Assembly Panel OKs CSU Bill

A key Assembly panel has given its blessing to a bill aimed at generating cash needed to transform Camarillo State Hospital into Ventura County’s first four-year public university.

The Assembly’s appropriations committee Wednesday unanimously endorsed legislation, introduced by Sen. Jack O’Connell (D-San Luis Obispo) to create a special authority dedicated to managing all financial aspects of the proposed campus.

The bill, already approved by the Senate, goes to the full Assembly for ratification.

“Assembly members really put this bill under the microscope, but we proved the merit of this new approach,” O’Connell said in a prepared statement. “It’s a new campus for a new century with a creative support mechanism.”

The legislation would create a special authority made up of Cal State trustees and local elected officials to serve as landlord for the campus, planned for the shuttered mental hospital.

A cross between a redevelopment agency and the type of entity used to revive mothballed military bases, the seven-member authority would be responsible for raising revenues from property and sales taxes, selling bonds and providing tax incentives to lure private and public ventures to the 630-acre property.

The authority would not be needed to launch the inaugural phase of the campus, as lawmakers have earmarked $16.5 million to convert the old hospital into the new home for the Ventura campus of Cal State Northridge.

Rather, it would be needed to generate the $25 million to $50 million necessary to expand the Northridge center into a full-fledged university, a 23rd campus in the CSU system to be called Cal State Channel Islands.

“This bill will ensure that county and city leaders play a joint role with the CSU system in the establishment of the new campus,” O’Connell said. “To my knowledge, this is the first community in the state to really make higher education a joint venture.”