POLICE WITH PICKET SIGNS—Simi Valley Police Officers Association members and their families rally for support outside city hall in October during the city’s 40th birthday celebration. Union members were upset over ongoing contract negotiations, which were settled just this week. IRIS SMOOT/Acorn Newspapers Police fought for their jobs; teachers did too. The economy continued to dictate headlines in 2009, but the recession didn’t prevent Simi Valley from achieving several major milestones. The city, which turned 40 this year, gained a dog park, a memorial and a presidential library. There were plenty of good squabbles along the way, too.

The following is a look at the Top 10 stories in Simi Valley this year.

10. Neighbors vs. nightclub

It took 2½ years of headaches, but residents who live near Candlelight Kitchen & Bar in eastern Simi finally succeeded in tempering the operation of the hilltop hotspot.

DOGGY HEAVEN—Siberian huskies Tikaani and Jackson get acquainted at the opening of the long-anticipated Simi Dog Park in March. IRIS SMOOT/Acorn Newspapers In August, the City Council voted 3-1 to grant the popular latenight venue a conditional use permit for amplified music and dancing. However, the approval came with a strict set of conditions to ensure that the bar wouldn’t again become a nuisance to locals. In response to complaints, the bar’s owner shut down the nightclub portion of the venue and promised it would not reopen.

9. Train crash victims honored

Exactly one year after the tragedy, the Metrolink Memorial Plaza at the Simi Valley train station was dedicated to the 25 men and women who died in the Sept. 12, 2008 train collision.

Although funding the $150,000 project was difficult, the city finished the memorial on time by taking out a loan it planned to repay with private donations. Designed by the community, the memorial of basalt columns and personalized pavers offered families and friends of the victims a place to go to remember and a sense of comfort in knowing their loved ones will never be forgotten. More than 1,000 people attended the memorial’s dedication.

‘MISS YOU, MOM’— Tina Mosley tightly holds her nephew, Kingston Ifield, 1, as she places a white rose below her mother’s name at the Metrolink Community Memorial during September’s somber dedication service. 8. Raise the woof!

Simi Dog Park opens

To the glee of pet owners and pooches alike, the Simi Dog Park opened its gates in March, giving dogs big and small just what they want: a place to run free.

IRIS SMOOT/Acorn Newspapers Nearly 1,500 locals and their canine companions broke in the grassy 3-acre site nestled in the mountains of the Big Sky community. The $700,000 park was not without issues at first, with complaints from some residents regarding the shared entryway and muddy conditions. But the Rancho Simi Recreation and Park District cleaned up the mess and the park has continued to attract packs of visitors.

7. Gunman opens fire

in dental office

In an act that stunned and saddened the community, a man wielding an assault rifle opened fire inside the Family Dental Care office on the west end of Simi on July 1, killing Mariela Paredes, a 24-year-old receptionist, and critically wounding three other employees.

According to Simi Police, suspected gunman Jaime Paredes, 30, was distraught over a recent separation from Mariela, his wife. Police units responded to the scene just minutes after the shots rang out and took Paredes into custody 20 minutes later. He was indicted in October and is scheduled for arraignment Jan. 19. The D.A. has not said if he will seek the death penalty.

SHOOTING—Simi Valley police lead gunman Jaime Paredes away in handcuffs from the Family Dental Care building in July after he shot four people with an assault rifle. His wife, one of the office employees he shot, was killed. Paredes is awaiting trial for murder. MICHAEL COONS/Special to the Acorn 6. The Gipper has a new home

While the city had long claimed ownership and bragging rights over the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, Simi officially became the home of the museum on the hill in November.

It took three years to bring the annexation to fruition, but the city succeeded in getting the support of the county, Moorpark and Thousand Oaks as well as the unanimous approval of the Ventura County Local Agency Formation Commission, which handles annexation requests. Along with the library came six adjacent residential parcels, for a total acquisition of 161 acres.

5. Save our teachers

Remember the pink slips? The first half of 2009 was rife with headlines about the state’s budget crisis and its impact at the local level. Few places felt the pinch more harshly than our classrooms, as school districts everywhere scrambled to deal with $11 billion in cuts to education statewide.

Here in Simi Valley Unified, administrators and trustees facing a $10-million deficit had to make tough budget decisions, which included increasing class size and letting teachers go.

As expected, the California Teachers Association didn’t take the layoffs lying down and began a very public campaign to rally voters in defense of educators. The effort surely saved a few jobs, but in June, when the school board adopted its budget, SVUSD announced 122 teachers were not guaranteed employment in Simi Valley for the 2009-10 school year.

4. Save water, spend more

Three years into a statewide drought with water supplies continuing to dwindle, water conservation has been on the minds of everyone from Sacramento to Simi Valley. In order to comply with a 15 percent reduction in regional water use handed down by the city’s suppliers, the City Council passed a water-rationing ordinance in May to make residents use water more efficiently.

Then in July, the city restricted residents to watering their lawns only two or three days a week, depending on the time of year. This did not sit well with homeowners and the rule was changed in October to limit irrigation to 30 to 45 minutes per station per week.

Despite the water savings, residents will soon pay more for the precious commodity as the council approved a new three-tiered rate structure for waterworks district customers in 2010 that hikes rates as much as 23 percent for the biggest users.

3. No confidence in chief

The rank-and-file of the Simi Valley Police Department made headlines in November after members of the Police Officers Association—the union representing all of Simi’s sworn officers under the rank of lieutenant—took a 107-1 vote of “no confidence” in Police Chief Mike Lewis.

A press release put out by a POA-hired public relations firm called Lewis, who’s headed up the department since 2006, “incompetent, disinterested, non-communicative, uncaring and/or ineffective.” Lewis responded by calling the vote a “union tactic” motivated by the POA’s unhappiness with the city over ongoing contract negotiations. While the vote had no tangible consequences—only the city manager has the power to remove Lewis—it did send a clear message that all was not right at Simi’s Alamo Street police headquarters.

2. Nuclear cleanups

and downs

2009 was another roller coaster year for the Santa Susana Field Lab. It began with the federal government devoting $54 million to the cleanup of the contaminated site in the hills above Simi Valley and ended with a lawsuit.

In November, Boeing Co.— the field lab’s largest property owner—filed a suit against the state challenging the constitutionality of Senate Bill 990. The lawsuit came after a year’s worth of unsuccessful negotiations to incorporate the provisions of the state law, passed in 2008, into an agreement between California and the polluters.

The law requires the former rocket engine and nuclear energy test site be scrubbed to the EPA’s most stringent standards.

Some fear the lawsuit could further delay the already slowmoving cleanup, which is supposed to be finished by 2017.

1. Cops take on city hall

Simi Valley takes great pride in its reputation as a safe city. Call it the “We’re Not the San Fernando Valley” syndrome, residents as well as their elected officials have long made public safety priority No. 1.

So when tense contract negotiations between the police officers union and the cash-strapped city suddenly turned ugly this year, every corner of Simi took notice.

After months of closed-door meetings produced no new contract, word of the failed negotiations began to leak out. In response, the Police Officers Association hired a PR firm and began a campaign to convince residents that the city was using the bad economy as an excuse to take away not only officers’ pay and benefits, but longstanding working conditions as well.

The union turned more heads when members and their families demonstrated outside the city’s 40th birthday celebration in October and again later, outside a council member’s home.

While citizens from First Street to Kuehner Drive openly debated which side was to blame for the sudden divide between two traditionally friendly agencies, representatives from both camps continued to meet behind closed doors. Just this week it was announced that the terms of a new contract had been put in place.

While the battle may be over for now, it remains to be seen how wounds from the turmoil will play out in 2010.

Editor’s note: Don’t agree with our list of Simi’s top stories of ’09? Think we left something off? Let us know about it in a Letter to the Editor. See information on page 4 .