Population Growth Slows in County, but Jumps in Simi

Aided by growth-control laws, Ventura County’s population crept up only 1.3% last year, the slowest increase of seven Southern California counties.

The county added 9,300 residents for a total of 742,000 as of Jan. 1, according to population estimates released Tuesday by the state Department of Finance. That ranks Ventura County as the 12th-largest of the 58 counties in the state, according to the report.

Population has inched up slowly compared to neighboring counties. Riverside County posted the fastest-growing rate, 2.2%, with San Diego County close behind at 2.0%.

Santa Barbara County, with 409,000 residents, grew 1.5%.

Ventura County’s growth slowed slightly compared with 1997, when the rate was 1.4%. Growth rates remain low because eight of Ventura County’s 10 cities--all but Oxnard and Port Hueneme--have ordinances that limit the number of building permits issued each year, said Steve Wood, the county’s population analyst.

Those laws have been in effect for more than a decade, he said. Sweeping growth-control measures that restrict development of the county’s farmland and open space, enacted in the fall, probably did not affect last year’s numbers, Wood said.

Moorpark lost its standing as the fastest-growing city within the county to Simi Valley, which recorded a 2.4% growth rate. A hot housing market spurred construction of homes in Simi Valley and Camarillo, which had a 2.0% increase.

For many years, Moorpark was the fastest-growing city, posting a 2.6% increase in 1997. But the east county bedroom community had a 0.7% growth rate last year, adding just 200 to its 29,600 residents.

Wayne Loftus, Moorpark’s director of community development, said the city’s 2,451-home Mountain Meadows project, which had fueled previous growth, was completed in 1997. There was little in the development pipeline for residential housing last year, he said.

But construction of 550 single-family houses will begin this year on the city’s southeastern flank and should bring another population spike, Loftus said.

Oxnard remained the county’s largest city, with 158,300 residents; Thousand Oaks is a distant second at 117,600.

In the mid-’80s, the county grew by roughly 10,000 residents a year, Wood said. But that clip slowed dramatically as the economic recession of the early ‘90s took hold, resulting in a 0.4% growth rate in 1996, the lowest in decades.

Increases over the last two years show that the county is recovering from the economic battering, Wood said. Government officials use the population estimates to plan development and to determine the amount of motor vehicle and gas tax payments that cities and the county receive.

State officials make the estimates based on births and deaths, immigration patterns and the number of people moving in and out of the state. Los Angeles County is the largest in the state, with 9.7 million residents, followed by San Diego County with 2.8 million, Orange County with 2.7 million, Santa Clara County with 1.7 million and San Bernardino with 1.6 million.

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Changes in County Population

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Area Jan. 1, 1998 Jan. 1, 1999 Pct. change Camarillo 60,300 61,500 2.0% Fillmore 13,100 13,200 0.8% Moorpark 29,400 29,600 0.7% Ojai 8,175 8,200 0.3% Oxnard 156,400 158,300 1.2% Port Hueneme 22,600 22,600 0.0% Santa Paula 26,950 27,100 0.6% Simi Valley 106,300 108,900 2.4% Thousand Oaks 116,000 117,600 1.4% Ventura 101,700 102,300 0.6% Unincorporated 91,700 92,700 1.1% Ventura County 732,700 742,000 1.3% California 33,226,000 33,773,000 1.6%

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Source: California Department of Finance, 1999 population estimates