Report Backs Shrinking Borders of Port District : Boundaries: The Oxnard Port District, which is seeking to expand countywide, should include only Oxnard and Port Heuneme, LAFCO says.

The boundaries of the Oxnard Port District should be shrunk to include only the cities of Oxnard and Port Hueneme and their unincorporated areas, according to a staff report released Friday by the Local Agency Formation Commission.

The district now includes Camarillo and parts of Thousand Oaks.

The report supports proposals made by the cities of Oxnard and Port Hueneme, but directly contradicts a proposal by the Oxnard Port District, which wants to expand its borders countywide.

LAFCO commissioners, who decide matters of annexations for cities and special districts, are scheduled to rule on the recommendation after a public hearing Friday.

Shrinking the district, for which the boundaries were set in 1937, could allow the cities of Oxnard and Port Hueneme to raid district funds, diverting them into city coffers, Edward Millan, district board president, said Friday.

“It’s phase one of a plan,” Millan said. “Phase two would be to dissolve the district and make the port a department of the cities” of Oxnard and Port Hueneme.

“The cities would then gain access to the district funds,” he said.

But Robert Braitman, executive director of LAFCO, disagreed. Laws are in place to prevent cities from spending port district funds on anything other than port-related business, he said.

“I do not believe this is an effort to balance the cities’ budgets on the back of the port district,” Braitman said.

At stake, port officials say, is their effort to expand the activities at the Port of Hueneme, which the district operates. Without the increased prestige of a countywide district, their efforts to make the waterway a U.S. port of entry would be jeopardized, they say.

The upgraded status would bring increased business and revenue to the port and the county, port officials contend.

Braitman, however, argued that the residents of Oxnard and Port Hueneme--who bear most of the brunt of truck traffic to and from the deep-sea port--would be better served by a smaller district. According to the staff report, trucks make trips to or from the port an average of 286 times per day.

If the two cities were the only ones included in district boundaries, their voters would decide issues such as port expansion, he said. If the district were countywide, voters who live 30 miles away from the port would decide on issues that affect Oxnard and Port Hueneme, Braitman said.

Friday’s report was the most recent in a series of maneuvers by the district, the cities and LAFCO. In August, Oxnard and Port Hueneme proposed that other cities be excluded from the district. To counter that proposal, port district directors proposed that the boundaries be enlarged to include the entire county.

In 1973, LAFCO supported a proposal for countywide boundaries. But information provided by Oxnard and Port Hueneme--as well as Fillmore, Ojai and Santa Paula, which opposed the expansion--changed Braitman’s mind, he said.

The Port of Hueneme’s two main shipments are bananas and cars, and it serves as a main terminal for most offshore oil activities.

Expanding the boundaries would bring no additional revenue to the district because it does not collect property taxes, although that is within its jurisdiction, Braitman said. It derives fees paid by ships that unload cargo at the port.

The port has a $26-million payroll and generates $143 million for the county’s economy, according to the staff report. Eighty percent of the money generated by the port directly benefits the cities of Oxnard and Port Hueneme, according to a 1989 study commissioned by the two cities.