This Coastal Jewel Needs Polishing
What is Ormond Beach? Nestled in the industrial and agricultural landscape of south Oxnard, it lies as an environmental uncut jewel.
A Southern California Edison generating station, Oxnard’s waste-water treatment plant and numerous light and heavy industrial businesses share that landscape. But Ormond Beach continues to be a blend of ocean, coastal wetlands, fore dunes and uplands, unique to our coastline. Development pressures have not disrupted the workings of the ecosystem there. Birds on the Pacific Flyway path forage in the estuary; insects, amphibians, birds and mammals make the dunes and uplands their home. The expanse of the sandy beach, the grandeur of the ocean, the flight of the birds overhead--all of this cries out the word “preservation.”
Some 90% of California’s wetlands have been drained and filled. At Ormond Beach, each year a natural berm is created, holding the rising water, giving the tidewater goby (an endangered fish) a home. The least tern and snowy plover, also endangered, visit the area to breed, nest and care for their fledglings before flying south.
The entire 1,404 acres (called the Ormond Beach Specific Plan) continues to be slated for redevelopment, which would radically change the present landscape. More than 20% of the acreage is now owned jointly by the city of Oxnard and the Los Angeles Metropolitan Water District, including the marsh and a portion of the dune and upland areas. The owners have hired a new consulting firm, Urban Land Institute, to visit the site and evaluate the potential for the Ormond Beach Redevelopment Area.
Over the past 20 years, concerned citizens who recognize the environmental sensitivity of the land and ocean resources have been in conversation with the city of Oxnard, hopeful that the city would place ecological needs in concert with the economic needs of the community.
In 1993, a Greater Ormond Beach Task Force was established, with the city playing a major role in its formation. Governmental agencies, the Navy, businesspeople, environmental groups and residents have been meeting and discussing issues surrounding Ormond Beach. Since 1995 we have had the services of a consultant who has aided in the formulation of land-use decisions made by the group. Over the past months the task force attendees have learned:
* American Bird Conservancy designated Ormond Beach a “continentally important bird area,” which means that the site provides habitat for more than 1% of the breeding population of California least terns and occasionally provides habitat for more than 1% of the coastal Western snowy plovers.
* The Ventura County Board of Supervisors and the city of Oxnard have awarded funds to purchase fencing and signs to protect the endangered birds.
* Teenage volunteers working with Oxnard have become environmental stewards of the beach.
* Boy Scouts, as well as more than 200 volunteers during Earth Week, have volunteered their time to the area.
* The Wetlands Clearinghouse, a state agency, has placed Ormond Beach on a list of sites that should be funded for wetland restoration / enhancement / acquisition.
* The embryonic California State University Channel Islands is planning a marine studies curriculum and hopes to use Ormond Beach as a living laboratory.
For more than 10 years, the Ormond Beach Observers, a coalition of organizations that support environmentally conscious land-use decisions countywide, has lobbied for the maximum protection of the ecosystem within the Specific Plan area.
Oxnard has the opportunity, after reviewing the consultant’s recommendations and previous planning documents, to make decisions that will bring out the luster of the jewel that is Ormond Beach and become a true environmental community, committed to the protection of the ecosystem.
