SANTA PAULA : Economic Agency to Be Considered

Faced with the need to create more jobs and increase sales-tax revenues, the Santa Paula City Council on Monday will consider establishing a department to shape economic development.

The council will also consider hiring an economic development director, who would help guide the city’s new redevelopment agency and revise the city’s General Plan, council members say.

“It’s getting tougher and tougher, as the state and county take more money away from us, for us to make ends meet,” said Councilman John Melton, explaining why a new department may be created in City Hall. “We’re just making it now, and we’re not doing everything we should.”

Once a thriving market town with nine new car dealerships, three department stores and upscale clothing shops, Santa Paula has increasingly become a bedroom community, said Councilman Les H. Maland.

“We have to bring some of our people home who are working elsewhere,” Maland said.

An economic development director can help determine how best to invest the funds generated in a redevelopment area, he said.

“We have the lowest family income of the county’s 10 cities and have the highest number of families and individuals receiving social assistance,” Maland said. “Those factors mean we have to go out and concentrate on job-producing development.”