City agrees with a portion of the findings
August
21, 2014
Moorpark
Acorn
By Stephanie Sumell
The City of Moorpark agreed
with only portions of a Ventura County grand jury report that suggested the
community development department, the city’s code enforcement arm, should make
changes to the way it does business.
The Moorpark City Council
approved a formal response to the report by the county’s grand jury, an
oversight committee that ensures that local government is serving the best
interests of the community, during its regularly scheduled meeting on July 16.
Released to the public on June
9, the grand jury report said the city needs to exercise more care when
processing municipal code violations and awarding conditional use permits to
developers.
The report followed a 10-month
investigation triggered by a complaint that suggested the city’s community
development department had awarded conditional use permits that did not align
with its municipal code.
The grand jury, which has no
authority to take legal action against the entities it investigates, concluded
that the City Council violated its own municipal code when, against the advice
of the city attorney, it approved a zoning clearance for a new business venture
that was not permitted by the zoning ordinances that were in place.
The recreational vehicle
storage business on Spring Road received a temporary zoning clearance in 1994.
The decision, the grand jury
said, ultimately allowed the developer to avoid submitting permit applications
and processing fees for 17 years.
The city’s report disputed the
grand jury’s finding.
It said the zoning clearance
was approved by the city’s former community development director—not the City
Council— in 1994, but was promptly rescinded after it was reviewed by the city
attorney.
The city’s report also disputed
the jury’s finding that the community development department lacks the
organizational structure needed to “provide for adequate and timely management
oversight and technical review of zoning clearances or permits.”
“The conclusion in the grand
jury report was made based on the handling of one case by the community
development staff that occurred 20 years ago,” the city’s response said. “The
handling of that case is not reflective of the organizational structure today.”
The city also defended its
decision not to use specially hired experts to interpret sections of the
municipal code because Dave Bobardt, the community development director, is the
city’s expert in those matters.
The city also found fault with
the report’s assertion that the community development department doesn’t
provide city management with enough information to adequately keep track of
permits.
According to the city’s
response, City Manager Steve Kueny requests information from community
development department as needed.
And the information he
receives, the city said, is adequate.
The city also disagreed with
the grand jury’s assertion that being overly “business friendly” can have
significant consequences to the city.
“Being business friendly does
not imply that the city condones or ignores the violation of any of its laws,”
the city said in its response to the grand jury’s report. “Furthermore, the
current City Council is not in the position to second guess the intentions or
actions of the 1994 City Council.”
The city did agree, however,
with the grand jury’s findings that its community development department
doesn’t have an effective way of alerting city staff to pending and outstanding
violations to city code. What’s more, the report showed the city doesn’t do a
good enough job of keeping track of the permits and the abundance of
correspondence between City Hall and those seeking permits.
Moorpark is taking steps to
address those issues.
Joe Fiss, a principal planner
for the city, said the community development department will continue to look
for ways to improve.
“There is always room for
improvement,” Fiss said. “The city felt that some of the suggestions (by the
grand jury) were appropriate to effectuate and others weren’t necessary to
accomplish our goals.”
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