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Susana Barrios
From:Christine DeBaz <cdebaz@gmail.com>
Sent:Monday, October
To:Public Comment
Subject:\[EXTERNAL\] Deer Canyon Reserve
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To the City Council,
I am a resident of the city of Anaheim and I am very concerned about the possibility of the development
of Deer Canyon. I have many concerns and disagree with many aspects of the project, but I will highlight
just a few.
First, I would like to you to understand the perspective of residents after the Planning Commission
meeting. After many hours of tax payers, residents, and voters vocalizing their love and fears for our
community, an unelected planning commission disregarded not only them, but also our hard working
police department, fire department, and city planner. This is something I truly do not understand. How
this commission could hear from, not just individuals, but our own civil servants, and still vote as they
did. And during their vote, some members appeared taunting and rude to the residents that came out to
speak. Is that an appropriate way to respond to the voice of the public in our government? What message
does that send to others? That our government will listen to you just to turn around and taunt back while
making jokes about rooftop cocktails? Again, these officials are unelected, so we would have little
recourse in removing them from office for their behavior, so what consequences could they have?
Many have expressed fears of a future fire evacuation and shared their stories of the gridlock traffic
during the last evacuation. Climate change only threatens us more and more every year. The developers
would love to say how they might be reducing fire risk, might I recommend we just pave over all of
Santiago Oaks Park? Perfect, now it can never burn! Why stop there, let’s pave over all the national
parks, cure this state of fires with concrete. Frankly, if we’re not listening to our fire department’s
evaluation and opinion of the fire and evacuation risk, then I believe the city should be held liable for
injuries that happen during the next evacuation. This level of neglect is offensive to our fire fighters, who
will be risking their lives trying to save people from a problem that the city made worse, and that they
warned would happen.
I hope that you, our elected officials, can hear our voices. The planning committee tried to divide us,
putting the “hills versus the flat landers.” This rhetoric is disgusting and dangerous. What a terrible
picture to paint. We are all citizens, trying to keep our families safe, in a world where fires are getting
worse and summers are getting hotter. While the planning committee is unelected, the city council is. I
hope that this means that the city council can more clearly represent its constituents, listen respectfully,
and avoid mocking the real fears of real people.
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I look forward to seeing you all at this week’s meeting.
Christine DeBaz
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