Shape future of Arcadia

Guess what? No matter what any of us prefer, Arcadia’s population has been growng steadily for more than a century and will likely continue to do so for decades to come despite our best efforts to prevent it. The city grew a whopping 257% from 1940 to 1950 alone, then another 78% by 1960 to 41,000. And it’s grown nearly 40% more in the past 50 years to about 57,000.

by Scott Hettrick

So let’s recognize that hard fact of life and work together on a thoughtful and forward-looking General Plan for the growth of Arcadia over the next 25 years to ensure that we protect all the things most important to us about Arcadia while creating a framework to deal with inevitable population growth in the least objectionable way possible.  Let’s not get ourselves into another situation where we now have the mansion-ization that so many residents despise because we didn’t create a General Plan 30 years ago that built in options for sensible and preferable development of lots and residences to accommodate the unanticipated 11,000 additional people in Arcadia since 1980.

Once the mansion-ization began, City leaders scrambled to go back and modify restrictions in terms of house design and setbacks, etc. But, for the most part, the horse is out of the barn and, as Councilman Bob Harbicht has said, it’s difficult to now try to tell a property owner that they cannot sell their house to someone paying top dollar to raze it and build a mansion.

Let’s learn from our mistakes. The answer is not to bury our heads in the sand again and try to prevent population growth or to suggest that just because previous efforts to develop Downtown Arcadia and Live Oak have failed, we should give up and never try again.

The answer is to recognize that population growth and a managed level of business expansion is inevitable (and necessary if you want to continue having top-ranked schools and if you want to keep up with the increasing costs of city services).

Everyone involved, including Councilmen who have the final vote, should keep an open mind and be receptive to concepts that may initially seem counter-intuitive.

And let’s not get too heated over any short-term hot-button issues presented with superficial and misleading facts. When Councilmen say they want to protect the City from residential and mixed-use buildings that are three-stories to five-stories tall in Downtown and which will bring thousands more residents to Arcadia, please look closely and see that there are already much taller office buildings in the nearby area and understand that these same Councilmen have already approved a two-story parking garage for the train station in the heart of Downtown that is being built to expand to four levels. They also recently approved the building of a four-story senior housing project right next to Arcadia High School on Campus Drive, which was once again the result of less-than-ideal foresight years ago that may have helped create more appropriate land use.

Please also realize that the likelihood of any developer building even a three-story residential building, let alone five stories, is highly unlikely since it does not make economic or logistical sense once you factor in parking requirements, setbacks, landscaping, and other factors. But few developers will be enticed to even consider building anything remotely practical for today’s environment in Arcadia if you don’t offer that kind of option as a starting point.

A group of residents, including myself, representing many different elements of life in Arcadia were invited to spend dozens of volunteer hours over the last couple of years working with City staff and expert consultants to create the first draft of a General Plan for the city covering the next 25 years (and a second draft, since the City Council unceremoniously shot down most of the fundamental underpinnings of the first six months of our work and probably close to $1 million in time and expenses for city staff and consultants, giving only a few minutes and little weight to the input from a cross-section of a dozen or so residents last year). Now it’s important to get your input.

We set these goals for the General Plan that we hope you feel are worthy:

1. Preserve and protect Arcadia’s neighborhoods

2. Improve circulation and connectivity (traffic, walking, bicycling)

3. Revitalize downtown Arcadia (train station, quality new businesses)

4. Enhance commercial districts (Live Oak, Duarte, etc.)

5. Retain Arcadia’s unique and special quality of life

The Plan, which is to be used as a guiding framework on which to base specific decisions as they come up, addresses everything from housing, land use and community design to economic development, resource sustainability, safety, noise, parks, and much more. We provide general and specific concepts to address areas where there are long-vacant lots and blight, suggest approaches to dealing with any potential shift in use of the Santa Anita Park property, and offer a conceptual guide to preserving history, culture, and art.

After generating advance input from the community a couple years ago at community events and forums, City staff will once again be doing their best to explain all of this to as many people and groups who are interested over the next couple months before taking it to the Planning Commission and ultimately back to the City Council.

The road show will begin with a booth at the firefighters’ pancake breakfast this Saturday, May 1, and followed by a presentation open to the public at the Arcadia Chamber of Commerce Government Affairs Forum at 8 a.m. Thursday morning, May 6, and another at a meeting of the Arcadia Chinese Association on May 19 and the Arcadia Chamber of Commerce board of directors on May 27.

Community workshops will be held from 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. on June 3 in the Sunset Room of the Santa Anita Golf Course, and again on June 23 in the Cay Mortenson Auditorium of the Arcadia Public Library.

Materials will be handed out and mailed and the staff is eager to arrange a presentation to your group in the next 60 days.

The majority of people, myself included, are most comfortable with things staying generally the same as they have always been.

That would probably be nice for the most part, but it’s virtually impossible. And by the way, the things you remember so nostalgically during your childhood when Arcadia’s population was between 30,000 – 40,000 were different than the things your parents remember so fondly from their childhood when the town had about 10,000 – 15,000 people, and likewise your grandparents. And the things you don’t like so much now when the town has grown to nearly 57,000 residents are the things that your kids will remember fondly as they grow older — and you’ve probably noticed they don’t share your warm, fuzzy feelings for things of your generation, so it’s probably just as well things do change.

Technology advances faster than many of us can keep up with to the point that it has become relatively complicated to make a simple phone call anymore, and oftentimes the connection isn’t as good as the old landline phones.

Our friend had a new subscription TV service installed to go with her new HD TV and Blu-ray player, and yet far too frequently she gets frustrated when she bumps a button and winds up not being able to get the TV signal back on the screen. Wasn’t it easier when TVs just had one on/off switch and a simple channel changer?

Likewise, many of us would love Arcadia to remain the quiet little bedroom community that it has been since our youth or the very same that it was when we were initially attracted to move here in the first place.

Guess what? It isn’t going to happen. Never has, never will.

There has not been a single decade during which the population didn’t grow, and in all but three cases it grew by double digits, four times by triple digits.

Arcadia can continue to be primarily a bedroom community but in order for that to happen we need to be pragmatic and realize that we cannot bottle up whatever decade we happened grow up in Arcadia and prevent it from ever changing. What we can do is be realistic about the future by learning from the past, and preparing a road map for future City leaders and our kids that will help preserve the most valuable aspects of Arcadia, which is the sense of community, active involvement, and the relatively simple, safe, and comfortable lifestyle we enjoy.

Someone years ago coined what sounds like a marketing slogan for Arcadia realtors, “A Community of Homes.” That sounds rather cold and detached to me. I prefer to think of Arcadia as a Community of People.

Please provide your input on the General Plan so we can ensure that we remain both a Community of People and a Community of Homes as we grow and adapt.

— By Scott Hettrick