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Santa Barbara City Council approves document, which covers downtown’s revitalization DAVE MASON/NEWS-PRESS PHOTOSState Street Master Planner Tess Harris answers questions from Santa Barbara City Council members Tuesday. The council voted to accept the master plan.
The Santa Barbara City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to accept an updated State Street Master Plan, considered a “visioning document” for the next 30 to 50 years, with an eye toward the downtown’s economic revitalization.
The master plan update represents the work of the State Street Advisory Committee, which also asked the council to spend up to $709,000-plus to hire consultant MIG Inc. to work with the city to meet the plan’s goals over the next 16 to 18 months until its expected completion in December 2023.
Councilmembers also directed city staff to return with their suggestions for interim steps to take concerning the current downtown pedestrian promenade and dining parklets, including new construction, the size of outdoor areas and rent for the parklets.
The council’s ad hoc subcommittee is expected to return to the full council in September with its recommendations concerning rules and regulations, rents and parklet portability. The committee will also report on providing more security and lighting downtown, ensuring adequate stormwater drainage and possibly resuming parades on lower State Street.
The downtown revitalization effort called for in the Master Plan will focus on the State Street area from Anacapa to Chapala streets and State Street from Sola Street to the Highway 101 underpass.
At left, A master plan for lower State Street, which became a pedestrian promenade complete with outdoor parklets for businesses, was approved Tuesday by the Santa Barbara City Council. At right, Councilmember Oscar Gutierrez asks Master Planner Tess Harris whether MIG consultants for the State Street plan would be located in Santa Barbara or working remotely. “The project manager is based in their Bay Area office,” Ms. Harris told him, but added MIG staff will be in Santa Barbara often.Councilmembers and several people speaking in person or virtually spoke highly of the master plan, saying how excited they were to see the process move forward.
“This is what we need now, not in the future, but now,” Councilmember Kristen Sneddon said. “It strengthens to me the commitment and direction we need to be going in.”
Anytime someone mentions “going backward” to the way it was pre-COVID, “we hear overwhelming cries from the community to keep going forward but in a carefully planned way with a very structured plan, and that takes money,” she said.
“It really is an exciting day for us for a lot of reasons,” Councilmember Meagan Harmon added, praising the hard work put in by the advisory committee to create a “visionary” master plan. “We are not only putting this plan together for right now but also for generations to come. I’m really excited to be voting yes.”
There was some dissent, however. One speaker criticized the high consulting fee. Another urged councilmembers to ensure safety downtown when implementing the master plan, and one railed against using such a “logical” approach to deal with the “irrational” problem of gang behavior in the downtown area.
People travel on lower State Street in various ways.For the most part, though, it was nothing but praise, especially for the Advisory Committee’s commitment to continue to accept residents’ input along the way by holding public meetings and charrettes, and appearing at community events and neighborhood meetings.
“We want to keep the momentum going,” State Street Master Planner Tess Harris said. “And we’re going to engage members of the public.”
Although MIG’s home office is in the bay area, consultants will be in town repeatedly throughout the year to tour the downtown, participate in public outreach including the Spanish-speaking community, appear before the council and advisory committee and work with staff and other “stakeholders” to turn the plan into reality, Ms. Harris said.
She said city staff and the consultant will act as “facilitators” while the master plan continues to receive input and move forward.
“The community will be designing the master plan,” she said.
In response to councilmembers’ questions about implementing the plan once all the design work is completed, she said that final, more detailed designs would have to be made based on everything gathered over the interim.
She said funding sources for capital improvements would have to be identified before any actual changes are made downtown.
email: nhartstein@newspress.com
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