Activists Criticize New Plan to Build Homes on Oxnard Farmland

City officials are again considering plans to build homes on farmland, angering activists who want to slow the pace of urbanization.

Under a new proposal, the city would annex 203 acres of farmland between Oxnard and Camarillo--property once included in the 815-acre Southeast Plan. That project, widely denounced as a giant step toward urban sprawl, called for 3,165 new homes and an agriculture theme park.

Two weeks ago, after months of pressure from environmentalists and residents, officials declared the Southeast Plan dead. The strong opposition from residents caused Somis-based Ag Land Services to pull the proposal, city planners said.

But now, planners are asking City Council members to consider at least some new homes in southeast Oxnard. The scaled-down plan calls for a high school, elementary school and 350 new houses.

Activists said they are stunned that officials still have their eyes on farmland.

“It does appear the Southeast Plan is coming back, Hydra-like,” said John Buse, an attorney with the Environmental Defense Center in Ventura. “You cut off one head and others start coming back.”

Added resident Paul Chatman: “I’m rather dismayed by the attempt to resurrect the Southeast Plan. That’s why there’s distrust [of city officials].”

Those reactions came during a broad discussion on growth Tuesday night at Oxnard City Hall, one in a series of meetings aimed at charting development in Oxnard through the year 2020.

Like cities across the county, Oxnard has been searching for ways to save farmland without stifling business growth. But the new proposal for southeast Oxnard triggered strong reactions from preservationists, who are fighting to strip elected officials of their power to rezone farmland.

Whether council members will accept the new proposal, put forward by city planners who say Oxnard needs to keep its growth options open, remains unclear.

Councilman Tom Holden, a chief critic of the Southeast Plan, said Wednesday that the scaled-down proposal merits a close look. Councilman John Zaragoza said he supports letting schools build new campuses there but opposes building new homes.

Meanwhile, Mayor Manuel Lopez and Councilman Dean Maulhardt said they are still considering the plan. Councilman Bedford Pinkard could not be reached for comment.

Delving into a broader issue, council members Tuesday discussed urban growth limits--strict boundaries aimed at making certain areas off-limits to development.

Hoping to halt urban sprawl, several Northern California cities have adopted such limits, but Oxnard would be the first Ventura County city to set them.

Supporters of the Save Open Space and Agricultural Resources campaign have said they want the new limits to correspond with the city’s sphere of influence. That would freeze growth at the city’s current planning boundaries.

Such a move would rule out several annexation plans. In addition to the new proposal for southeast Oxnard, City Council members are looking at a 450-home subdivision on farmland near Victoria Avenue, a 128-unit housing project near Pleasant Valley Road and 365 new homes on sand dunes at Mandalay Bay.

Those projects have been under consideration for some time. And council members have said that before they set new restrictions, they want to consider all those proposals, making sure that they leave enough room for growth.

But after the bruising public battle over the Southeast Plan, the new look at southeast Oxnard took many by surprise.

Public Services Director Matthew Winegar said city planners are not being pressured by developers to keep the Southeast Plan alive. But with the city’s high school and elementary school districts wanting to build new campuses in the southeast site, planners think that erecting 350 new homes there is a good idea, he said.

“Having schools surrounded by residential areas would be better than having them surrounded by farms, because pesticides, herbicides and crop management are sometimes incompatible with school activities,” Winegar said.

Activists, however, said they thought that they had made it clear--they do not want any new homes built on farmland near southeast Oxnard.

They called the new proposal another reason to support the SOAR campaign. In addition to freezing growth at the city’s present boundaries, slow-growth advocates want to take away the power that elected officials have to rezone farmland, instead making voter approval necessary for such projects.

But in a sign that SOAR backers and the Oxnard City Council might consider a compromise, Holden on Tuesday night announced that he supports giving voters control of farmland development. When the City Council sets the urban growth limits, he said, it should stipulate that the lines can only be changed by voters. Officials expect to discuss where the lines should be drawn next month.

“I think it’s an opportunity for the council to demonstrate leadership, to move ahead and offer [residents] some comfort and security,” Holden said.

Holden’s move did not draw immediate responses from the other council members. But it was praised by Richard Francis, one of the leaders of the SOAR campaign.

Giving voters control of farmland development is the key issue dividing city officials and SOAR backers, he said. Francis plans to meet with each council member in the next few weeks to see if a majority will support that stipulation--a move, he said, that would make an Oxnard SOAR ballot initiative unnecessary.

“There’s room to talk,” he said. “But nobody’s making any deals yet.”