The City of Santa Maria is working with a local development company to construct a five-story building with housing and retail space that the city hopes will help revitalize downtown.
Earlier this year, local developer Vernon Property Group purchased a nearby discount store to convert into apartments. Now, they’re purchasing other properties throughout the city to develop.
Chuen Ng is the Community Development Director for Santa Maria. He said plans to revitalize downtown have been in the works for more than 10 years.
“The last update was done in 2015. In 2019 we adopted a downtown streetscape plan, and this is intended to beautify the corridors of Maine and Broadway which intersect the downtown area,” Ng said.
Last month the city had a meeting finalizing the developer agreement with Vernon, but Ng said the project is still subject to review by the downtown community, the planning commission, and city council. He said in the past the city has gathered input from residents asking for more entertainment and recreational spaces.
“What we've heard over the years is that our residents want a downtown that's pedestrian friendly, that there will be places to go to, that there would be a mix of uses including a commercial residential but certainly, you know, entertainment uses, cultural uses that people can go to,” Ng said.
Ng said the agreement looks to revitalize several underused parking lots, a plaza and a park in Santa Maria. He says the developer has proposed concepts for combining residential and commercial development with the goal of having a place to gather in the community.
“Just good safe comfortable spaces that people can congregate and gather and just to make the downtown a destination again,” Ng said.
Ng said as the project moves forward there will be more opportunity for public input at city council meetings. He said their biggest obstacle will be having the community accept the city’s larger revitalization goals.
“Not everyone may agree on the intensity of the proposed concepts — you know, there are five story buildings being proposed. There's a lot of housing that's been proposed,” Ng said.
He said there is still a lot of work to do, and the next step is the entitlement process where the developer seeks the right to develop on the property through zoning and occupancy permits.
The Santa Maria City Council meets every two weeks on Tuesdays at 5:30.
