apache 2.2 - web files permission setup

I could not find out what is the best way to setup your web files under UNIX OS.

I have Apache running on Centos OS, I put my root directory under /var/www/html

Here is the example:

/var/www/html         750         ssh-user       apache
  /project_a          750         ssh-user       apache

    /normal_folder    750         ssh-user       apache
    /upload_folder    770         ssh-user       apache
  /project_b          750         ssh-user       apache

I setup full control to the owner (ssh-user) and only read access to group users (apache group). For upload folder, I setup 770 which group users able to write stuff inside.

What is ssh-user? This is the same user who I use to login using SSH.

These settings are fine but sometime I got annoyed because I need to re-set the file permission by doing

chmod 750 -R project_a
chown ssh-user:apache project_a

Everytime I create new file/upload using FTP, I need to execute those commands.

So my questions:
- is my file ownership correctly setup?
- how about file permission?
- do you use any tools to manage this file permission? I heard facl may do this elegantly
- anybody used capistrano? any hint for the file permission and ownership?

Thanks guys!