Clarification: This story was changed to include Scott Newton’s comments about his involvement with the Mittry Family Trust.
For the second time this year, Pismo Beach City Councilmember Scott Newton is facing criticism from some of his constituents for “jumping ahead of the line” in his efforts to construct a single-family home on Naomi Avenue.
One such critic is Pismo Beach resident and attorney Tarren Collins. She referenced a Sept. 9 California Coastal Commission meeting where Newton alleged that his critics comprised “political opposition” who disliked him.
“Of course, I don’t like what he’s doing but it’s not personal to Scott Newton. That’s playing the victim card in my book,” Collins told New Times. “It’s very disturbing to me that he doesn’t grasp how the community is concerned about community character, that we don’t want huge homes that are a big impact to the neighboring properties.”
Earlier this year, Pismo Beach approved an amendment of its local coastal plan (LCP) to rectify a change made in 2011. That year, the City Council approved construction restrictions pertaining to setbacks in the St. Andrews neighborhood, which includes Naomi Avenue. The restrictions limited construction and remodeling capabilities in the aging neighborhood.
The Mittry Family Trust owns the Naomi Avenue property. Its trustee, Richard Mittry is Newton’s stepfather.
One of the first allegations of impropriety came in March from former city Planning Commissioner Adam Werner through a letter to current commissioners. Werner stated that Newton is the executor of the trust who holds first right of refusal to purchase the property. Newton told New Times that he has no power over the trust and never had any type of control over it.
In the letter, Werner added that Newton tried to get the Planning Commission to approve his project to replace the existing home on the Naomi Avenue plot with a larger residence. That application also included a request to amend the general plan in order to make his proposed home compliant with architectural guidelines.”
“It should also be noted that in the four years I served as a planning commissioner, to the best of my knowledge, no applicant had requested a change to the general plan,” Werner wrote in his letter.
Others, too, said that Pismo Beach’s April approval of the LCP amendment and Newton’s coastal development permit, which a city staff report said was “contingent” on the LCP change, set an unfair precedent. Former City Council member and one-time Coastal Commissioner Erik Howell told New Times that he had never come across such an application during his time on the Coastal Commission. Howell lost his City Council seat to Newton in the 2020 election, and is running again with the hope to capture one of the two spots up for grabs.
“The whole thing was tainted from the get-go,” Howell said. “The privilege to have the city extend resources in order to change the LCP for a single-family house is unprecedented.”
Howell added that though rare, general and local coastal plans are mostly amended in instances of large-scale reconstruction such as wanting to redo the whole downtown quarter.
On April 19, 2022, the City Council approved the amendment, and in turn, did away with the setback limitations. That same day, the council also rejected an appeal filed by Werner and Collins of a building permit granted to the Mittry Trust to replace the existing smaller home at Naomi Avenue with another almost triple in size. On Oct. 18, the City Council ratified the building permit after the California Coastal Commission certified the change to LCP.
Newton denied that he acted out of self-interest and said that property owners in the St. Andrews neighborhood stand to gain from the LCP amendment.
“The public benefit is that the city corrected an action that was wrong in the past and now made all the noncompliant houses legal again,” he said.
Mayor Ed Waage echoed Newton’s comment at the Sept. 9 Coastal Commission meeting where the state agency approved the LCP amendment.
“About 10 years ago, our council approved these changes and it was a mistake to do so, and I regret to say I was on the council when we made that decision,” Waage said. “In retrospect, we did not know the impacts of that decision as we know today.”
But Howell and Collins still cry foul. They said that it’s unusual for the LCP to be amended during a period when it’s expected to be updated altogether. Moreover, once the city approved the change, it’s supposed to send the Coastal Commission a final notice of action within seven days of making the decision. Pismo Beach failed to do that in April, and it became a stumbling block in Collins’ efforts to appeal the move.
“I received notice back from commission staff that because the city has failed to give notice of final action to the Coastal Commission, the appeal couldn’t be filed,” she said. Δ
This article appears in Oct 27 – Nov 6, 2022.
