Landowners May Be Billed for Road Work : Taxation: Improvements to the Flynn Road interchange with the Ventura Freeway may cost nearby property owners $4.8 million in assessments.

With traffic congestion increasing in the eastern part of the city, Camarillo officials are looking for ways to pay for a $5.3-million improvement of the interchange where Flynn Road meets the Ventura Freeway.

Although the city probably will contribute $500,000 toward the overall cost, the owners of about 700 acres north of the freeway and east of Lewis Road are being asked to join a special tax district that would pay the $4.8-million balance.

Following a public hearing scheduled for tonight, members of the Camarillo City Council will consider creating the special district over the written protests of more than a fourth of the landowners.

State law allows cities to form assessment districts despite the protests of property owners.

Since 1987, the City Council has required developers in the area to agree to the formation of such a district. In fact, owners of 93 of the 206 parcels within the proposed assessment district have signed agreements requiring them to join, officials said.

Each would be assessed a special tax based on zoning and the size of their parcel.

“We’ve known for a long time that access to the freeway needed to be improved,” Mayor David Smith said. “As more development takes place, that necessity becomes more apparent.”

City staff first recommended that the city contribute about $270,000 toward the project. But after receiving complaints from some property owners, the recommended contribution was raised to $500,000.

Under the financing plan put together by city officials and consultants, an assessment district would be formed for the owners of 206 parcels east of Lewis Road, north of the Ventura Freeway and west of Santa Rosa Road.

The assessment would pay for contractors to improve the northbound freeway offramps at Lewis Road, realign Mission Oaks Boulevard at Flynn Road, install a traffic light at the freeway ramps at Flynn Road and Mission Oaks Boulevard, and relocate some of the existing utility poles.

The northbound freeway exit at Dawson Drive also would be closed.

Dan Greeley, the city’s director of engineering services, said he recommends that the council ante up $500,000 because the intersection would benefit all city residents to some extent, and not just those who live or do business in the eastern portion of Camarillo.

“There isn’t a set formula” for city contributions, Greeley said. But “there is some benefit to others that are not connected with the district itself.”

Preliminary schedules call for construction of the new interchange and traffic light to begin in November 1996. The project would take about eight months to complete, depending on weather, Greeley said.

Despite the smoother traffic flow that would come with the $5.3-million road improvement, some area homeowners object to the continuing development in their neighborhood.

“Whatever happened to growth control?” asked Dagmar Ragnow, who bought a house on Calle Lozano six years ago. “They keep putting in these new developments and it has totally destroyed my neighborhood.

“All of our farmland is going away,” she said. “Everything that attracted us to this community is disappearing.”