MOORPARK : Council Opposes Concert Fund-Raiser

The Moorpark City Council is strongly opposing a citizens’ group proposal to raise funds for a new high school athletic complex by holding a country-Western concert in Happy Camp Canyon Regional Park this fall.

In comments made Wednesday that will be forwarded to the county--which will eventually rule on the request--the council said such a use would not be appropriate on the rural property.

“You will create a scar upon the landscape from which it will not recover,” Councilman Scott Montgomery told Barbara Loczi, a representative of the Moorpark Athletic Community Complex committee, at the meeting.

Montgomery was the most outspoken critic of the group’s plans, at times challenging Loczi on the specifics of her plan. At one point, Mayor Paul Lawrason stepped in to caution the councilman and the speaker that things were getting “argumentative.”

The MACC committee applied to the county March 19 for the permit needed to hold the concert Oct. 10. The maximum crowd would number 15,000, Loczi said.

The council on Wednesday raised concerns over damage to the park and the effects of traffic, noise and air pollution. They said the concert would be better held at the high school stadium, which is under construction, or some other site.

Lawrason said Thursday that he has offered to help the group, which Loczi said has raised $371,600 in cash and in-kind donations since February, 1992, find another location for the concert.

“It’s a really worthy cause, an excellent thing that I want to support,” Lawrason said. “But in this time frame, on that property, it’s not working for me.”

The athletic complex would include the stadium, a track, two lighted softball fields with seating, an Olympic pool, a weight-training facility, baseball diamonds and four tennis courts.