Lea Simvoulakis has been named the city’s new director of Community Development to replace Christopher Hoem, who was terminated on Feb. 26.
The appointment was ratified by the Ceres City Council on Monday.
According to City Manager Doug Dunford, Simvoulakis was selected from a pool of highly qualified applicants and has undergone an interview process with an interview panel.
Simvoulakis comes to the city of Ceres as the deputy director for Manteca’s Development Services Department where she has been overseeing approximately five employees in the Planning Department. Her professional history includes experience as planning manager in San Jose, senior planner, and Community Development Director for the city of Hughson.
Her appointment was ratified at Monday’s City Council meeting with a starting range at $12,849 per month, or $154,188 annually. Her employment agreement also includes three weeks of vacation per year, 12 sick days and 120 hours (15 days) of executive time.
The Community Development Department was formerly named the Planning Department.
Ceres resident Gene Yeakley addressed the council to ask why Simvoulakis wasn’t present and was told that she was attending by Zoom.
“I’d like to hear what she has got to say about herself,” said Yeakley.
Simvoulakis explained that she just finished her job in Manteca on Thursday and, as a mother of three and transitioning between jobs and childcare that she was unable to be at her appointment meeting.
“I intend to be at all the other council meetings,” she reassured the council. Simvoulakis noted that she is “grateful for the opportunity to serve the city of Ceres.”
Councilwoman Rosalinda Vierra asked Simvoulakis to expand on her planning experience since the city in the midst of updating the Housing Element of the Ceres General Plan. Simvoulakis noted that in Manteca she worked three years on a seven-year General Plan update. She also started working on the Manteca Housing Element.
After Manteca approved its General Plan in 2023, the city had a referendum on that plan “which, as a planner, I hope no one has to experience … which means we basically had to stop working on the General Plan and our Housing Element until we resolved the referendum issue, which we just did on March 5 where we repassed our General Plan.”
Simvoulakis noted that the Ceres City Council had just approved on its consent agenda a contract amendment with EMC Planning Group, Inc., to continue preparing the city’s 2024-25 Housing Element. The contract cost was $35,277.
“So I’ll be able to work with that consultant to get you over that finish line, understanding the importance of getting that document completed and hope to get that done soon so that we are in compliance and we can start working on achieving those numbers.”
State law requires the city to update its Housing Element by Dec. 31 to identify programs to accommodate sufficient housing capacity in the Regional Housing Needs Assessment (RHNA) allocation to the satisfaction of the state Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD).
Although cities can plan for housing needs, construction of new units is completely dependent on the private sector, which is currently hamstrung by high interest rates and materials costs.
EMC Planning Group published the initial public review Draft Housing Element on July 17, 2023 for a 30-day public review period, which ended on Aug. 20. EMC Planning has completed revisions to the draft Housing Element but additional edits are necessary to comprehensively respond to the state’s 90-day “findings letter.”
