Sale of Moorpark Fields Fails Again : Recreation: City had hoped to convert the land to park use.

After more than six years of negotiations and legal wrangling, the city of Moorpark and the Moorpark Unified School District have failed again to complete the sale of district athletic fields that the city envisions as a downtown park.

The lack of an agreement that many thought was imminent was particularly frustrating to city and school officials, who hoped to close the book on an issue that has become one of the most divisive in this city’s 10-year history.

“I was devastated,” Councilman Bernardo Perez said last week after hearing that the school board had rejected the latest deal that he, Mayor Paul Lawrason and school board members Clint Harper and Tom Baldwin had hammered out June 19.

“It was not an easy task meeting with Tom and Clint, it was not a thoroughly congenial discussion and yet we left there knowing that Clint and Tom saw that proposal as being fair,” Perez said. “We thought, in light of all the history, that we were there.”

Representatives of the city and the board left that June meeting needing only one additional vote on each side to make the long-awaited sale a reality.

Meeting in closed session Monday, the council unanimously approved terms of the sale. But Harper and Baldwin failed to persuade board President Pam Castro and board member Gregory Barker to back the deal in a closed session Tuesday night. Castro objected to the terms and Barker to the price.

Former board President Sam Nainoa resigned earlier this month, leaving no one to break the 2-2 deadlock.

Baldwin said he was so frustrated with Castro and Barker that he walked out of the meeting. “I said, ‘The heck with it,’ and I left.”

The most recent disappointment followed a court battle over the land that went all the way to the state Supreme Court, several joint meetings to discuss the sale and continuing negotiations for the past few years.

City officials criticized what they saw as a failing on Barker and Castro’s part to recognize a chance for the district to raise some badly needed funds and the city to give its residents a downtown park. The city has for years promised to bring a park to the predominantly Latino area.

Perez was especially critical of Castro, whom he sees as a fellow advocate for the city’s downtown residents.

“It’s ironic and perplexing that Pam Castro, a longtime advocate of a downtown park, a longtime downtown resident, is the one that stands in the way,” Perez said.

Under terms of the latest deal, the city would have paid $1.2 million for roughly 10 acres of the 26-acre school site at 280 Casey Road--$900,000 up front and the remaining $300,000 in annual payments of $50,000, interest free.

The city also agreed to allow the same number of housing units to be built on the remaining 16 acres as would have been allowed on the entire 26 acres--between 80 and 120 residences. Finally, the city agreed to allow the district to continue using a maintenance and storage building on the parcel for another two years, rent-free.

Baldwin maintains the deal is a good one for the district.

“I was very disappointed,” he said. “We really worked hard to get them to come to this point, it wasn’t like they just tumbled to it. We worked very, very hard on it.”

Castro said Thursday that the deferred, interest-free payment of $300,000 was the sole reason she could not support the settlement.

“We’re in no position to float a loan for another entity,” Castro said. “We’re certainly in no position to be a loaning institution. That was my only concern.”

Castro said she still hopes the sides can iron out that final point and move ahead with a deal.

“I still see that there can be compromise,” she said. “I know we can make it work. I completely feel that there are committed people in the city and school district who will make it happen.”

Barker said the city’s purchase price was too low but he still has hope for a deal.

He said Harper, Baldwin, and to some extent Castro had allowed themselves to develop an “emotional attachment” to the idea of a downtown park that was clouding their ability to negotiate.

“I don’t have any such allegiances, other than to the children in the district,” Barker said. “I want to negotiate it, but I don’t think that we’re anywhere close to it yet.” Shortly after the board appointed Gary Cabriales to serve the remainder of Nainoa’s term early Friday, it met in closed session and voted to send a new proposal to the city for consideration.

Harper would not say Friday how the amended proposal differed from what was considered last week, but said it was very close to the settlement the city had approved.

Perez said Friday he had mixed feelings about reviewing yet another deal.

“I don’t know how well-received a revised offer would be at this point,” Perez said. “The council is at its limits as far as trying to consummate this deal. On the other hand it’s awfully tough to be so close and lose the site.”