The future of solar energy at the Newbury Park Library just became a little dimmer.
A month after hiring an engineer to design the project, the city has learned it won’t receive thousands of dollars in funding it was counting on to help pay the cost of installing carports mounted with solar panels in the parking lot of the library on Borchard Road.
When the City Council gave the go-ahead to the estimated $1.2-million plan in November, staff cost estimates included $372,000 of funding from the California Solar Initiative—a rebate program sponsored by the Public Utilities Commission and managed through Southern California Edison.
At the time, the city was awaiting response from Edison as to whether an extension it requested to apply for the money had been approved.
“ It’s not really anybody’s fault,” Perez said. “It’s just how the system works.”
Perez said she submitted another application to Edison around Dec. 23, but this time the most the city could qualify for is about $200,000—at least $172,000 less than was originally expected. The solar rebate fund decreases with time, an incentive for cities to use the money sooner rather than later.
“We’re going forward with it (nonetheless),” Perez said. “Obviously it’s always disappointing (to miss out on money).”
The loss means that the taxpayers’ portion of the somewhat controversial $1.2-million solar energy project is now estimated to be $ 612,000, as opposed to the $440,000 figure that was presented to the council in November. In turn, the predicted payback period— the time it takes for the solar panels to pay for themselves in energy-cost savings—increases from 15 to 20 years.
When asked about the loss in funding and whether it would affect her support for the solar panels, Councilmember Jacqui Irwin said she had just returned from vacation and hadn’t heard the news.
Irwin, a supporter of the project in November, said it was something she’d have to consider.
City projects can’t just be good for the environment, they must also make fiscal sense, Irwin said.
“If the payoff period is too long, in my opinion, we shouldn’t be doing it,” she said.
Councilmember Claudia Billde la Peña wants the city to explore alternatives, such as leasing the property to energy companies to create solar energy, similar to public private ventures in Europe.
“They should be investigated before we move forward on spending $1.2 million on solar panels,” Bill-de la Peña said in an e-mail. “At the least, we could try to renegotiate the current deal to make it more cost-effective for the taxpayers.”
Bill-de la Peña said she’s also concerned that the project has drawn little support from the community because of how the panels look.
“That is why I suggested a broad community meeting for more public input, but it was not supported by the council majority,” she said.
When asked what caused the city to miss Edison’s original deadline of Nov. 17, Perez said it generally takes one to two years to apply for outside funding.
In the case of the Solar Initiative money, Thousand Oaks only had eight months, the maximum time allowed by the program. Perez said she thought the effort it would take to meet the deadline was worth the opportunity to obtain “free money” for the project.
But the plans hit a roadblock in September when the planning commission unanimously rejected the solar panel project, citing “aes- thetic concerns.”
The commission’s action added further delay because it forced the issue to go before the City Council.
At the Nov. 16 City Council meeting, several critics, most of them from Newbury Park, said the panels would be an unsightly welcome to the city and would cost too much. Noting their concern but moving the project forward, the City Council approved a $107,000 contract with Digital Energy of Thousand Oaks, asking for several design options.
Perez said she hopes to know before the Jan. 25 City Council meeting whether the city qualifies for the rebate and, if so, how much.
Depending on action taken by the council, final construction costs and a recommended contractor could go before the City Council for approval by April, Perez said. If all goes as planned, construction could start by early June.
In addition to the Edison rebate, the city will pay for the solar panels with $400,000 in federal stimulus funds and the remainder from the general fund.
Lifetime medical benefits at center of discussions
Two City Council members are meeting with staff this week to review compensation for the council, namely a provision that guarantees lifetime medical coverage to council members who are over 50 and have served five years in office.
Councilmembers Tom Glancy and Jacqui Irwin, who sit on the city’s finance audit committee, were expected to meet Wednesday with staff to begin evaluating salary and benefits for the city’s five council members.
At least since 1998, Thousand Oaks City Council members can receive lifetime citypaid monthly health insurance premiums benefits for themselves and their immediate family.
To receive the benefits, council members must be at least 50 years old and have served on the council for at least five years. They also cannot accept another position in government that provides California Public Employees’ Retirement System (Cal PERS) pension benefits.
Since the council adopted the ordinance, three council members have retired and received this benefit: Ed Masry, Alex Fiore and Judy Lazar. Four people are currently receiving benefits: Masry’s widow, Joette; Fiore’s widow, Katherine; and Lazar and her husband, Roger.
Prompted by questions from voters, Councilmember Dennis Gillette brought up the issue of lifetime medical coverage during a November council meeting shortly after being reelected to a fourth term.
Gillette said he raised the issue because the decision for lifetime health benefits was made in a different economic climate, most likely before he took office in December 1998.
“Quite honestly, I don’t recall it,” Gillette said of the vote that established the benefit.
Gillette said although he thinks a careful scrutiny of the council’s compensation is appropriate and warranted, by no means is he implying the city is mismanaged.
“Is it appropriate or isn’t it? That (question) to me is a real simple thing,” Gillette said.
Mayor Andy Fox says it’s inappropriate.
“That’s completely out of line with the public’s expectation,” Fox said of the lifetime benefits.
Councilmember Claudia Billde la Peña and Planning Commissioner Al Adam, one of 10 challengers in last year’s election, have called for an immediate termination of the council members’ lifetime benefits.
Bill-de la Peña has said taxpayers “should not be on the hook” for lifetime medical benefits for council members and their families, especially considering the council is a part-time position.
“I don’t know of anyone in the private sector who receives such a generous benefit after five years in a part-time position,” Bill-de la Peña said.
The council majority rejected the idea of immediately terminating the benefit in November, saying such a move could have unintended consequences with Cal PERS and affect the council’s current health coverage. Instead, they ordered a review.
At least one person at the Dec. 14 meeting criticized the City Council for not including members of the public in the fact-finding efforts of the finance audit committee.
Gillette and Glancy said it’s routine for only council members to sit on certain committees, such as the finance audit and facilities committees.
“That’s a housekeeping issue and it’s done routinely,” Gillette said. “There’s no controversial issue here.”
But Pete Sepp, spokesperson for the nonpartisan advocacy group National Taxpayers Union based in Alexandria, Va., echoed what many residents expressed to the council: How can those with a vested interest in keeping these benefits recommend their termination?
Sepp said that T.O.’s lifetime health benefits policy for council members is more generous than for members of Congress. Federal congressional retirees must be 62 or older to receive healthcare for life for themselves and their spouse.
People are living and working longer than in times past, Sepp pointed out, so, in addition to the cost to taxpayers, lifetime healthcare benefits for former council members in their 50s “may not have a basis in common sense anymore.”
The Jan. 5 finance audit committee meeting and any of its subsequent meetings are closed to the public. But the committee’s findings will be made public when they’re presented to the City Council, Glancy said.
Glancy said he didn’t know when that would happen because it depends on the number of times the committee needs to meet before coming to a decision.
Glancy said he expects the committee to submit a “totally unbiased” report to the City Council.
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Dean takes over newlook sheriff’s department
2011-01-06 / Front Page
OATH OF OFFICE—Camarillo resident Geoff Dean was sworn in this week as the 19th sheriff in the history of the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department. RICHARD GILLARD/Acorn NewspapersVentura County has a new sheriff in charge.
Geoff Dean was sworn in Monday before an audience of police, county and city officials at the county government center in Ventura.
Dean replaces Bob Brooks, who retired after 37 years with the department, to lead an agency with 1,200 employees, a budget of more than $200 million, and five contract cities to keep watch over—including Thousand Oaks.
Sworn into office by Clerk-Recorder Mark Lunn, Dean then swore in his assistant sheriffs, Gary Pentis and John Crombach.
“It’s kind of surreal,” Dean, 53, said of the brief afternoon ceremony that provided a final chapter to the contentious 2010 race for sheriff which pitted Dean against Dennis Carpenter, a now-retired chief deputy. “It’s an awesome experience. It’s a huge responsibility.”
CRIMEFIGHTERS—Sheriff Geoff Dean and assistant sheriffs Gary Pentis, left, and John Cromback are tasked with maintaining the department’s level of service amid deep budget cuts. RICHARD GILLARD/Acorn NewspapersJoined by his children— daughter Lindsey, 22, and son Andy, 19— Dean’s wife, Marlene, pinned the badge to his chest moments before he took the oath of office.
“It’s not about me, it’s about the office of the sheriff,” Dean said. “It’s a distinguished office.”
Even as he savored the moment, the new top lawman in the county already had his eyes set on the obstacles that lie ahead, namely budget cuts.
“We’re seeing significantly reduced revenues coming into the county in all forms of government, and our challenge is to deliver the necessary services with reduced revenue,” he said.
“We have to keep doing what we can with less and less money.”
To help lower the department’s payroll, Dean announced in November his plans to name Pentis and Crombach as assistant sheriffs, new positions created to replace the former executive command staff that included an undersheriff and four chief deputies.
The move is expected to save about $1 million a year.
County Supervisor Kathy Long lauded Dean’s decision to trim the executive command staff and said she looks forward to maintaining a good relationship between the sheriff’s office and the board of supervisors.
“It’s not him against us or any of that,” said Long, the board’s chair. “He understands the relationship and that we need to support one another.”
The new positions mean Pentis and Crombach will divide the department and manage approximately 600 employees each, a job that was once the task of five executive officers.
Pentis, who commanded special services as a chief deputy, now also oversees the county’s three jail facilities as head of detention services. Special services includes major crimes, SWAT, the air unit and the bomb squad.
Pentis is a 32-year veteran of the department.
“ I’ve worked every geographical area of this county in 32 years . . . and to be valued by citizens when you’re working law enforcement in their area and to be valued by their elected representatives is extremely rewarding,” said Pentis, 56.
Crombach starts at the sheriff’s department two months after retiring from the Oxnard Police Department, where he’d served as chief since 2005.
Dean joked with his longtime friend during the induction ceremony, pointing out that Crombach began his career with the sheriff’s department in 1978 but soon left for more than three decades with the Oxnard Police Department.
“Ironically it took him that long to realize he belonged in this color,” Dean said, referring to the tan and green uniform of the sheriff’s department.
Crombach, 57, will oversee patrol and support services. Patrol services include deputies patrolling each of the department’s five contract cities, emergency services and the communications center. Support services includes financial and business operations, human resources and the regional training academy.
Dean, Pentis and Crombach all live in Camarillo.
Cmdr. Steve DeCesari, chief of the Camarillo Police Department, said Dean’s arrival hasn’t signaled any large- scale changes across the department.
“Everything we’ve been doing for the past six months would indicate to me that everything is pretty much going to be the same. We’re just going to be a little leaner at the top,” DeCesari said. “ I think with day- to- day business people won’t see any difference.”
DeCesari said the command staff will have its first meeting with Dean as sheriff soon, and there will also be a meeting in the coming days with the department’s managing ranks.
Brooks, whose career included three terms as sheriff, said he is ready for retirement.
“I feel great about my career, and I feel great about the future of this department,” said Brooks, who will leave on a humanitarian mission to Haiti in February. “It’s a good way to go out.”
When asked about the changing of the guard moments after the ceremony, Brooks, who backed Carpenter in the sheriff’s race, focused on the future.
“The department is in good shape; I can leave with a clear conscience,” he said. “It’s in real good hands.”
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Rent hearing for Thunderbird is Monday
2011-01-06 / Community
HEARING SET—The owner of a T.O. mobile home park wants to raise rents $323 per month. MICHELLE KNIGHT/Acorn NewspapersThe city’s Rent Adjustment Commission will hear arguments Monday from an attorney representing a mobile home park owner who wishes to raise rents and from residents who say they can’t afford it.
Andrew Hohn, owner of Thunderbird Oaks Mobile Home Park, applied to the city last spring to raise rent at the lowincome senior park by several hundred dollars per month per space.
Rent at the 161-space park south of Thousand Oaks Boulevard and Live Oak Street ranges from $373 to $525 a month. Hohn proposes raising the monthly rent $261, to between $634 and $786.
City code requires owners of mobile home parks to file a detailed application justifying rent increases on the basis of improvements made to the property or to recoup a “just and reasonable return.”
Hohn’s attorney, Boyd Hill of Hart, King & Coldren of Santa Ana has told the Acorn in past interviews that the property owner has a constitutional right to get a fair return on his investment.
Marilyn Aurand, spokesperson for Thunderbird Oaks residents, said as many as 100 of her neighbors plan to attend the 6 p.m. public hearing Monday at city hall, which is expected to go late into the night.
The city’s staff report and recommendation to the commission on what it considers a just and reasonable return for Hohn is expected to be posted on the city’s website today, along with a report from paid consultants Kenneth Baar, a mobile home expert hired by the city, and Anderson & Brabant, an Escondido firm hired to do an appraisal of the park.
Thunderbird residents were expected to meet yesterday to organize transportation to the evening meeting. Some of the elderly residents don’t venture out at night alone because they have poor night vision, are unable to drive or have difficulty walking, Aurand said. Others are in wheelchairs or need to carry oxygen tanks.
“It’s a big deal to get there,” Aurand said.
Park residents plan to wear signs at the meeting identifying themselves. They call their group SOS, or Save Our Seniors.
“We want the city to know exactly who we are,” Aurand said. “We want them to know they’re going to destroy us if they do this.”
Aurand said residents from other mobile home parks in Thousand Oaks—Ranch, Vallecito, Conejo—and the advocacy group Congress for California Seniors have said they’ll attend Monday’s meeting in a show of support.
It’s reasonable to expect the Rent Adjustment Commission to make a decision before the end of the month, said Russ Watson, the city’s housing and redevelopment manager. Either party has 14 days after receiving the commission’s decision in writing to file an appeal to the City Council.
The 6 p.m. Jan. 10 public hearing will be in the Scherr Forum. All commission meetings are open to the public.
A second hearing on the proposed rent hike at Ranch Mobile Home Park in Newbury Park— also owned by Hohn—will be on Mon., Jan. 24.
That meeting is being continued from Dec. 6 because commissioners felt the meeting was running too long.
