Deckers Outdoor Corp.‘s plan for the Cabrillo Business Park moved closer to fruition Tuesday evening as the Goleta City Council, acting as the Planning Agency, gave its approval of proposed modifications for accommodating the shoe manufacturer’s needs.

The 4-0-1 vote, with City Councilman Roger Aceves recusing himself, allows Sares-Regis, the development company, to move up planned frontage improvements along Hollister Avenue and Los Carneros Road — which currently have no sidewalks — and changes in a requirement for the undergrounding of utilities.

The Planning Agency’s decision is the latest in a series of rather last-minute developments for the business park, which has recently been in talks with the manufacturer to become the new headquarters site for Deckers.

Deckers, global manufacturer of brands such as Teva, Ugg and Simple shoes, started in Goleta and currently operates out of a facility in the Old Town area. With a few modifications to the Cabrillo Business Park development plan, according to the project’s supporters, Deckers could stay in Goleta on a campus that can accommodate its growth, and the park would get a desirable tenant that may in turn boost its economics — as well as those of the city.

Planning and Environmental Services Director Steve Chase said the modifications and reconfiguration would result in a reduction of 14,000 square feet of developed space in the park’s Master Plan. And environmental analysis revealed “no new or worsened impacts” from the original approved plan.

There are still a few steps the modified plan has to take, including preliminary and final review from the city’s Design Review Board. The City Council will meet next week — as the council, not the Planning Agency — to review and vote on the proposed changes.

Because the Cabrillo Business Park has been a project of the city before the appointment of a Planning Commission, discussions on it are held with the Planning Agency, the body that historically reviewed and approved the park’s plans. The Planning Agency is composed of the same members as the City Council.

Also on Tuesday, the City Council voted to initiate a spay/neuter ordinance that most likely will mirror that of Santa Barbara County. The council voted unanimously to take a look at the county’s ordinance, which includes a requirement for licensing unaltered cats, provisions that require owners to have their impounded animals spayed or neutered as a condition of their release, and for dog owners to undergo a consultation on the merits of fixing their unaltered animal as part of the regular rabies vet visit.

While the city’s ordinance committee has yet to pore over the particulars of the county’s pet policies, it’s likely that for uniformity’s sake, as well as in order to save staff time, the city’s ordinance will match the county’s ordinance closely. The county’s ordinance has been adopted by Buellton and Solvang, and the City of Santa Barbara has a similar ordinance.

— Noozhawk contributing writer Sonia Fernandez can be reached at sfernandez@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk or @NoozhawkNews.