9-30-25
CITY CLERKS OFFICE
City Clerk (Via hand delivery)
City of Santa Clarita
23920 Valencia Blvd., Suite 120 CITY OF SANTA CLARITA
Santa Clarita, CA 91355
2025 SEP 30 PM 4:54
ATTN: Mary Cusick, City Clerk
Rachel Clark, Office of City Clerk
Re: Appeal of WILEY CANYON MIXED-USE PROJECT (MASTER CASE 20-238), And all associated permits (ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN REVIEW 20-023, CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT 20-005, DEVELOPMENT REVIEW 20-017, MINOR USE PERMIT 20-013, OAK TREE PERMIT 425-004, AND TENTATIVE MAP 83295)
INCLUDING REQUIRED FINDINGS OF FACT, AND ADOPTION OF THE MITIGATION
MONITORING AND REPORTING PROGRAM
Project Address: 24924 Hawkbyrn Avenue, Newhall, CA 91321 To the City Clerk:
This letter is an Appeal pursuant to the Santa Clarita Municipal Code (hereafter "Appeal"). When the City and the Planning Commission choose to disregard mandatory local and state requirements imposed on all developments, and do so without lawful justification, a proposed development should be denied. At each phase of this Proposed Project, the record shows that the City has made conscious, knowing choices to allow the developer to ignore required and lawful compliance with City and State planning obligations and requirements, including the City's General Plan.
The Master Case 20-238 development should be denied for these reasons and those discussed in this Appeal, and as supported by the voluminous detailed objections and comments filed over the past several years.
Common sense, state and local law, including the General Plan, should require special interests, and whatever other considerations are placing the interests of this particular developer above those of the residents (key stakeholders) in and around this proposed development, to follow long-established laws and guidelines. This is true especially when the residents' objections have been in service of a shared goal with the City, that is, to make the development of these parcels a better, smart development, not about striking the project altogether. But that hasn't happened in the case of MC 20-238.
For these reasons, this document serves as not only an Appeal to the current City and Planning Commission determinations and approvals allowing MC 20-238 to proceed per Section 17.07.040 of Santa Clarita Municipal Code, but it also serves as a simple process check; it is a reminder that it is not too late for the City to help SCV Residents and the developer create a mutually-beneficial development which is not otherwise on its face grossly deficient in complying with material and substantial 1 categories which a development by law must meet to serve the needs and interest of the people of the City of Santa Clarita. CITY CLERKS OFFICE
CITY OF SANTA CLAR ITA
Santa Clarita Municipal Code Section 17.07.040 Compliance. 2025 SEP 30 PM 4:55
A. Filing. An appeal shall be filed with the Commission Secretary in the case of the Hearing Officer and Commission or the City Clerk in the case of the Council in the form of a letter, along with any accompanying appeal fee, and shall state specifically:
1. A determination or interpretation is not in accord with the purposes of this code; or
2. It is claimed that there was an error or abuse of discretion; or
3. The record includes inaccurate information; or
4. A decision is not supported by the record.
Any one type of violation or defect in the four categories noted above is sufficient to justify vacating all approvals as to all conditions made to date on the MC 20-238.
However, in the case of MC-20-238, the City has violated the letter and spirit of all four categories, repeatedly and knowingly, and to such a degree, which vacating and remanding the approvals is mandated.
1. A determination or interpretation is not in accord with the purposes of this Code. (Santa Clarita Municipal Code Section 17.07.040(A)(1)).
The Santa Clarita Municipal Code depends on the City's compliance with City guidelines and regulations and state laws. At each phase of this project, the City's determinations regarding this proposed development have been grossly counter to the letter and spirit of many important laws and legal guidelines as is required by the Santa Clarita Municipal Code, including but not limited to:
a. The City's General Plan, including but not limited to Circulation Element C-27; b. CEQA (including but not limited to CEQA Guidelines Section 15126.2); c. The City's Conservation and Open Space Element Policy; d. The City's Community Character and Design Guidelines; e. Santa Clarita Municipal Code;
f. SCAQMD regulations and guidelines; and
g. Environmental impact regulations, including but not limited to, siting distance recommendations requiring protocol surveys for, at a minimum, the Crotch Bumble Bee habitat.
Just one of many glaring examples of the City and Planning Commission's willingness to ignore the Code in its determinations regarding this proposed development, and this particular developer, is the City's ongoing refusal to enforce the General Plan (Circulation Element C-27) by requiring the developer to build a 4-lane arterial highway on Wiley Canyon Road. The developer has even bragged to residents 2 that the City told him he didn't need to comply with Circulation Element C-27, and, in support of his claim he mentioned names of people he spoke with at the City.
The City doesn't have the authority to ignore the General Plan and this particular Circulation Element, and especially when the City and predecessor entities to the City of Santa Clarita have required all prior owners of the subject parcels to set aside land in support of a 4-lane arterial highway.
2. It is claimed that there was an error or abuse of discretion. (Santa Clarita Municipal Code Section 17.07.040(A)(2)).
Per CEQA Guidelines Section 15132 (d), the required content of a Final EIR must include the responses of the Lead Agency to significant environmental points raised in the review and consultation process. The city received nearly 1,000 pages of comments on the DEIR and failed to address these comments in a substantive manner that documents any consideration of them.
Yet the Planning Commission chose to certify the Final EIR without meeting this requirement of CEQA. Without the certification of a Final EIR that is CEQA-compliant, the Planning Commission's project approval is inconsistent with law, is not supported by the record and therefore the project's approval is an abuse of discretion.
3. The record includes inaccurate information. (Santa Clarita Municipal Code Section 17.07.040(A)(3)).
An incomplete record means that the City is making decisions based on inaccurate information. The City received nearly 1,000 pages of comments on the DEIR and failed to address these comments in a substantive manner, including importantly, addressing comments about inaccurate the City and developer's inaccurate roadway measurements for Wiley Canyon Road. Making approvals on conditions for the development based on these failures and omissions necessarily renders decisions approving MC-20-238, and considerations related thereto, wholly unsupported and based on gross inaccuracies.
The City has stated to residents and at public hearings that its recommendations) for approval for MC 20-238 are based in part on road, street, and arterial highway measurements (in feet and inches) for which it has never produced documentation and proof of claimed measurements, despite numerous requests in the record for it to provide proof of same. At present, these verbal representations do not rise to the level of "accurate" or reliable information required to support any planning decision.
4. A decision is not supported by the record. Santa Clarita Municipal Code Section 17.07.040(A)(4)).
CITY CLERKS OFFICE
CITY OF SANTA CLARITA
2025 SEP 30 PM 4:55
3 The City has been aware, and continues to be aware, that the following partial list of deficiencies, individually and cumulatively, demonstrate that the City's decisions at each phase of this proposed development are not supported by the record. Here are a few examples of substantial health and safety issues which have been brought to the City's attention over the past few years, in writing but which the City has ignored by approving conditions related to MC 20-238.
• The City failed to evaluate the potential impacts on local neighborhood streets from vehicles avoiding new traffic-slowing features on Wiley Canyon Road and Calgrove Boulevard and the generalized increase in vehicle trips from the project. The City has acknowledged this deficiency by imposing Condition TE20 on the project which requires the submittal of new local traffic counts to the City Engineer within one year after construction. This deferral of both analysis and mitigation is not permitted by CEQA because it prevents the decision-makers from making a fully- informed decision regarding the project. The analysis, and any recommended mitigation, should have come prior to project approval.
Therefore, the decision to approve the project is based on inaccurate information and is not supported by information on the record. • The City ignored the finding in the DEIR that the project site just meets the maximum eight-minute response time that is used by the Los Angeles County Fire Department for planning purposes. The obvious conclusion is that the neighborhoods in the city to the immediate east of the site must wait longer than the eight-minute maximum for response from the closest fire station in Stevenson Ranch, which would be compounded by the project's additional vehicle trips being added to existing roads. Moreover, the project would increase these response times for emergency responders by constructing the traffic-slowing features of two new traffic signals and three new traffic circles. The county had proposed a new fire station site on the Lyons Canyon Ranch Project to address these deficiencies, but then removed this requirement from the approved project., The absence of services in the southern part of the city means that any response to incidents in the Newhall pass would also be unacceptably slow. This is a potentially significant impact that should have been disclosed and mitigated for in the DEIR, possibly by including a fire station site on the 32-acre project site. The DEIR included a determination that there was no impact. Project approval is based on inaccurate information and is not supported by the record.
• The Housing Accountability Act (Gov. Code §65589.5), which the City cites as the reason that the project must be approved by no later than a fifth CITY CLERKS OFF IUE
CITY OF SANTA CLARITA
public hearing states that a housing development project that complies 2025 SEP 30 PM 4:55 with the objective standards of the general plan and zoning ordinance 4 must be approved by the agency, unless the agency is able to make written findings based on the preponderance of the evidence in the record CITY CLERKS OFFICE that there is an impact to the public health and safety and this impact cannot be mitigated. This exception would apply to a project that brings CITY OF SANTA CLARITA 232 townhome /detached condominium units and a senior/assisted-living facility with 120 units within the 500-foot setback from the I-5 Freeway that 2025 SEP 30 PM 4:56 violates the residential planning standards of both the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and the South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) and for which no site characterization sampling for air quality was performed.
The air quality analysis in the DEIR uses data from SCAQMD stations in Van Nuys, Downtown Los Angeles and in Newhall to east of Railroad Avenue. Site concentrations of pollutants, particularly PM 10/2.5, are undoubtedly higher at the project site than those at the SCAQMD stations used for modeling due to the site being located immediately adjacent to one of the greatest line sources of air pollution in the state, I-5. Additionally, the project location is at the northern base of the Newhall Pass, and vehicles accelerate in the southbound lanes at the site to begin to climb over the pass and, correspondingly, vehicles brake in the northbound lanes at the base of the pass in order to slow after descending from the top of the pass. These characteristics would lead to an increase in pollutants, particularly particulate matter, which are then pushed onto the site by nighttime drainage winds from the pass as well as from other hills to the north, west and east of the project site. Since the existing level of pollution onsite is unknown, a site characterization study with real time sampling needs to be completed to ascertain actual ambient air quality on site. The modeling performed for the Draft EIR is a desktop computer exercise and does not factor in these characteristics, thereby understating the potential impacts. Therefore, there is no adequate site characterization of levels of air pollution on site in the record.
This project would expose both the elderly and children to high levels of pollution of undefined severity and represents a public health and safety impact that cannot be mitigated. This deficiency, like many others brought to the City and the Commission's attention, could be used for the city's denial of the project.
The record includes inaccurate information and the determination that project must be approved is not supported by the record.
The record is replete with evidence demonstrating this project is inconsistent with many of the desired characteristics that are used to make significance determinations.
The record is similarly replete with objections and comments highlighting gross and substantial violations of long-established criteria for a lawful development which violations are 1) Numerous and in all material categories 2) Typical of projects which courts easily quash, vacate and remand as failing to be compliant with CEQA and local 5 law on its face; and 3) Significant - the current approvals of conditions for MC 20-238 affect the quality of life of real people (pollution, noise, dangerous traffic, patterns, etc.).
Further, the record amply demonstrates an alarming willingness by the City to throw out the entire rule book for this developer and this proposed development.
The City and Planning Commission still have a chance to do the job required for all proposed developments and require the developer to follow local and state law. The City should also work with appellants and the developer to build a scaled project which is in conformity with a planned community - one where the guiding principles encapsulated in the General Plan are utilized, not ignored for this one developer. If prior owners of these parcels can be required to follow the law, so can this developer.
Appellants hereby request that the City and the Planning Commission reverse their prior approvals on all conditions for MC 20-238 and deny this proposed development as grossly deficient in dozens of categories. Instead, the City should use common sense and the law to require this developer to follow local and state law for the health, welfare, safety and quality of life of the ultimate stakeholders in any good City Planning analysis, SCV residents. The appellants look forward to meeting with members of the Council to discuss our concerns in greater detail and explore a resolution to our concerns.
Respectfully submitted,
Appellants within 500' of the project and included within the attached signature list:
Linda Heberer, 24857 Fourl Road, Newhall, CA 91321
Ed Bernstein, 24634 Fourl Road, Newhall, CA 91321
Loraine Cuomo, 24868 Fourl Road, Newhall, CA 91321
CITY CLERKS OFFICE
CITY OF SANTA CLARITA
2025 SEP 30 PM 4:56
6 The below listed individuals and groups hereby appeal the following entitlements:
WILEY CANYON MIXED-USE PROJECT (MASTER CASE 20-238),
And all associated permits (ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN REVIEW 20-023, CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT 20-005, DEVELOPMENT REVIEW 20-017, MINOR USE PERMIT 20-013, OAK TREE PERMIT 425-004, AND TENTATIVE MAP 83295) INCLUDING REQUIRED FINDINGS OF FACT,
AND ADOPTION OF THE MITIGATION MONITORING AND REPORTING PROGRAM NAME ZIP Signature
inge Heer 89857 swen taken
ED BERNSTEIN 24634 FOURL RD 9/321 C
Loraine Cuona 24868 FaurI Rd 91321
23901 CanerweLL St. „Cata fune
Monan Jimenez 2351 Generwell 58 41321 Manh news
Licil Amenez 23941 Canerwelst 91321 2
MARNIN GONZALEZ
Rhoda Strother 25400 Avenida Escalera 91355 strother
CITICSFGARFRY
2625 SEX 30
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