Bargain Road

The competition for discount shoppers along the Ventura Freeway will heat up again this summer as developers begin expanding two retail projects in Oxnard and Camarillo and look for new tenants at a third.

Flush with success over the first two phases of the Camarillo Factory Stores, owners of the outdoor mall have broken ground on the third group of designer stores six months ahead of schedule.

Officials from Chelsea GCA Realty, the New Jersey-based trust that owns the outlet mall, said that another 20 shops will be built on vacant ground across Camarillo Center Drive from the existing center.

“We are proceeding ahead of our anticipated schedule due to the success of our leasing efforts,” said Michele Rothstein, Chelsea GCA Realty vice president of marketing.

In Oxnard, city leaders are expected to give final approval tonight to new retail development along their city’s stretch of the Ventura Freeway--overriding residents’ concerns about traffic and safety to allow the Cleveland-based Office Max Inc. to start building a 23,275-square-foot office supply store at Rose Avenue. The store could open by the end of the year.

The project was held up for months as city officials argued over how to pay for a new bridge crossing the freeway at Rose Avenue. Last week, council members agreed to let Office Max go forward but delay any further development at Shopping at the Rose II until an assessment district is set up to raise money for the overpass.

“We are delighted to be able to proceed with this portion of the project,” said Stanley Rothbart, the Santa Monica-based developer behind the complex.

Down the freeway, officials with the Oxnard Factory Outlet complex said they are waiting to sign more leases with tenants before proceeding with plans to double the size of that center.

Peggy Wimberley, the outlet center’s general manager, said expansion plans call for adding 35 new stores or 147,000 square feet of retail space on a site just west of the existing 35 stores.

But Wimberley said Prime Retail and Fru-Con Development--the two companies behind the complex--want to lease at least 50% of the proposed space before announcing any plans.

“Leasing has been a little slow, not just at our center, but across the country,” Wimberley said. “But retail sales have picked up. We are hopeful this means that retailers will be looking at expansion again.”

Officials at the Camarillo outlet mall are having no trouble attracting tenants to their mall, which opened last year and now has 70 designer businesses offering factory merchandise directly to consumers.

The mall employs about 800 people and includes 245,000 square feet of retail space. The third phase will add another 200 full- and part-time jobs and offer another 55,000 square feet of shopping space.

Completion of the latest phase of the outlet mall is expected by November--just in time for the holiday shopping season.

“We felt that rather than do it [next year], let’s shoot to get some stores open by the holidays,” Rothstein said. “The demand is there from the tenant side.”

*

Realty company officials also are planning a fourth phase of the Camarillo Factory Stores.

No date has been announced for that addition, although it is expected to add another 145,000 square feet of retail space and hundreds of new jobs to the Camarillo area.

Teri Cameron, general manager of the Camarillo Factory Stores, credited the development’s ongoing success with its high-end marketing strategy.

“We have a good mix here, and others want to join the lineup,” said Cameron, adding that Benetton and Reel Studio both opened within the past two months.

“We’re just attracting those types of names because they want to be here with the other names that are already here,” Cameron said.

The announcement spells good news for Camarillo city officials, who have watched city sales tax revenue steadily climb since the factory outlet opened its doors.

“Any increases they have over there will increase our sales tax,” said Anita Bingham, the city’s finance director.

“The other good thing is that it gives Camarillo citizens more opportunity to shop in Camarillo rather than take their money out of town,” Bingham added.

Sales tax revenue in Camarillo climbed almost 33% over the past year, rising from $3.5 million in May 1995 to $4.5 million this May, Bingham said.

“But it isn’t all due to that [factory outlet],” she said. “There are some other business sectors in the community that have increased too.”

Shopping at the Rose--a collection of discount stores at the intersection of Rose Avenue and the freeway--has drawn huge crowds and tax revenues for Oxnard, as well.

But before allowing the project to continue expanding across Rose Avenue, City Manager Tom Frutchey and the Rio School District appealed to the council to find a solution to the traffic bottleneck on the two-lane freeway overpass.

Frutchey and the school district argued it would be premature to allow any more development in the area without setting up a financing plan for area traffic improvements.

*

School district officials have argued that the existing overpass is too often clogged with traffic and is dangerous for neighborhood schoolchildren crossing the roadway.

But city leaders countered last Tuesday that Oxnard is close to setting up a $15.8-million special tax district that will help pay for a new six-lane overpass across the freeway. The bridge, however, will not be completed until 2000.

Final approval of the Office Max project comes with conditions: The City Council cannot allow additional development at the site, where another 60,000 square feet is planned, until the special assessment district is actually set up sometime later this year.