Buellton council approves five-year permit, license for Hundred Hills School after contentious hearing

Buellton City Council approved a conditional-use permit and a five-year license on July 24 to allow Hundred Hills School to operate a Waldorf-inspired preschool through fourth-grade program on a 0.68-acre portion of the city-owned Williamson property near Riverview Park.

The council’s decision followed a full staff presentation, an applicant statement and 90 minutes of public comment in which speakers divided sharply. Planning Director Andrea Keeferst summarized the staff review and said the city prepared an addendum to the Williamson project’s mitigated negative declaration to address project-specific impacts. Keeferst said the school proposal would include four round “yurt” classroom structures (about 16 feet tall), an administrative building, one restroom building and a fenced courtyard. She told the council the plan provides up to 10 parking spaces in the new Lower Williamson parking lot, requires all routine drop-offs and pick-ups to occur there (with a single ADA space left on the upper parcel), and limits enrollment to a maximum of 50 students when fully built out in later years.

Applicant Whitney Stevenson, founder of Hundred Hills School, asked the council to approve a temporary, “incubator” location for the school while the founders pursue a permanent site. “This land could become the foundation of something extraordinary,” Stevenson told the council, describing the proposal as privately funded and rooted in a local family’s nonprofit. A second applicant…