Pismo Beach City Council, mayor candidates face off at forum. Here’s what they said
Pismo Beach City Council and mayoral candidates squared off at a League of Women Voters forum Thursday evening.
The forum featured two candidates for mayor — Kevin Kreowski and current Mayor Ed Waage — along with City Council candidates Marcia Guthrie, Scott Newton and Gianni Scangarello. Guthrie and Newton are current council members.
During the forum, candidates shared their thoughts on the future of the city’s streets and parking, the Coastal Commission’s role in local development and the controversial Central Coast Blue water sustainability project.
Road and parking improvements proved to be the top topic of the evening, with candidates sharing their plans for how to continue repairing streets and making parking available for residents and tourists alike.
Here’s where the candidates stand on some of the most important civic and economic issues facing Pismo Beach.
Infrastructure, parking at top of mind for candidates
When asked how they would keep streets safer and in better condition, candidates had differing views.
Kreowski said the city needed to stop losing legal battles, including a recent $2 million suit with a contractor involved in the construction of a new sewer lift station.
Waage said the city has already replaced around a third of its streets in recent years, and said he supported the city’s efforts to take over the stretch of Highway 1 that runs through the south end of the city. He said adding crossings to the highway would make it far safer for foot and tourist traffic.
Scangarello said taking over part of Highway 1 would add costs and responsibilities to the city’s plate, and said the city needed a “better plan” for keeping obstructions from construction out of the way.
Newton said proactive maintenance to keep streets from reaching poor condition was a good way to save money on road projects, while Guthrie said she supported making bike and pedestrian paths safer and more well-maintained.
“It can cost 20 times more to rebuild the road than just maintain the property,” Newton said. “It’s on us to make sure that we always properly fund the maintenance, but also, we cannot neglect the people that live on roads that have not been touched in 35-plus years.”
Parking was frequently mentioned as one of the biggest issues facing the city and its businesses at the forum.
When asked how best to support local residents in this area, all candidates said the city needed to focus on making downtown parking and traffic easier to navigate residents so they can participate in the local economy.
Guthrie said adding more perimeter parking around the outskirts of high-traffic areas would help alleviate the street congestion that comes with concentrating traffic downtown.
“People are now parking at the butterfly park and then walking in, so they’re not afraid of walking,” Guthrie said.
Where do City Council candidates stand on Central Coast Blue?
Despite the loss of partner cities Arroyo Grande and Grover Beach this year, several Pismo Beach candidates said they supported continuing to support Central Coast Blue. All candidates said water would be an issue going forward, regardless of their support for the project.
Waage said the city should look at a scaled-back version of Central Coast Blue without the involvement of other cities and warned that a pending lawsuit between an environmental group and San Luis Obispo County over Lopez Lake’s water supply could play a role in the city’s water capacity going forward.
Newton and Guthrie similarly said they were disappointed to lose the partner cities but said water reclamation — be it Central Coast Blue or another initiative — would be needed down the line.
Guthrie said the city should advance the project as far as possible under the current budget and be ready to pick it up down the line as droughts worsen.
“The money comes to agencies that are ready, and so we need to be shovel-ready when this next drought comes again,” Guthrie said. “I refuse to let it die.”
Kreowski said the city should wait until the election is over to see if the partner cities will be more amenable to continuing to work on the project.
“I want to see us stop increasing rates until we get that plan put together,” Kreowski said. “I think the residents deserve not to be paying more for something that is not happening, and be paying for or losing $2 million out of the water fund because we have to settle a court case.”
Scangarello said the project would need to be reduced in scale if it were to continue to avoid rising costs and said the project would be necessary particularly in the event of seawater intrusion into the city’s water supply.
“A scaled-down version is the only way this project can possibly move forward,” Scangarello said. “The cost for it is astronomical now.”
Chapman estate and seawalls face uncertain future
Candidates were again in lockstep on the subject of the Coastal Commission’s role in the development and maintenance of city infrastructure and private residences along the coast.
Newton said local control was needed to ensure businesses and residents on the bluffs would be able to protect their properties from erosion through seawalling.
Waage agreed and said the Coastal Commission has essentially stonewalled all attempts by residents to maintain their properties.
“One possible way forward is this so-called neighborhood approach, where instead of parcel-by-parcel approval, you look at a given area for approval,” Waage said. “That makes more sense — I would hope we get something like that and get relief to our property owners who have been suffering for a long time.”
The Chapman Estate, which sits on Shell Beach bluffs and is owned by the city, was another point of agreement for candidates.
All five candidates said they supported divesting the property from the city, citing high repair costs and the financial drain of maintaining a property that can’t pay its own way.
“It’s an absolutely beautiful building, but it’s not historical building, and that’s the difference,” Newton said. “How do we spend as a city up to $10 million to repair it when as a city, our discretionary money we have as a City Council per year is only $3-5 million?”
