Ventura Council Defying Constituents
* The only points you report on Ventura’s deal with developers of the Buenaventura Mall are those emphasizing the “outsider” aspects of the drive to stop the deal. I say, so what? The same can be said for the proponents of the mall deal.
What is important is that the City Council committed a lot of city money to a project clearly opposed by many of its citizens. The drafters of the opposition initiative may be outsiders, and they may be on the Esplanade’s payroll, but the people signing the petitions all live here, and no one’s paying them for their signatures.
Most of the “infrastructure improvement” money tied into this deal actually goes for a parking structure. And, if it is such a good deal, why doesn’t the city let the people decide the merits of the project at the voting booth?
Even if the mall debt swap is a good deal, which I doubt, the actions of the Ventura City Council convey the image of a deliberative body purposefully defying the will of its constituents.
WILLIAM P. McGOWAN
Ventura
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