Supervisors Pick 5 Issues as Priorities : Government: In agreeing on goals, the board says it must find innovative ways to make the most of a shrinking budget.

In an hourlong goal-setting session, the Ventura County supervisors on Tuesday agreed on five issues--ranging from strong law enforcement to more affordable health care--as their top priorities for 1993.

“If we don’t know what the goals are, we will not be able to get there,” Supervisor Maria VanderKolk told the board. “As our resources continue to shrink, these decisions become more critical. We all acknowledge that we are in trouble. . . . We all have to define the direction that we want to go.”

The supervisors said they must find innovative ways of making the most of the county’s diminishing dollars, while attracting new business to the county in an effort to cut unemployment.

In the wake of the state budget woes, county officials are fearful that they could lose up to $40 million in funding for the 1993-94 fiscal year.

“California has always been considered the Golden State,” Supervisor Vicky Howard said. “I think we are seeing that changing. One of the most important things we need to look at, other than our budget, is the creation of jobs.”

Flynn suggested that the county should implement programs to encourage the growth of small businesses and streamline its permit process.

“Seventy percent of our jobs come from small businesses,” Flynn said. “We need to encourage entrepreneurs.”

The supervisors said they must decide this year whether they should build a landfill at Weldon Canyon--an issue that has dogged the county since the 1970s. The board had hoped to resolve the matter last year, but snags in the environmental impact report slowed down the review process.

“The time is here,” Howard said. “I’m getting old and gray and I want something done very, very soon.”

The board members said they want to make sure that the county’s health-care system is more affordable and accessible and the county’s law enforcement agencies remain strong despite the fiscal difficulties.

“The budget is going to be so tight, it is going to be very hard to deal with priorities,” Supervisor Maggie Kildee said. “Clearly health care and law enforcement are the areas the board members all expressed a concern about.”

She suggested that the county--which operates the Ventura County Medical Center and four neighborhood clinics--hold a special forum to discuss health care issues.

Howard, meanwhile, cited the county’s low crime rate as a reason why the board should continue its strong support of law enforcement.

The low crime rate “is so important to our quality of life,” she said. “We see what is happening in Los Angeles, the casual accidental shooting death of a young person because someone was carrying a gun in a satchel to school. That’s a shocking thing.”

Faced with the worst budget crunch since the 1930s, the county should seek more creative ways to use its limited funding, VanderKolk told the board.

“My No. 1 goal would be to start giving exposure to new ideas,” VanderKolk said. “Some of the things that seem like heresy right now could really be setting the standards 10 years from now.”

For instance, VanderKolk said the county should explore the possibility of combining police and fire services, an option that she said is successfully in place in other communities.

She said the county should also consider consolidating some of its services.

“Supervisor Flynn and I have been talking about a reorganization,” VanderKolk said. “This is something that we hope to bring before the board within the next couple of months.

“We need to prioritize the shrinking resources that we have and bring all of those things under one umbrella.”

Top County Priorities * Economic Development

* Budget Matters

* Law Enforcement

* Health Care

* Trash