Residents of Old Agoura Unite, Chip In to Buy Signs at Rural Life Celebration

Everybody who was anybody in Old Agoura was at the homeowners association’s barbecue Saturday, and some bet on which chalk-marked square a cow might grace with a foul-smelling blob of . . . well, you know.

But more serious matters surrounded the event, attended by more than 300 people, said Ron Troncatty, Old Agoura Homeowners Assn. president and “the guy with the cow chip raffle tickets.”

Mainly, there was “the preservation of Old Agoura’s rural life style,” Troncatty said. Although the barbecue was organized to raise money for two rustic “welcome” signs the association wants to erect at local intersections, it also offered a chance for residents to unite behind a rural cause, he said.

Residents Riled

Commercial development along the Ventura Freeway and at the southern edge of Old Agoura has riled residents who like to ride horses on the streets but don’t like to compete with trucks.

The homeowners association earlier this year opposed an Agoura Hills city plan to extend a street to provide access from the freeway to a commercial area. The residents, fearing that more traffic would flood the neighborhood, temporarily got their wish this summer when a commercial property owner successfully challenged in court a different but integral part of the city’s plan. Residents are optimistic that an acceptable compromise will emerge, Troncatty said.

The Agoura Hills City Council is mulling over what to do with two other streets, Medfield Street and Driver Avenue. Residents of Old Agoura want to close Medfield Street, or at least make it a one-way street, and to ban trucks from Driver Avenue.

The Bob Hope Thing

And then there is the Bob Hope thing, or, in Troncatty’s words, “the most ignorant thing in the world.”

Developers want to build a road from the Ventura Freeway through nearby Cheeseboro Canyon Park to provide access to a tract owned by the famed entertainer. The developers and the PGA Tour have an option to buy the land and want to build 1,800 luxury homes and a golf course in Palo Comado Canyon, just west of Cheeseboro Canyon.

National Park Service officials rejected the proposal in April but last month began reconsidering it.

Despite all the concerns, an overriding reason for the barbecue Saturday seemed to be the desire to have a good time with friends and neighbors. Children played on bales of hay, adults wore big hats and drank beer, and everybody listened to live country and Western music. All was in expectation of the cow chip raffle, in which first prize was a sculpture of an elephant, donated by a local artist.

The sculpture went to the holder of the ticket corresponding to the first numbered, chalk-marked square that was soiled by the cow.

The neighborhood barbecue idea started with a yearly pig roast held by Steve Weldon, 46, and one of his neighbors, Weldon said. The hundreds of people were getting to be a little much, so the homeowners association turned it into a unity session and fund-raiser, he said.

“It’s to perpetuate the spirit of our neighborhood,” Jess Thomas, 47, said.