Rift Threatens Oxnard Panel Charged With Unifying Residents

After succeeding for more than 20 years in bringing residents together, a special committee representing 36 Oxnard neighborhoods is now driving them apart.

Last week, a dozen delegates to the Inter-neighborhood Council Committee walked out in the middle of the body’s first meeting of the new year, charging that the committee has become too political.

Established in the early 1970s, the committee serves as the unifying force for Oxnard’s successful neighborhood councils. But some delegates say what was once a forum to swap ideas on wiping out such urban ills as crime and graffiti is evolving into a political body with a specific agenda.

“I don’t feel that it is my place to represent my neighborhood in a political stance,” said Denise Paul, chairwoman of the Orchard Park Neighborhood Council and one of the delegates who left the Jan. 3 meeting. “That is an individual choice. [The committee] is going toward dictating city policy and is getting away from Neighborhood Watch, graffiti and CERT [community emergency response training].”

In particular, Paul said some delegates urged the committee to back an effort to reinstate Oxnard’s Planning Commission, which the city replaced last year with a hearing officer and a panel of land-use advisors.

Some delegates also asked the committee to back Village West, a hotly debated proposal by a financially troubled developer to build 351 residences in south Oxnard near factories and a sensitive wetland.

“I don’t see these as citywide concerns,” said Nancy Pedersen, chairwoman of the Cal-Gisler Neighborhood Council and a committee vice chairwoman who resigned last week. “In my neighborhood, we have no interest in land use. We have no land to develop.”

Pedersen, Paul and others say the committee should continue to serve as a clearinghouse of information on concerns such as code enforcement, graffiti removal and getting rid of gangs. They said they left the meeting, which included the installment of new officers, because they believed the incoming leaders would favor taking positions on so-called political issues.

But Steve Buratti, the committee’s chairman, said the body’s bylaws clearly call for using the panel to convey delegates’ views to government officials. Buratti said he favors taking a stance on an issue before the City Council if a majority of its delegates supports the move.

“[Village West] is exactly the type of project that we should consider because it directly affects four neighborhoods and indirectly affects scores more,” Buratti said. “People on the south side of Oxnard want some of the better developments that have been proposed. This is the type of thing that the [committee] as one voice should let the City Council know.”

Buratti said contrary to the opinion of those who walked out, the committee has no plans to abandon the issues that concern them. After the dozen representatives left the Jan. 3 meeting, members voted on the top issues for 1996: Neighborhood Watch, code enforcement, graffiti and gangs.

Shawn Henning, a committee delegate and member of the Hobson Park West neighborhood council, called the walkout premature. “They never gave the new board a chance,” he said.

In a letter delivered Tuesday to Oxnard’s City Council, 13 delegates, including those who had walked out, stated that a serious rift had developed within the committee. The letter asked the city to redefine the role of the committee and suggested that some neighborhood councils may leave the body for good and reorganize as neighborhood associations.

“I don’t need the [committee],” said Eleanor Branthoover, chairwoman of the Rio Lindo Neighborhood Council. “My neighborhood can get along without it. I want to communicate with other neighborhoods on a much friendlier basis.”

Buratti contends the dozen who walked out could achieve more by returning to the committee and influencing its direction with their views.

“We might be able to do some good things for the city,” he said.

Buratti, dogged by claims that he intends to use the chairman’s post to launch a bid for the City Council, denied the rumors.

“Emphatically, unequivocally, and once and for all, I have no intention now or in the future of running for City Council,” Buratti said.

Although Oxnard Mayor Manuel Lopez said the City Council is awaiting a report on the dispute, he said the walkout may be a sign that the neighborhood councils’ program is incurring growing pains.

“I think that the [committee] has always been political if political is just actions by people that affect their living situation,” Lopez said.