In a rare unanimous decision on State Street, the Santa Barbara City Council approved a plan to terminate the contract with the MIG — the consultant originally hired at a cost of $780,000 to handle the State Street Master Plan — to change course and bring in world-renowned architect and urban planner Stefanos Polyzoides, known as “the Godfather of New Urbanism,” to lead the city through the final planning stages.
Councilmembers and city staff considered the consultant swap a smart move, noting Polyzoides’s reputation as dean of the School of Architecture at the University of Notre Dame, cofounder of the Congress of New Urbanism, and planner behind both Pasadena’s Civic Center Master Plan and the Downtown Los Angeles Strategic Plan.
“I feel like this is finally a group that is going to deliver in a way that we haven’t seen before,” State Street Master Planner Tess Harris said during Tuesday’s council meeting…