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Susana Barrios
From: Debi C <
Sent: Monday, October 28, 2024 4:50 PM
To: Starla Huerta <SHuerta@anaheim.net>
Subject: \[EXTERNAL\] time sensitive
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Hi Starla, let's try this again. Please let me know when you have forwarded this to the city council and
mayor. Thank you.
Dear City Council members, I had hoped to take you for a hike up Deer Canyon and offer lunch or dinner
to you last week but there was a communication error and the invitation never made it to you. I wanted to
discuss the pros and cons of the proposed Salt development.
Who: I am a constituent of district 6, stay at home mom to four kids and a proud Utahn.
Where: I live kitty-corner to where the proposed Salt development wants to build. Next to the storage
units. We've been here almost 7 years.
I hope you watched the recorded city meeting (September 30th) which the last council passed this on to
you. Everyone was scared about being able to evacuate when there will be another fire in The Hills.
The EPA reading was that the building will not cause a fire risk and it seemed that the council took this as
there is no danger. Please do not assume this makes our neighborhood safe or better off in a fire! Our
police and fire chiefs and (I'm sorry I don't know her title or name) the woman who started the meeting all
said that more traffic/more people to evacuate will be a problem and opposed it.
My concerns:
TEACHERS AND SCHOOLS: Just west of the proposed Salt development is El Rancho Middle Charter
School. This school is fed by Crescent, Running Springs, Anaheim Hills, Canyon Rim and Imperial
Elementary Schools. My daughter goes there. There are 40+ students in every one of her classes! She and
her friends have all said the same thing when I ask how 7th grade is at the start of the year, 'there are a lot
of kids'. My daughter barely makes it to her classes on time. Her periods are on opposite sides of campus
and she is back and forth but it's not the distance, it's navigating through the thick crowd.
I have two other children at Crescent Elementary. Last year there were three combo classes. THIS WILL
MAKE A DIFFERENCE FOR OUR CHILDREN AND TEACHERS. I don't think it would be fair to the students
to add more kids without having the teachers and infrastructure for them first. Please don't do this
backwards.
SAFETY: I'm a transplant. It wouldn't be fair to say I'm opposed to people moving here and I understand
the housing shortage. My opposition is not trying to pass the buck and place the growth somewhere else
for selfish reasons but if you have lived here or have even driven through at rush hour you would
understand and see that Santa Ana Canyon Road is a major artery for traffic. Our exits are Weir Canyon
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Road and Imperial. I'm a nurse so blood flow works for me but perhaps streams feeding a creek to a river
is better. There is no other exit for us. The infrastructure for more traffic does not exist and puts us at risk.
Please look at our map and note all the small neighborhoods that feed on to Santa Ana and listen to
what our firefighters have said.
TRAFFIC: with four kids I'm constantly in and out. As much as I would like my husband to work from
home, this isn't the case or the trend. Companies want in person. We avoid the rush hours and days
when possible but it's a mess. Parking, school drop off and pick up is not built for the current numbers. I
had actually taken video of traffic around town during the week and at different times to share with you. It
feels unfair to have you vote on something that could potentially have such a negative impact without
even knowing what the current traffic is like. Please take the current daily traffic into consideration. On
Tuesday at 4pm it was grid locked from Weir Canyon through every traffic light west and I couldn't exit my
neighborhood at Molher. Also kindly remember the apartments already approved and going up in the
Festival area just East of the proposed site.
ENVIRONMENT: Being from Utah it is odd to me that a Utah company wants to develop here. It's also very
interesting to me that with so few green and natural areas left in this area that building this large
apartment in the mouth of this gem canyon would even be considered. In the proposed Salt development
they mentioned a fire barrier. I fought wildland fires in my 20's and built fire brakes,which is a large
cleared area that works as a 'barrier'. I assume this is what they would do. I love the rainy season here
and studies to run off were not mentioned in the city council meeting. The runoff would definitely be my
neighborhood. Please inquire about and consider this. If you've recently looked at Deer Canyon please
know that it is the ugliest time of year and coming in from Santa Ana may not seem like much. I hope you
walked up at least to the bathrooms. The bathrooms are where the parking spots for hikers are and
where it feels like the trail really should start but the road to access this and even the parking lot at the
mouth have been closed. Could you ask why? Seems to be an advantage to Salt to have this closed off to
the community. Luckily I can walk there from my front door.
NOISE: There is a house on the edge of the hill right next to where the proposed developement would go.
Every year they have a party (happy birthday or whatever celebration to them) but this sounds like it's in
my front yard. The first couple years I literally walked out of my house several times to see which
neighbor it was. My point is the sound really carries and a party type rooftop wouldn't be appreciated by
all the neighbors.
DEMOGRAPHICS: The proposed Salt Project for 'low cost family apartments' only offers 2 rooms? If we
are meeting a need for housing, who are we housing? Families need more than 2 rooms and the price
point is not affordable for families.
It seems to me that we would be giving up a lot to add more people to our community. I don't think our
safety, our children's education and quality of life should have to be compromised for this developer.
Let's do our part for the housing crisis but as a city planning committee I beg of you to do it right and plan.
This proposal would cause more problems than solutions. There are so many smart people and I know
there is a better solution. I have several ideas and I'm sure there are more and better ones too- More ADU
incentives, apartments for 65+ in this part of the city would make more sense (keep traffic down, not
burden schools, have an evacuation/ field trip bus for seniors)
I regret the error that the invitation was not forwarded and no conversation could happen. I think there is
a lot of money on the line and I'm sure you have felt pressure. I appreciate you taking the time in reading
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this. I look forward to meeting you and I hope we can work together to keep Anaheim a great place to live
as we address the needs of our city.
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