Developer Forms Citizens Panel to Study Uses for Celery Fields

The Sammis Co. has formed a citizens committee to try to find an alternative to a factory outlet mall on 86 acres of celery fields in Camarillo.

But the developer, which vowed to obtain community opinion before developing a new proposal, has restricted debate to a committee of 17 residents who have agreed not to speak about the group’s progress.

“One thing I don’t understand: If they want the public to participate, why turn around and say the meetings are closed to the media and to the public?” said Bill Torrence, president of a homeowners group that led the fight against the original Sammis proposal. “I’m beginning to wonder what’s going on.”

The citizens committee has met only a few times, but Torrence’s group already is gearing up to fight any plan that the committee forms.

“We’re going out for a membership drive, trying to build up a war chest, and we’re going to be prepared for these people,” Torrence said.

Sammis withdrew its proposal for a factory outlet mall in November amid heated opposition by residents who want to see nothing but celery fields on the Sammis-owned site at the southeast corner of Pleasant Valley Road and the Ventura Freeway.

In response to weeks of raucous public debate, the Planning Commission recommended against Sammis’ request to amend the General Plan from agricultural to commercial uses, saying the rezoning was premature. The City Council then agreed that Sammis could come back after soliciting community opinion. Council members urged Sammis to include plenty of open space.

However, Councilman Michael Morgan, who was not at that meeting, said this week that he did not favor any development at the site. Furthermore, he added, the committee “is not getting the full input from the community. They’re getting limited input.”

Opponents of the initial Sammis project point out that none of them were appointed to the committee, which will take only written comments at a post office box. A report is expected in six weeks.

Opponents say that by forming the committee, Sammis will be able to present a plan for a commercial project that it can say citizens developed, when it was citizens who forced Sammis to withdraw in the first place.

“I think Sammis is playing a very cagey and shrewd deal within the guidelines dictated by the City Council,” said Bill Kobrin, one of the original proposal’s opponents.

Kobrin said Sammis could come up with a plan that the City Council likes, obtain a General Plan amendment to change the land use to commercial and then sell the property.

“I’m very much against anything going in there,” he said.

Russell Goodman, regional Sammis president and a member of the advisory committee, did not return telephone calls this week.

The 19-member committee, which includes two Sammis representatives, as of Friday had decided only that it will operate by consensus, said Sharon Browning, a facilitator Sammis hired to work with the committee. Browning was unavailable for comment Monday.

Sammis, she said, “wanted to come up with a community plan that is acceptable to as much of the community as possible.”

Committee members live in the area near the 86-acre parcel or have some investment in the community, she said, and were chosen through referrals by groups such as the Chamber of Commerce and the school system.

One committee member, Emily (Penny) Swain, said she had no idea why she was picked because she expressed no interest in the project and did not attend any hearings about it. She also declined to say what the committee was doing.

“We’re not supposed to say anything,” said the woman, who described herself as a senior citizen and Camarillo resident of 30 years.

“They don’t want to be divided by the community or the politics of it,” Browning said to explain the committee’s agreement to keep quiet for now.

“If everybody in Leisure Village called and told me what we’re supposed to do. . .,” said committee member Bill Himstreet, trailing off. “We don’t want that much input right away.”

Himstreet said he had remained neutral on the Sammis proposal and, like the other members, had no preconceived notion about what should go on the Sammis property.

Himstreet, a former business professor at USC, said he has been active in the community and probably was picked because a former student works for Sammis.

“I was pleased,” he said. “I looked on it as kind of an honor.”