Ventura May Put Library Tax Proposal on Ballot : Funding: Council is expected to let voters decide whether property owners should pay more to maintain three county branches in the city.

With elected officials rejecting a proposed tax to support libraries at a regional meeting earlier this week, the Ventura City Council on Monday is expected to agree to place a similar measure before voters this November.

Council members have heard for months from library boosters that the three county branches in Ventura deserve more funding--even if it means paying higher property taxes.

“It’s a disgrace that we have to go through this every year to maintain the libraries,” said Carolyn Newman, a director on the San Buenaventura Friends of the Library board.

The Ventura County Library Services Agency has seen its $10-million budget shrink to about $6 million over the past four years.

County analysts have earmarked $820,000 in extra library funds for 1995-96, but the Board of Supervisors could slice into those dollars during summer budget hearings. The county is facing a $19-million deficit next year.

Dixie Adeniran, the library agency’s director, warned each of the seven city councils served by the system that many of the 16 branch offices will close if more funds are not found.

“If we stay where we are, library service in Ventura County is going to die,” she told the Ventura council two weeks ago.

The Friends of the San Buenaventura Library earlier this month turned in the signatures of more than 5,000 Ventura residents who support an annual parcel tax of about $35 per lot.

They asked council members to impose the tax or let voters decide whether to approve the assessment, which would generate about $1 million a year for Ventura’s libraries.

Two weeks ago, the seven-member panel rejected Councilman Gary Tuttle’s motion to enact the tax without voters’ consent. But members did agree to place the measure on the November ballot if the Ventura Council of Governments failed to support a countywide assessment.

At the regional meeting of local elected officials on Thursday, however, most representatives said the county library district was top-heavy with managers and that voters would probably not approve a tax increase.

“Only [Ojai Mayor] Nina Shelley and I were sounding at all interested in moving in that direction,” said Ventura Mayor Tom Buford, who attended the regional meeting Thursday.

“The county’s certainly not going to put a countywide measure on, so we have to go ahead and do what we have to,” Buford said. “I don’t think there’s a real choice if we’re looking for new funds for city libraries.”

If approved, Ventura’s ballot measure would ensure that proceeds would benefit only the three branches within the city.

“It’s a first step toward making our libraries healthy,” Tuttle said Friday. “The first thing we do is get the money to keep them open, then we start looking at maintaining the facilities.”

But the assessment would need the approval of at least two-thirds of the voters to pass.

“It’s going to be difficult, but we’re sure hoping,” said Barbara Swanson, president of the San Buenaventura Friends of the Library group.

“If people hadn’t voted for Proposition 13, we wouldn’t be in this situation,” Swanson said. “That’s what caused all this money to be taken away from the library system.”

That 1978 measure limited the amount of property taxes the state could impose.

Money generated by the parcel tax would allow county officials to nearly double the hours at the Foster, Wright and Ventura Avenue libraries. The branches now are open between 19 and 27 hours a week.

Further muddying the picture is the deteriorating condition of several of the agency’s library branches. For example, part of the Foster Library in Ventura has been condemned.

Buford has been called on to appoint a committee to study ways to raise money for library buildings. He expects to name its members later this summer.

“It’s falling down around our ears,” Buford said of the Foster Library.