CAMARILLO : City Sued Again Over Factory Outlet Mall

An Oxnard man has sued the city of Camarillo for the second time over a proposal to build a long-embattled factory outlet mall in Camarillo.

Stephen J. Maulhardt filed a lawsuit in Ventura Superior Court last week charging that the city of Camarillo and Camarillo Factory Outlet Stores developers failed to live up to an agreement to pay his legal fees from a previous lawsuit.

In addition, he alleged in the most recent suit that the city had not adequately addressed the traffic congestion at the mall to be built south of the Ventura Freeway between Carmen Drive and Las Posas Road.

Maulhardt said the city agreed in a settlement to pay $40,000 for fees incurred in the first lawsuit last summer, which Maulhardt won. That suit charged that a deal the city made to rebate sales tax revenues to the mall developer amounted to a gift of public funds and that the city’s environmental review was inadequate.

In exchange for the $40,000 settlement, Maulhardt agreed not to sue the city again over the development of the mall. But because he has not been paid, Maulhardt said the settlement is no longer valid.

“I decided to challenge the (new environmental report) because it still does not adequately analyze (traffic) impacts,” Maulhardt said in a statement. “To add insult to injury, they have dishonored the settlement agreement.”

But City Manager Bill Little said that developers Chelsea GCA and the Koll Co. and property owners refused to honor the settlement, and that the city also balked at paying Maulhardt.

None of the developers could be reached for comment Tuesday, but Little said the new lawsuit was nothing but an attempt by Maulhardt to recover the $40,000 and slow the mall’s development. It is scheduled for groundbreaking later this spring.