Ventura Backs Proposal for Veterans Home

The City Council unanimously endorsed plans to bring a war veterans home to a 22-acre parcel in the city’s east end Monday night, a state-funded retirement facility that would be one of only four such sites in Southern California.

The only opposition to the plan came from Councilman Gary Tuttle, who expressed concern about a component of the project that would allow the developer to build 430 homes on an adjacent 62-acre parcel.

“I am a little worried, Tuttle said during the meeting, which was attended by veterans from across Ventura County. “I am not ready to plunk down another 430 homes in another east end orchard.”

But Tuttle voted with the council majority to support the project after being reassured by City Atty. Pete Bulens that the council would not be committed to approving the housing development by voting for a resolution supporting the veterans home.

“You are not bound by this action,” he said.

The resolution will be sent to members of a governor’s commission that is considering Ventura, among other cities, as a site for the $30-million facility. The commission will meet in Ventura on March 6.

City officials hope to lobby the commission to choose Ventura as the fourth veterans home site in Southern California. They say the retirement home will bring jobs as well as visitors to Ventura, boosting tourism and the local economy.

“This will add tremendous value to our economic base,” Councilwoman Rosa Lee Measures said before the meeting.

In October 1994, the City Council unanimously approved a resolution endorsing the site owned by Newport Beach developer Wittenburg-Livingston as the future home of a veterans facility.

Chumash leaders initially opposed the project because the parcel was once a tribal burial ground. Their opposition helped scuttle the earlier proposal, because state officials were leery of bringing the home to a divided community.

But a compromise was reached among the developers, Chumash leaders and veterans groups last June to build a memorial at the location, clearing the way for the project.

Chumash leaders and veterans sat together at Monday’s council meeting and jointly urged the seven-member panel to support the proposed facility, which would house about 400 veterans.

“We are going to go forward and make this a success,” said veteran Richard T. Lee Jr., a Camarillo resident.

LeRoy Andrews, a veteran of World War II, said the facility will provide needed housing for some of the 700,000 veterans who live in Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties.

“A veterans home here,” Andrews said, “will support those veterans.”

Local veterans and Chumash representatives say the joint Native American-Veterans memorial would be the first of its kind in the nation.

Chumash leader Greg Sandoval, who is designing the war memorial, said the land in east Ventura has provided for the Chumash for 8,000 years. “Now,” he said, “it is providing for the veterans home.”

In exchange for donating 22 acres for the facility, Wittenburg-Livingston wants permission to build 430 homes on 62 acres near the site at the corner of Wells and Telephone roads.

“I have some real concerns,” Tuttle said before Monday’s meeting. “I think I have heard loud and clear from the citizens that we have enough houses.

“I am in favor of the veterans facility, but I am not in favor of more houses.”

The city’s Comprehensive Plan says Ventura’s population should not exceed 105,874 by the year 2000. But recent estimates indicate that the population will surpass that number by nearly 2,000 residents, reaching 107,566 by April 1, 2000. That does not include residents of the housing development tied to the veterans home.

Because that figure exceeds earlier projections, city staff is recommending that the council raise its ceiling for new development before considering housing projects in 1996. The council will take up that issue next week.