Port Hueneme cleans up property issue

Port Hueneme– The Successor Agency for Redevelopment Agency, April 18, approved a joint resolution with the city council conveying APN 206-0-0310-090 from the city to the successor agency.

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ITY Attorney

Kevin Spaulding presented the item to the agency and said the resolution is an anachronism.

“This resolution is going to be a joint resolution of the Successor Agency and the city council and corrects a historic problem that’s happened with a number of properties in the city,” he said. “The first time the council and Successor Agency encountered this problem is when we transferred Market Street from the Successor Agency to the city and discovered there had been a prior joint resolution that was approved on March 11, 2011, that conveyed approximately 8-10 properties from the Redevelopment Agency prior to its dissolution to the city.”

He said that was done seeing the dissolution act on the wall that dissolved all Redevelopment Agencies in the State of California and was done as a way to save properties from what was going to happen with the Redevelopment Agency dissolution.

“In 2014, John Chiang, the State Controller, as a result of the dissolution laws, undertook an audit of all Redevelopment Agency activities for the year preceding the dissolution act,” Spaulding said. “That included the City of Port Hueneme’s Redevelopment Agency, and he determined that joint resolution A 21 and 3980 was not authorized by law, and those property transfers were invalid.”

He said that clouded titles on a number of properties that had recorded grant deeds in favor of the city, and it declared all those transfers invalid.

“Theoretically, the title that is recorded by the county on a number of these properties is wrong,” he said. “In order to do anything with these properties, we have to fix what happened in 2011. This is one such property, and the others will be handled in a more clean one-fell sweep type deal, but the reason for this is that John Chiang ordered that these properties be reconveyed back from the city to the new Successor Agency that was created as a result of the dissolution act.”

Spaulding said the city would quitclaim any property interest it may hold. Since there aren’t any, which is why it’s not a grant deed, it would be quitclaimed to the Successor Agency in accordance with Health and Safety Code 34167.5, the direction given by the State Controller.

“Once that deed is recorded, the title is clear to this property,” he said. “This is a property that’s adjacent to the Habitat for Humanity property.”

He said the next agenda item is that Southern California Edison needs an easement grant for its utilities.

“We can’t grant the easement on the name of the city on a property the city doesn’t rightfully own,” he said. “This clarification needs to occur, and the reason why you’re sitting in joint capacity is that the city is conveying, by joint resolution title, to the successor agency, and then you sitting as Successor Agency members are accepting title from the city. Then we can record it and deal with the next step in item 12, a Successor Agency only agenda item.”

The city council reconvened and approved a resolution granting an easement to Southern California Edison for electrical system operations.

Spaulding said now that the property is conveyed back to the property entity, they can satisfy Southern California Edison’s need for an easement to provide for the operation, maintenance, and installation of fiber optic equipment and electrical utilities to serve the Habitat for Humanity property.

“This is a necessary step to complete the build-out for Habitat for Humanity as well as maintain the necessary infrastructure there,” he said. “The Accessory Agency to the Port Hueneme Redevelopment Agency hereby grants to Southern California Edison. Now, we’re at the right stage to convey an easement.”