Do We Really Need to Annex Mont Calabasas?
Annexation of Mont Calabasas to the City of Calabasas is not an issue to be glossed over, whether one lives in the City or in the community of Mont Calabasas. While the City could use a new source of revenue, we see no evidence that the annexation of nearby communities will accomplish this. The additional revenue opportunity by annexing Mont Calabasas is virtually nil: modest utility taxes and fees collected for landscape maintenance of neighborhood streets. The City of Calabasas web site estimates it’ll take in an additional $123,000 per year after the annexation. This doesn’t even scratch the $3M-$4M deficit the city will generate this year.
For this modest annual sum of $123,000, the residents of Mont Calabasas will get…not much. Most likely, less. They already receive the necessary services including Sheriff, water, power, trash, and sewer. It’s not known what benefit LAFCO will receive. But disgruntled Mont Calabasas residents point out that the LAFCO wasn’t encouraging residents to protest the annexation as it didn’t include a return envelope in its recent mailing of protest forms.
In terms of political support, residents of Mont Calabasas appear to be doing well, pointing out that County Supervisor Mr. Yaroslavsky has been responsive to and supportive of their needs. The City of Calabasas, on the other hand, does not have a great track record with its citizens. Although to be fair, it’s new Council has offered citizens an amnesty period of 90 days to relieve the City of its lawsuits over septic system inspections. While it appears that the City has a new Council that is more responsive, City management itself hasn’t changed. The City Council is really nothing more than a Board of Directors. If you’re an investor in a company and a change in direction is needed, you might make changes to your BOD, but that’s certainly not where your focus would be.
If there is an argument for annexing Mont Calabasas, the citizens of Calabasas have yet to hear it. One would expect that it will cost the City of Calabasas significantly more than $123,000 per year to enforce its new heavy-handed Municipal Code in such virgin territory. Even if its new Municipal Code proves to be a generator of new revenue through fines and permits, why would Mont Calabasas residents want to set themselves up for that?
If you’re a resident of Mont Calabasas, you have until June 8 to make your wishes known. You have been mailed protest forms for this purpose. To do nothing is a “yes” vote for annexation. A “no” vote requires you to respond by returning the protest form. It will take 25% of you to protest in order to get an actual vote taken in the community. That’s a high margin requirement, and means it’s going to take action to make this happen. If you vote this down, you’ll be in good company with the residents of Mountain View Estates who do not want to be annexed.
We know of no justification for annexing Mont Calabasas into the City of Calabasas, and looking at it from the other end of the deal, there’s no benefit, and more likely a negative benefit, of being annexed. This just looks like another effort of empire building. Given that the City has a budget problem, let’s hope we don’t have to add more to deficit spending. As with any company, before looking to expand, management needs to first demonstrate that it can efficiently operate what it has. The City of Calabasas needs to focus on fixing its financial issues. And what better way to do that than to cut expansion plans and start cleaning up City management?
