Governing Body Studied for Airstrip : Point Mugu: Some executive members of the panel examining possible civilian use of the Navy runway call the idea premature.

Although the feasibility of civilian passenger and cargo flights at Point Mugu Naval Air Station has yet to be determined, a countywide committee studying the idea may establish a governing authority to run the proposed project.

But the concept of establishing such an authority--proposed by some on the 70-member study committee--was criticized by several members of its executive panel during a meeting Wednesday at Camarillo Airport.

“This seems to me to be putting the cart before the horse,” said Ventura County Supervisor Maria VanderKolk, a member of the executive panel. “What has given you folks the sense that we’re in the rush mode here?”

VanderKolk and other executive committee members called the idea premature until a feasibility study on civilian use of the Point Mugu airfield is completed. Even then, they said, the Navy would have to sign off on the proposal before it could proceed.

Creating a governing authority now, they said, could send a misleading signal to the public that the proposal was a done deal.

Echoing VanderKolk was Camarillo City Councilwoman Charlotte Craven.

“We would be sending a very strong signal that this thing has been approved,” Craven said. “And, clearly, that’s not the case.”

The Southern California Assn. of Governments is conducting the feasibility study on civilian use of the Navy’s 11,000-foot airstrip. The study is being funded by a $150,000 grant provided by the Federal Aviation Administration and is due to be released in late March.

Although the Navy first proposed possible civilian use of its facility, Capt. Tom Boothe, the Navy’s top-ranking representative on the committee, said Navy approval of the concept is not a foregone conclusion.

“Once this committee gets its act together, (this proposal) will have to go up the chain of command for approval,” Boothe said. “So far, we have received a lot of vertical nods and no horizontal nods on this thing. Maria’s right, though, there is no formal approval for this project yet.”

The idea to establish the so-called “joint powers authority” came from a subcommittee on organizational structure led by former Oxnard City Manager Vernon Hazen and attorney Wayne Lemieux. As proposed, the authority would be made up of representatives from Ventura County and the cities of Thousand Oaks, Camarillo, Oxnard, Ventura and Port Hueneme along with the Oxnard Harbor District.

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Both Hazen and Lemieux said that by contacting potential members of such an authority now, vital time could be saved later if the feasibility study reaches favorable conclusions.

“The idea behind this is to save time,” Hazen said.

Executive panel members decided on a go-slow approach. They directed Hazen and Lemieux to sound out representatives of the county, city managers of the five cities and representatives of the harbor district on the authority idea and report their findings.

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During the meeting, SCAG spokesman Tim Merwin said that the first phase of the feasibility report--once expected in February--will be delayed a month because analysts need more time to research radar capacity, missile range scheduling and other details. The report is now due to reach the full committee in late March.

The committee will next meet March 2 at the County Department of Airports offices in Camarillo.

Navy officials first proposed sharing their Point Mugu runway with commercial passenger and cargo carriers early last year. A steady decline in military flights has left the airfield with flight time available. Selling flight time could help the Navy defray the costs of running the naval air station, but opponents fear that it could lead to development of a full-scale regional airport.