Council Supports Baseball Stadium

Handing a resounding “Yes” to stadium organizers, Ventura City Council members agreed Monday that they would like to have a minor league baseball stadium on 35 acres near the Ventura Auto Center.

“We need something to happen here in this community, and we need it to happen now,” said Councilwoman Rosa Lee Measures after the unanimous vote. “I think it’s really exciting that we could all be sitting in the stands together in April, 1996.”

The toughest votes on the issue, however, are yet to come. Oxnard’s City Council is scheduled to vote on the matter today, and the Camarillo City Council will consider the item on Wednesday.

A stadium committee composed of officials from all three cities looked at four possible sites for the $15-million, 5,500-seat stadium, which is slated to open in the spring of 1996. Of the three other sites, two were in Camarillo and one was in Oxnard.

Some Camarillo officials are still insisting that land near Camarillo Airport would be much better suited to a baseball stadium for a Class A baseball team than the parcel in eastern Ventura.

In a report to other council members, an Oxnard councilman likewise touted the merits of a 49-acre Oxnard site on Rice Avenue near Gonzalez Road.

But Ventura officials say they are optimistic that they can work out differences among the three cities.

“We’ve gone through a process, we’ve all agreed on the consultant; this is the preferred site and I think it’s a clean deal,” Ventura Councilman Gregory L. Carson said. “I hope we stay on board.”