State Says Laws Favor Home for the Dying : Thousand Oaks: Neighbors and Councilwoman Zeanah vow to prevent the proposed facility from opening.

State officials said Wednesday that nobody can stop a home for terminally ill patients from opening on Westlake Lake as long it complies with city planning laws regulating neighborhoods.

Furthermore, the city may run afoul of federal fair housing laws if it adopts any new ordinances or permit processes aimed at shutting Isobel Oxx’s home, City Atty. Mark G. Sellers said in a memo to Thousand Oaks City Council members.

“It is considered a residential piece of property,” said Scott Lewis, a state Department of Health Services spokesman. “You cannot restrict it specifically.”

Oxx’s application to open her home to six dying patients is pending before the state Department of Health Services.

Despite Wednesday’s news, the neighborhood and Councilwoman Elois Zeanah remained undeterred.

Zeanah vowed Wednesday to “go all out” to prevent the home that Oxx calls “My Father’s Home” from becoming a reality.

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As Zeanah sees it, the state should not be given authority over what the councilwoman believes is the city’s jurisdiction.

The City Council agreed with her and voted unanimously Tuesday to lobby the Legislature to amend the law governing such facilities. Local legislators said Wednesday that they have not been contacted by Thousand Oaks officials.

“We haven’t heard from them,” said John Thiess, an aide to state Sen. Cathie Wright (R-Simi Valley). “Plus, there’s nothing we can do in this legislative session.”

Thiess said Thousand Oaks officials would probably have to wait until next year if they want to introduce legislation to change the law.

Zeanah also said Wednesday that she hoped to use the city’s planning and health laws to prevent the home from opening. But a city official said the home has already passed inspection and there is little they can do to prevent its opening. Oxx touched off a firestorm of criticism when neighbors learned of her plans. Oxx was unavailable for comment Wednesday.

More than 100 of Oxx’s Leeward Circle neighbors packed the City Council chambers Tuesday night to denounce the planned home. A next-door neighbor hung a sign Wednesday on a gate directing the coroner to Oxx’s home.

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“What will happen to daily peace and privacy,” an adjacent sign asks. “Many deaths next door.”

Oxx’s many critics contend that the serenity of their suburban neighborhood on the shores of their man-made lake will be shattered by the dying patients in the home. Three homeowners in the cul-de-sac have recently placed large “No Parking” signs in their front yards.

“The signs are something that shouldn’t be there,” said Jim Mashiko, an associate engineer in the city’s Public Works Department.

“It’s a public street. They need to come and get a permit.”

Mashiko said public works officials planned late Wednesday to check into the signs.

But Oxx’s neighbors on the quiet cul-de-sac are vehement in their opposition. Neighbors such as Katie Anderson are working nearly full time to prevent the home from opening. Stacks of newspaper clippings and copies of federal, state and city laws overflow on her kitchen counter.

“This is such an overwhelming problem,” Anderson said. She said she understands the need for such a facility.

“But they have no place in a Westlake neighborhood or a Watts neighborhood or a Bel-Air neighborhood,” she said. Instead, Anderson said the homes for the dying belong in a more commercialized part of town.

Anderson said she and her husband bought their house on the cul-de-sac four months ago because of the tranquillity the lakefront community offered. She said she would not have bought the home had she known a house for the dying was to open yards away.

She fears her street will become overcrowded with visiting family and friends, ambulances, coroner vans and hearses which will limit her 11-year-old son’s ability to play on the street. She said some of the home’s tenants may be AIDS patients, who contracted the disease through intravenous drug use.

“And their criminal friends will come by to say goodby,” Anderson said, adding that syringes discarded in the neighborhood could become a problem. Anderson said a quiet residential neighborhood is no place for Oxx’s facility. And laws that protect that right are wrong, Anderson said.

“That’s truly an overreaction,” said Jean-Marie Cull, a registered hospice nurse in Ventura County. “It’s a wonderful idea.”

Cull said there’s a lack of facilities for the dying in Ventura County, which averages about 50 terminal patients at any given time. She said she doesn’t expect Oxx’s home to be very profitable.

“That’s why you don’t see hospitals opening up wings for the dying,” she said.