Ruling on Attorney Fees to Be Appealed

Oxnard will appeal a judge’s ruling that the city pay about $256,000 in attorney fees for a lawsuit that argued Oxnard was failing to attract sufficient affordable-housing projects to the city.

The City Council voted 5 to 0 Tuesday to appeal the February ruling by Ventura Superior Court Judge Joseph D. Hadden that said the city must pay about $256,000 total to various attorneys and legal agencies that brought the suit.

The lawsuit was filed in 1994 by Mary Herrera, a longtime Oxnard resident who had been trying without success to find affordable housing, attorneys for the case said. Another suit was filed, but the two were consolidated into one suit called Herrera vs. the City of Oxnard.

The suit alleged that Oxnard had failed to comply with state law because the city lacked a solid plan for attracting low-cost housing projects.

“Oxnard’s housing policy was a ship without a captain,” said Barbara Macri-Ortiz, a staff attorney with Channel Counties Legal Services Assn. and the lead attorney on the suit.

The city settled the case last year after adopting an Affordable Housing Production Plan that provides incentives to developers to build low-income housing.

But after the city and the plaintiffs failed to reach an agreement on attorney fees, the issue went to court, and Hadden ruled that the city must pay the $256,000.

City Atty. Gary Gillig said the sum is simply too much.

But Macri-Ortiz said she and other lawyers had proposed a lower amount that the city rejected.

“The court determined what we were asking for was fair,” Macri-Ortiz said. “So now the city doesn’t like what they heard.”

Macri-Ortiz said Oxnard could wind up paying more money in additional legal fees and encounter sanctions if the court throws out the appeal.