Ventura County Visionary

In the old folk tale “Stone Soup,” a hungry traveler with only a pebble in his pocket manages to cook up a delicious feast by sweet-talking his reluctant host into adding one tasty ingredient after another to the pot.

That’s the role Handel Evans has played as founding president of Cal State Channel Islands.

Although Evans, 62, plans to step down next year--more than a year before Ventura County’s first four-year state university officially welcomes its first students--his accomplishments here have been little short of alchemy.

When Evans arrived in early 1996, proposals to build a Cal State campus in Ventura County had been simmering for more than three decades, cooled down again and again by opposition of one sort or another. A furious battle over whether to build a campus on Taylor Ranch just north of Ventura had left Cal State officials wondering whether Ventura County really wanted a university after all--and left local supporters demoralized.

As Evans took charge, fresh from converting the Fort Ord Army Base into Cal State Monterey Bay (a task with its own set of challenges), the favored site was a 266-acre lemon orchard near Camarillo. Then Camarillo State Hospital was ordered shut down, and Evans set about morphing the storied old mental institution into a brand-new university.

Plop! went the stone into the soup pot.

With minimal staff but maximal energy and enthusiasm, Evans cajoled lawmakers into budgeting millions of dollars for the conversion.

He persuaded county and city leaders to chip in more than $30 million toward road improvements and transportation projects.

He preached to Rotary Clubs, Chambers of Commerce and anyone else who would listen about the wondrous future awaiting a Ventura County with its own Cal State campus.

He met with farmers, Navy brass and leaders of local business and industry to begin tailoring a curriculum just right for Ventura County.

He forged alliances with high school and community college officials to develop mutually beneficial programs.

He oversaw creation of a master plan for income-generating ventures designed to expand the campus over the next 25 years.

And he wooed some of Ventura County’s crustiest individualists into digging deep into their pockets, charming more than $11 million in donations for a campus that has yet to open its doors.

Evans has had plenty of help from local boosters and board members, including invaluable work in Sacramento by state Sen. Jack O’Connell (D-San Luis Obispo). Many of Ventura County’s university advocates have toiled in this effort far longer than Evans, an English-born architect and former president of San Jose State University. Indeed, Ventura County has had the resources, talent and desire to build a university for decades.

But Evans was the guy with the stone.

“He’s the man who made it happen,” Carolyn Leavens, who has worked for years to bring a Cal State campus to Ventura County, told The Times. “I can’t believe how he was able to pull everybody together and for that reason he was just the right man for the job.”

From the start, Evans’ mission has been to create the new university, not to run it. If his departure comes sooner than expected it is because the effort has gained enough momentum to move into its next phase. Cal State officials hope to install a permanent president by next spring, allowing time for the new administrator to hire faculty and get to know the campus and the community before the university opens in fall 2002. A committee will be authorized this week to begin the search.

The stone soup of Cal State Channel Islands will provide nourishing education for many generations to come. We invite the rest of Ventura County to join us in thanking Handel Evans for a job well begun.