Site Partner: University California Santa Barbara

Available:  September 1, 2007

Deadline:  June 8, 2007

Decision:  July 6, 2007

Contact:  bryan@designcorps.org

Job Description:

COMMUNITY NEED:

Home ownership in Isla Vista has become unaffordable for low and moderate income workers who have no representative voice in the unincorporated but densely populated area.

Since its inception in the mid-1920s, the unincorporated community of Isla Vista has evolved adjacent to one of the largest public universities in California.  It maintains a high and extremely dense population of two-thirds students, with the remainder comprised of university service worker families and a small percentage of non university-affiliated residential homeowners. An unregulated history of private real estate development, in tandem with UCSB expansion over the past 40 years, has perpetuated the unsustainable environment that now exists in Isla Vista.  The inflated rental market, with most landowners residing outside of the community who have little investment in its stewardship, has encouraged substandard housing development and construction, a dominantly unsupervised and migratory student rental population occupying a large degree of illegal and overcrowded habitation.  The lack of age diversity and cultural amenities present in the community, despite its adjacency to the campus, has generated unregulated late night recreation (with its attendant problems of noise, crime and alcoholism) and have discouraged but a handful of adult faculty, graduate students and staff to choose to live in Isla Vista.  The unstructured community governance has led to  a need for a plan for sustainable development.

FELLOW’S ROLE:

In the Isla Vista community, there are three related and overlapping planning projects identified for this position that require an individual with urban planning interest and experience in order to assume an effective role as facilitator in this community:  Given the absence of a professional architectural design and planning program at UCSB, a Design Corps Fellow, trained in the field of urban planning would be crucial to the development process at this time.

1. Isla Vista Masterplan:  Strategic urban design, planning, coordination and facilitation of stakeholder interests in Isla Vista.
Despite numerous development efforts made on the part of various stakeholders in Isla Vista, (IV) there remains a lack of coordinated oversight on the range of community development initiatives.  The poor lines of communication have fostered a degree of distrust that has hindered any sincere, community efforts on the part of any one of the stakeholders. 

The need for effective leadership and oversight on the part of a knowledgeable, non-partisan facilitator is critical to the other ongoing projects currently in planning stages in Isla Vista. The facilitator/s should ensure that action items get completed, and provide management oversight as to how responsibility is shared across divisions.  They should work closely with existing groups from the county, community and university to develop clear lines of communication, policy development and delineation of stakeholder roles.  In the absence of a civic structure for governance, the facilitator would design a planning process infrastructure that effectively coordinates and encourages development of the IV community agenda (i.e.: planning meetings, town hall meetings, workshops, etc). 
The Fellow will work closely and pro-actively with the University in coordination with the RDA (Redevelopment Agency) and the PAC (IV Project Area Committee) to review, refine and implement the most critical facets of the IV Master Plan. The critical elements should address the needs of IV residents, business owners as well as those of UCSB students, in the planning and implementation of changes that would effectively transform Isla Vista.

2. Isla Vista Housing
According to the 1970 UCSB Isla Vista Commission the “age homogeneity” of the population (a large percentage of residents are between the ages of 19-22) and the “social isolation of its populations from non-student age people” was identified as major factors leading to the unrest in Isla Vista.  It continues to exist today.  As a community, a proactive effort is necessary to make IV a desirable and affordable place to live and socialize for its residents, inclusive of students, faculty, staff and non-university affiliates.  Greater presence of adult residents could provide an effective influence on the undergraduate population who live in the same neighborhood.  The facilitator would mitigate various interests, including those of property owners, business owners and renters in coordination with local county and city officials.
Housing, especially affordable, as well as, housing that draws adult faculty staff and graduate students to the community, are key to this evolution.
Fellow will spend 50% of their time commitment dedicated to the exploration and development of effective housing/ parking/transit options for Isla Vista.  Analysis of current demographics and the development of a means in which to transform residential composition would be amongst the challenges. 
Relevant to any effort made in the development of alternative housing in Isla Vista and the nearby campus would be the creation of an effective, housing non-profit that could act both on behalf and apart from the existing stakeholder interests. The creation of a non-profit, comprised of an array of interested and invested university-community representatives, could act effectively in a number of ways toward the housing efforts.  This non-profit could attend to housing initiatives that include real estate acquisition for new housing, effective communication and coordination with existing and future property owners, influence in design and development of housing types suitable for university workforce in conjunction with IVRD, university planning and housing developers. Fellow would be central to this effort as well as ensuring a means to sustain and build upon its initial formation.

3. Isla Vista Sustainability Plan
Given the degree of planning necessary to facilitate all of the identified needs in the community of Isla Vista, it is critical that all initiatives employed have clear mechanisms in place to ensure their sustainability. Well beyond project implementation, it is important that the Fellow, in coordination with the identified future leadership in Isla Vista, develop both short and long-range planning strategies and infrastructure that monitor and provide means for regular review and evaluation of progress. While the Isla Vista Master Plan will be central to any future planning document, it should be accompanied by a detailed sustainability plan for the individual initiatives as well as how they will be framed within a coordinated master plan. 

As part of a sustainability plan, resource development will be a key component to this position. This will be directly related to the formation of a 501c3 non-profit, an entity that will be able to actively seek relevant partnerships and funding sources to implement the identified key initiatives for the community.

TARGET RESULTS:

• Plan leadership and technical facilitation of the identified Isla Vista initiatives.
• Work closely with various Isla Vista university and community stakeholders to plans for area’s development
• Coordinated scheduling, phasing and timing of meetings between stakeholders
• Produce community access web site, planning drawings, models written documents that reflect consensus building efforts,
• Facilitation to start an Isla Vista Housing non-profit (501c3)
• Sustainability and resource development plan documents for Isla Vista
• Community consensus building through consolidated plan for the physical environment that reflects communities values in the use of space
• Through the year-long collaborative community vision and planning process, a sense of collective consensus, community identity and stewardship
• Effective and ongoing communication between residents
• An evolution in representative governance for residents with appropriate mechanisms in place to facilitate sound planning
  

QUALIFICATIONS 

The ideal candidate will have:

• A degree in architecture or planning.
• Experience/study in construction, urban design, urban policy, community service, non-profit or non-governmental organizations is a plus but not required.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• The ability to work with diverse groups, and the demonstrated capacity to move between cultures, disciplines, and professions.
• Highly organized and motivated.