Alzheimer's Club

By Chuck Schultz

Objections by some Orcutt homeowners to plans for a 14-bedroom house on Soloman Road, where seniors with Alzheimer's disease would be cared for, will be heard Tuesday by the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors.

Opponents contend the care facility proposed by Chuck and Margie Halsell shouldn't be allowed in an area characterized by ranchette homes, each on one acre or more and many with horse stables.

County staff planners who approved the project - and whose decision was unanimously upheld in December by the Planning Commission - note that special care homes for seniors are routinely permitted in residential areas, under both state law and county land-use regulations.

Jack Brady, who is appealing the commission's decision to the supervisors, said he and some of his neighbors worry the senior facility could fail financially and then be converted to some other use, such as a drug-rehabilitation center or a halfway house for paroled prisoners.

The site is along the south side of Solomon, adjacent to Song Lane.

“It's horse county,” observed Brady, who owns a home in the same block on Solomon. “I'd call this a commercial facility, but the state and county define it as a residential facility.”

Residents of the 61-home Westrails subdivision directly east of the Halsells' property are concerned, too, about what the big house might be used for in the future, said Terry Morgan, a homeowners association board member.

“We don't want it to end up being a drug rehabilitation facility,” he said.

Even the proposed senior facility “would be too commercialized in the middle of a residential development,” he contended.

Marcie Halsell said numerous design changes have been made in response to neighbors' concerns since the permit application was submitted to the county Planning and Development Department last year. Second floors were deleted from the plans for adding two wings onto the existing, two-story structure, and there won't be any second-floor windows facing toward the Westrails tract, as originally envisioned, she said.

The home is 4,463 square feet now, and has four bedrooms, but would be expanded to 7,940 square feet.

“This area is very suitable for” the proposed Alzheimer's facility, she added. “The state needs to encourage the opening of these homes.”

Improvements already made to the property include paving what was a dirt road to a width of 24 feet, installing a fire hydrant and adding an 80-foot-wide cul de sac where emergency vehicles can turn around.

“We've already improved the look and safety of the neighborhood,” Halsell said.

The supervisors will meet beginning at 9 a.m. at the Betteravia Government Center, 511 E. Lakeside Parkway in Santa Maria.

Also on their agenda Tuesday is an item relating to a controversial plan to extend Stubblefield Road in Orcutt so it connects to Black Oak Drive.

Against the wishes of some nearby residents, the supervisors in July approved a 160-foot extension of Stubblefield eastward from where it now dead ends.

Connecting it to Black Oak Road will make Stubblefield a thoroughfare for housing tracts such as Vintage Ranch and Mesa Verde, but opponents contend it will mean too much traffic through their neighborhoods and diminish their quality of life.

The extended road would pass through land slated to become a neighborhood park when the 725-home Rice Ranch project is built. So, the supervisors are being asked Tuesday to revise that project's “specific plan” to reflect the Stubblefield extension.

Source: Chuck Schultz. Alzheimer's care facility on agenda. lompocrecord.com (26 Feb 2007) [FullText] Chuck Schultz can be reached at cschultz[at]lompocrecord.com

Labels: Alzheimer's Care