Ventura OKs Housing Plan With Library

The City Council has agreed to move ahead with a proposal to borrow as many as 180 housing allocations reserved for downtown projects to speed up plans to build houses off Ventura Avenue.

The 180-unit housing tract proposed by the Neel family would also include a new $500,000 library, under the plan presented by Tom Neel and Councilman Ray Di Guilio on Monday night.

Neel told the Ventura council that his family’s 20-acre ranch between Ventura Avenue and California 33 at Shoshone Street would be an ideal site for single-family homes and townhomes.

The idea of including a 4,000-square-foot library was added to the housing proposal after Di Guilio approached the family, descendants of Ventura library donor E. P. Foster, who now has a branch named for him.

The facility would replace the tiny Ventura Avenue library, which is slated for closure this summer.

But who would pay the new branch’s ongoing operation costs is still uncertain because library officials have proposed cutting all funding for the county’s smaller branches.

The Neel project, which abuts an industrial area, also faces a number of other challenges, including opposition from nearby businesses which have expressed concern over existing toxic waste and loud industrial operations that would be incompatible with residences.

But some City Council members said they were intrigued by the library proposal and, at least conceptually, they support the Neel housing plan.

The council voted unanimously to direct city staff to come back in July with a proposal to move the housing allocations.

Such a move would allow the council to get around its decision earlier this year to postpone, because of population concerns, the biennial housing allocation process in which developers are given the right to build.

“What that means is, the Neel project will not have to compete with any east-end projects for allocations and go right into the entitlement process,” said Everett Millais, the city’s community services director.