County to Seek $7.2 Million for Tent Jail : Port Hueneme: The sheriff favors a military base as the site. But the Navy is undecided about allowing the encampment.

Responding to Sheriff John V. Gillespie’s prediction that his planned “tent city” for Ventura County drug offenders will become a model for the nation, the Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to ask the Justice Department for $7.2 million to help launch the program.

If the federal agency approves the request, as many as 320 minor drug offenders could be housed in four large tents, preferably at the Naval Construction Battalion Center in Port Hueneme, Gillespie said. Each tent costs $60,000 and houses 80 inmates, he said.

“We will concentrate on counseling and rehabitation” at the tent encampment, the sheriff said after the supervisors’ meeting. “In addition, the people housed in the tents will work eight hours a day, cleaning beaches, parks and flood-control channels. On the base, they could help paint buildings, among other things.”

Gillespie said Capt. R.J. Pearson III, commanding officer of the Seabee base, has cooperated with county officials who have visited the proposed site, but a base public affairs specialist, Kassandra Gale, stopped short of saying the commander favors the plan.

“I talked to him just 10 minutes ago, and I would have to say he is neutral at this time,” Gale said. “He told me there are still some items that need to be investigated.”

Gale said several legal aspects would have to be worked out for the encampment to be approved. Pearson could not be reached for comment.

Gale said final approval for placing the encampment on the 1,615-acre Navy base must come from Pearson’s superiors in Washington.

Gillespie said he is determined to go ahead with the plan, called the Ventura County Criminal Justice Drug Control Strategy, even if he is turned down by the Justice Department and the Navy.

“I’ll tell you this--we’ll have a tent up, one way or another,” he said. The program would be scaled back if federal funds are not provided, he said.

The program is expected to cost $13.6 million in its first year, with the county providing the balance through funds already on hand. Much of the program’s budget--about $9 million--would pay for personnel. Under the plan, 71 new county positions would be added.

Gillespie added that one or two other sites for the encampment have also been discussed, in case the Navy does not make available the Port Hueneme base. He said prisoners placed in the encampment will be nonviolent and, when not working, will be confined behind a tall fence.

The tent encampment is the most unusual part of a new drug-enforcement policy developed by Gillespie and Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury. The sheriff said one in every 100 Americans uses cocaine. He added that heroin is making a comeback among drug users.

So-called occasional drug users are indirectly responsible for the murder of 200 judges in Colombia, Gillespie said. He added that drug arrests in the county increased by 177% in the last decade.

The plan would also provide for personnel to staff two courtrooms to handle drug offenses and would expand anti-drug programs in the county’s schools.

“Every school in the city of Ventura has adopted the DARE program for educating children about the hazards of drugs,” Gillespie said. “The program is available in . . . other cities, but we hope to expand it to the entire county.”

In Ojai, Gillespie said, fifth-graders who received DARE instruction from sheriff’s officers were not using drugs by the time they reached the seventh and eighth grades. Before the DARE program began, 40 to 60 drug cases were reported among seventh- and eighth-graders in Ojai, he said.

The sheriff predicted to supervisors that cities and counties nationwide will model their anti-drug programs after the Ventura County program.

“Maybe what we do here won’t be applicable in Detroit, but hundreds of other places will follow our lead,” he said.

In a letter to supervisors, Gillespie and Bradbury said the war on drugs will take at least 10 years to win in the county. They said they expect to seek federal aid for three years.

Kevin McGee, acting chief deputy district attorney, said current plans call for housing only male inmates in the encampment. Eventually, he said, a unit to house women may be added.