate studies to figure out how to best handle them. He called for more emergency planning, saying the city has “gotten off to a great start, but needs to do a lot more.”

Fredericks-Ploussard said that despite a low homeless count in the area, the city needs to care for the homeless. She said that County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl’s office told her that the area has no immediate plans to build a homeless shelter, but services are available. Like Washburn, she said she expects the numbers to increase, and the city needs to plan accordingly.

Kraut agreed with Fredericks-Ploussard that it is first important to understand why people become homeless, and to treat them compassionately. He said the city needs to better communicate its homeless initiatives, and advocated for Safe Parking Programs, which allow for supervised overnight parking programs that he says have worked well around Los Angeles. Because the homeless community “does not know where our city borders start and stop,” Kraut said the city must collaborate with neighboring communities.

Candidates were then asked how to improve the city’s wireless service. Washburn at first misheard the question, and instead addressed how to respond to the city’s “shelter needs” rather than “cell service needs.”

Fredericks-Ploussard said that she reviewed Councilmember James Bozajian’s comments two years ago that although more cell towers are needed, they are prohibitively expensive to build. Fredericks-Ploussard said Bozajian suggested the city could potentially provide incentives for the city to share towers with other cities. She ended by simply saying she would look into the issue more on the Council.

Kraut advocated a city-wide infrastructure or fiber-optic cabling to reach everywhere in the city, which he said would improve cell and internet service and allow the city to better negotiate with its wireless providers. He said one of his first initiatives on the Council would be the cabling project, and hire a grant writer to find the funds.

Weintraub said that “awful” cellular and wireless service is the one issue all Calabasans can agree on, and a survey showed that people across the city have been struggling with bad service. She said she sees this as an emergency preparedness issue, and led the charge to improve it. She said the council needs to change what cell providers have called one of the most “restrictive ordinances in the country,” and a change in the city ordinance will allow providers to invest in new technology to provide increased service. Weintraub said the Communications and Technology Commission is working to change the ordinance and involve the public in the process.

Candidates were then asked if they would seek more in-depth building rules regarding use of slopes and lot utility requirements to avoid neighbors blocking each others’ views. Fredericks-Ploussard said the planning commission does need to develop concrete rules over building and view obstructions, because she has heard of many conflicts.

Kraut said he’s been working on the planning commission to change a loophole in the development code that allows developers to build irregular structures. He again said he wants to work to realign the General Plan with the Development Code, and remove loopholes and unclear language.

Weintraub said she’s proud of her work to make sure that the community has the opportunity to be involved before any new developments, which has led to many changes in proposed developments. She recommended residents bring any concerns to construction to the planning commission and the Council “because that’s the beauty of being part of a small city like Calabasas vs. the city of LA - your planning commission, your city council, your staff, listens and hears from residents and responds to them.”

Washburn seemed to again address the housing element question, and spoke about annexing Craftsman’s Corner to build the 350 required units. “That’s one of the ways out of the problem in part, but it’s also an opportunity to look at how we’re going to operate in the next four years, ten years, 20 years, and not get fined or penalized for doing the right thing, which we are doing now, and have been doing for years and years here,” he said.

The final question asked if leaf blowers should be banned from the city given air and noise pollution concerns. Kraut called leaf blowers “annoying”, and advocated for electric leaf blowers, but said one of the commissions to research this issue and how other cities have dealt with it, which he said would help overburdened city staff.

Weintraub said more people have asked about leaf blowers during COVID-19, and the public health commission has said they do not pose any health risks. She said that while she has heard of better technologies, she agrees this would be a good question for environmental or public health commissions to further research.

Washburn said the city should look at recommendations from the South Coast Air Quality Management District, and how it can help outside contractors shift to quieter, more sustainable equipment.

Fredericks-Ploussard recommended transitioning to electric equipment and possibly banning gas leaf blowers, and training employees how to blow leaves safely out of the direction of people and cars. She said in her community, leaf blowers can begin early in the morning and last all day, and she appreciates the frustration.