City Covets Site Targeted for Commercial Complex : Thousand Oaks, Landowner Differ on Plans for Jungleland

The City of Thousand Oaks and the owner of the 20 acres where Jungleland once stood have rival plans for the land.

But city officials promise that they won’t let their own desires for the land prejudice their ruling on a development request by Asad Moravati, owner of the land at Thousand Oaks Boulevard and Conejo School Road, where the animal park stood for 40 years.

Moravati wants to build a 244,000-square-foot shopping and office complex. The city would like to use at least part of the site for a civic auditorium and three-level parking garage.

Thousand Oaks Mayor Frank Schillo said Thursday that “lousy timing” forced the city to consider simultaneously the potentially conflicting plans for the property. “It just happened,” he said.

Worth $15 Million

The property, estimated by Moravati last year to be worth $15 million, is part of an ambitious 75-acre redevelopment project, Thousand Oaks senior planner Bob Rickards said.

Moravati’s proposal is scheduled for a hearing before the city Planning Commission on April 20.

Regardless of the Planning Commission’s decision, the final ruling on a project of this size will have to be made by City Council, city planning officials said.

Schillo and other city officials said they will be fair to Moravati, despite the city’s longtime desire to build a civic auditorium.

“I’ve made no decision on whether his project is good or bad,” Schillo said.

Four Plans

But at a hearing Wednesday, City Council directed the Project Area Advisory Committee, made up of two council members and 23 private citizens, to study four plans for the land.

These are buying about eight acres of the site for an auditorium, leaving Moravati’s commercial plans intact; replacing the shopping center with the auditorium and a hotel; moving the shopping center to another end of the parcel to make room for the auditorium, or eliminating about 100,000 square feet of the shopping center to make room for the auditorium.

The committee is expected to make a recommendation to City Council on April 22.

Moravati’s attorneys, who attended the hearing, said it was too early to comment on the city’s proposals.

Although negotiations with Moravati to purchase all or part of the site are expected, city officials said that a decision on the shopping center proposal will be made independently of the auditorium proposal. Officials agreed, however, that approval of Moravati’s project by the Planning Commission would drive up the price the city would have to pay for the property.

“Our goal is to get Moravati to participate,” Rickards said.

City officials said that neither the size nor cost of the auditorium has been determined. But the project will be smaller than the proposed $22.3-million cultural arts center narrowly defeated by Thousand Oaks voters last June, City Councilman Alex T. Fiore said.