CAMARILLO : 280 Jobs at Stake as 3 Firms Plan to Move

Three Camarillo businesses are relocating to other California cities to either reduce costs or expand, officials said this week.

The moves will cost Ventura County at least 280 jobs.

But in one case, Core-Vent Bio-Engineering will relocate only about 20 miles away to Calabasas. Management is hoping to keep all of its current employees.

And another business, National Diversified Sales, reports that a similar-size company is already slated to replace it when it moves in October.

National Diversified, which employs 99 workers at its irrigation systems manufacturing plant, will take about 70 employees to a larger building in Lindsay, a small town in the San Joaquin Valley.

“We needed a larger building because the company’s growing and expanding,” said Scott Palladino, chief financial officer. “Everything you look at is less expensive (in Lindsay),” he said.

In a similar move, Poser Business Forms will take its 85 manufacturing jobs to Visalia, near Lindsay. Plant officials could not be reached Thursday.

In an expansion, Core-Vent Bio-Engineering hopes to have operations started at a new 37,000-square-foot facility in Calabasas by mid-October.

Patricia Jacobs, vice president of operations, said the firm will try to take all 110 employees--most of whom live in Oxnard, Ventura and Camarillo--with it.

She said she expects to lose some workers who do not want to relocate or make the commute. Core-Vent makes implants for Dentsply International, a large dental products distributor.