BIG SIGN PLAN IRKS LOCALS.

Byline: Heather MacDonald Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA - Residents gearing up to fight plans for an electronic sign along the the Golden State Freeway touting the Valencia Town Center Mall and Auto Row say it will hurt their property values and cheapen their neighborhood.

But members of Santa Clarita's business community say the sign could boost sales - and tax revenues for the city - by as much as 30 percent.

``The idea is for people to come to Santa Clarita and spend their money,'' said Newhall Land and Farming Co. spokeswoman Marlee Lauffer. ``If you are on the freeway, you don't know that you are near a huge mall and about a dozen dealerships.''

Newhall Land is proposing to build the monument sign and message center just north of the Valencia Boulevard off-ramp, so motorists can exit and travel east on Magic Mountain Parkway to the mall area. The sign will not be visible from any homes, said city planner Enrique Diaz.

``It is blight,'' said Tom Dicioccio, a Valencia resident. ``A tacky, lit sign won't enhance this golf course community.''

Newhall Land, which owns the mall and planned the Auto Row, is seeking a conditional use permit from the Santa Clarita Planning Commission. The commission is scheduled to consider the sign in June, said city Planning Manager Vince Bertoni.

The planned sign is permitted under the city's sign ordinance because the sign will benefit a regional shopping area of more than 50 acres, is less than 20 feet tall and smaller than 1,000 square feet, Bertoni said.

``If business owners in Newhall and Canyon Country wanted to band together, they would certainly be allowed to put up a sign under the code,'' Bertoni said.

Dicioccio said Newhall Land should hold a meeting to answer residents' concerns about the sign.

``That's just good public relations,'' Dicioccio said.

Over the past several months, city officials have enforced the city's sign ordinance in earnest, asking many businesses all over town to take down or change their signs.

Twice in the last six months the ordinance has been revised, once to ease restrictions in downtown Newhall and most recently to exempt businesses in historical buildings, like the Saugus Cafe in Newhall.

Last week, the city agreed to a variance for the Santa Clarita Athletic Club; its 40-foot-tall sign sits at the mouth of the Santa Clarita Valley near the Calgrove Boulevard off-ramp on the interstate. City officials will work with the club's owner, Ron Hamilton, to make the sign ``less of an eyesore.''

In return for the variance, Hamilton agreed to allow the city to run advertisements for charity and community events at least 30 percent of the time.

The Auto Row and mall sign would also trumpet city events and fund- raisers, Lauffer said.

``We don't expect people to pull off the freeway on their way somewhere and buy a car, but they'll come back in the future if they know it is there,'' Lauffer said.

Plans for the sign were discussed in a series of closed-door meetings April 18 with individual council members at the Hyatt Valencia. U.S. Rep. Howard P. ``Buck'' McKeon, school district officials and business people attended the secret meetings organized by Will Fleet, publisher of The Signal newspaper.

Don Fleming, the president of the Santa Clarita Automobile Dealers' Association and owner of Valencia Acura, also attended those meetings. He said this week that there was nothing sinister about plans for the sign.

``Of course it is a selfish thing, because we want to see more business,'' Fleming said. ``But it could really increase the city's sales tax revenues.''

Car sales account for 25 percent of the sales tax revenues that the city collects, which make up a significant portion of the city's annual budget, said Assistant City Manager Ken Pulskamp.

Revenues in next year's budget are flat, and the City Council has started looking in recent months for ways to increase revenues to offset a slow-down in construction. In April, at the behest of the car dealers, they approved $30,000 for a campaign that will urge residents to shop locally for a car in the hopes it would lift the city's bottom line.

The Automobile Dealers' Association sponsored a November fund-raiser for Mayor Laurene Weste and Councilman Frank Ferry, both of whom plan to run for re-election in 2002. Weste and Ferry collected about $10,000 at the fund-raiser, held at the Hyatt.

``We're going to put up a sign that will be in the very best of taste that will showcase Valencia and Santa Clarita,'' Fleming said. ``The city will be proud of it.''