Ruiz to Step Down From School Board : Education: The veteran of the Ventura district decides not to seek reelection after serving 20 years on the panel.

Vincent C. Ruiz, a 20-year Ventura school board member who prides himself on his refusal to cater to special-interest groups other than children, announced this week that he will give up his post in November.

Ruiz, a six-time president of the 15,000-student Ventura Unified School District and the longest-standing member of the board, said Thursday that he will not seek reelection in the fall.

Ruiz, a retired construction labor union president who came to the county 48 years ago to pick lemons, said he will continue working with the district through nonprofit organizations to help the schools support programs for the arts.

“I feel that I represented the total community,” said Ruiz, 62, of his board service. He said he took strong and sometimes unpopular positions on labor and bilingual education during his tenure.

As a former labor negotiator, he said he could sympathize with teachers who were negotiating for better working conditions.

“I support the teachers union,” he said. “But they--and other groups too--should never forget what’s best for the entire school district.”

Ruiz, whose first language was Spanish, said he bucked opposition in the Latino community over his views on bilingual education. He believes that non-English-speaking students should be moved swiftly into English-only programs, a view that runs contrary to some parents and professionals who want longer transitions.

“They should still learn about Spanish culture,” he said. “But that should be in social studies so that everybody learns it. And they should learn not only about the Hispanics, but about the Asians and other cultures as well.”

Ruiz, as well as other board members, said his lack of a formal education beyond the high school education that he earned at Santa Paula High School in 1947 never proved a handicap to him on the board.

“I could always relate to the working people,” said Ruiz, the son of an Arizona copper miner who stressed the importance of education to his children. Ruiz is the father of four grown children who all went through Ventura Unified schools.

Richard Averett, assistant superintendent of human resources and personnel at the district, called Ruiz an astute board member who cuts quickly to the heart of an issue.

“He is the one who usually voices the important question, ‘What does this mean to the kids?’ ” Averett said. “It takes someone like Vince to bring us back to reality.”

Ruiz will be joined in his retirement from the board by 12-year board veteran Barbara Myers, a two-time board president who has decided not to seek reelection in November.

“I feel that it’s time for people with younger children to get involved with the board,” said Myers, whose two children are now in their last years of high school.

Myers, a middle-school teacher at Isbell School in Santa Paula, praised Ruiz for his consistent ability to hear an issue through before forming a judgment.

“One of the reasons we’ve been an effective board is that no one had an ax to grind,” she said.

During his years in the district, Ruiz said he delighted in meeting people from business, professional and educational fields as well as all the working-class parents.

He found a common thread that ran through them all, he said.

“They all want a good education for their kids and a good city to live in,” he said.

The five-term board member, who said he never spent a dime of his own money to get elected, said he decided not to run again when he looked at his calendar.

“I was looking at four more years of meetings,” he said. “You have to mark your Tuesdays and your Wednesdays.”