AREA TOWN VOTES TO JOIN CITY; STEVENSON RANCH COUNCIL SUPPORTS ANNEXATION BID.Byline: Jason Takenouchi Daily News Staff Writer A longstanding struggle to bring more of the Santa Clarita Valley The Santa Clarita Valley is the valley of the Santa Clara River in Southern California. It stretches through Los Angeles County and Ventura County. Its main population center is the city of Santa Clarita. The valley was part of the 48,612-acre (19,672. area under city jurisdiction won a major fight this week with a key vote in Stevenson Ranch Stevenson Ranch, California (in the 91381 ZIP Code) is a Los Angeles County, USA, unincorporated community west of Santa Clarita a few miles south of Six Flags Magic Mountain amusement park. The Stevenson Ranch fountain was redone in 2007. . After a monthslong study by area residents, the Stevenson Ranch Town Council voted 5-2 Wednesday to support incorporating the area into the city of Santa Clarita Santa Clarita, city (1990 pop. 110,642), Los Angeles co., S Calif., suburb 30 mi (48 km) NW of downtown Los Angeles, on the Santa Clara River; inc. 1987. Situated in the Santa Clara valley and nearby canyons, Santa Clarita includes the former towns of Canyon Country, . Town Council President Keith Pritsker said Stevenson Ranch representatives would meet with city officials in coming weeks to discuss the annexation. The process could take 18 months or more, and it will have to be approved by the county's Local Agency Formation Commission. ``We're not ready to file an application with LAFCO LAFCO Local Agency Formation Commission LAFCO Los Angeles Filmmakers Cooperative until we sit down and discuss this with the city,'' Pritsker said. Santa Clarita City Councilman Frank Ferry applauded the vote. ``I think its a major win-win for both the city of Santa Clarita and for Stevenson Ranch,'' Ferry said. ``It speaks highly of our city, and I think LAFCO needs to listen to that.'' If annexed into Santa Clarita, Stevenson Ranch's roughly 6,000 residents would have access to a range of city services The examples and perspective in this article or section may represent an unduly geographically limited view of the subject. Please [ improve this article] or discuss the issue on the talk page. - including police protection - and would have representation closer to home on the City Council. The area is serviced by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department This article is about the Los Angeles County Sherriff's Department, not to be confused with the smaller Los Angeles County Police The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) is a local law enforcement agency that serves Los Angeles County, California. and is represented in Los Angeles by county Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich Michael Dennis Antonovich (born 1939 in Los Angeles, California) is a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors representing the Fifth District, which covers northern Los Angeles County, the Antelope, Santa Clarita, Pasadena, and parts of the San Fernando and San . Area taxes would also flow into city coffers to fund many services, including library access, that Stevenson Ranch tax money does not support now. Annexation supporters said there are still several issues to work out, including the borders of the annexed area, the future of a county park in Stevenson Ranch and cable service. The eventual disposition of the Valencia Marketplace, a shopping plaza just west of current city limits, may be a particularly difficult issue. Under current law, an annexed area must be contiguous with the annexing city. The marketplace lies between Stevenson Ranch and Santa Clarita, and county supervisors may be unwilling to relinquish the area's heavy sales tax sales tax, levy on the sale of goods or services, generally calculated as a percentage of the selling price, and sometimes called a purchase tax. It is usually collected in the form of an extra charge by the retailer, who remits the tax to the government. revenues. Wednesday's Town Council vote came after a special committee of area residents voted 17-1 to support annexation. The body was also charged with considering the possible incorporation of Stevenson Ranch as its own city, but town Councilman Samuel Besse, the committee's chairman, said legal problems worked against that option. Lynette Findlay, a town councilwoman who said she supports annexation, voted against Wednesday's proposal over concerns that residents were not adequately polled on the issue. ``The community hadn't really been asked,'' she said. ``I think annexation is a great thing, but as a town council we have to have the community's input.'' Other annexation supporters said that kind of polling would be done later as part of the official process. |
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