Retail Sales Growth Sliding, Report Says

Alarming some City Council members, a Santa Barbara economist has told the council that the rate of retail sales growth in Ventura is sliding and may continue to fall unless something is done to reverse the trend.

“In the 1980s, Ventura was on the top of the heap,” Mark Schniepp, project director of the UC Santa Barbara Economic Forecast Project, said Monday. “But Ventura has lost its edge in retail.”

He said other cities had also experienced a slide in retail sales, but that the slip is more pronounced in Ventura, according to the project’s report. Here, retail sales increased by only 1.5% in 1996, behind every city in the county except Simi Valley and Fillmore. That was also well below the county’s average increase of 4.3%, according to the report.

Councilman Steve Bennett said he hoped the grim retail news would generate more public support for the planned $100-million Buenaventura Mall expansion.

“I hope everybody saw that,” Bennett said, referring to the graphic showing Ventura’s dismal retail revenues. “That’s a good reason for all of us to support the mall expansion.”

Councilman Jim Friedman said he was alarmed by the retail figures and asked Schniepp if Ventura could do anything to stimulate sales short of building giant box stores, like the Price Club in Oxnard.

After saying he was there to provide information, not influence policy, Schniepp answered: “Short of bringing in that kind of activity, I don’t know what the city would do . . . Retail sales taxes are one of the largest revenue components for a municipality.”

The UCSB Economic Forecast Project, established in 1981, provides current economic and business information to participating sponsors, such as the city of Ventura.

Schniepp had presented the 1997 Ventura County Economic Outlook at the project’s annual Economic Forecast Seminar on Feb. 20, but Monday tried to present more Ventura-specific information to the council.