Coming to Life?

Years after it was replaced by a newer facility, the former Oxnard High School still hasn’t found a new owner and has become one of the county’s biggest white elephants.

The campus--33 acres along 5th Street in the heart of the city--is home to a handful of thriving community groups, including the Oxnard Police Department’s Police Activities League, which have spruced up the gymnasium and a few buildings among the unused, graffiti-covered structures.

Those groups expect to relocate if a buyer comes along, but the property has attracted no bids, mostly because of its multimillion-dollar price tag and its location beneath the flight path of Oxnard Airport.

But there is some tentative interest in the site.

The owner of Garcia Mortuary wants to turn the 28 acres available for purchase into a public cemetery; the city would like the land for youth programs and sports fields. And even a few undisclosed churches have made inquiries.

The school district closed the campus in 1995, several months before it opened a larger $33-million Oxnard High School on Gonzales Road. This flagship of the five-campus district was paid for mostly by the state because the former campus’ location--about 3,600 feet from Oxnard Airport--posed a danger to students and employees.

The state had always said it hoped to recover some of the construction costs by selling the older campus at its appraised price. To date, appraisals have ranged from $4 million to $7 million. But at either price, making a sale hasn’t been easy.

“We did what we had to do and there were no takers,” said Eric Ortega, assistant superintendent of business for the Oxnard Union High School District, describing state requirements to first offer the site at $7 million to other public agencies and placing ads in newspapers.

He added that the district plans to retain five acres of the campus for a special education center, teacher training classes and transportation yard.

But for the right price, Roberto V. Garcia, who opened his downtown mortuary 23 years ago, envisions converting the ball fields where generations of Yellowjackets played into the city’s only nondenominational cemetery, transforming some classrooms into mausoleums and relocating his business onto the campus.

“It’s ideal for a memorial park,” Garcia said. “It’s not just land that people are buried in and forgotten. I want to preserve what is. The swimming pool could be converted into something nice, a fountain.”

City officials, however, see the site benefiting the living.

Oxnard City Manager Ed Sotelo said he anticipates the city could one day acquire ownership of the property and turn it into much-needed recreational facilities.

Supt. Bill Studt, said the district has also talked with city officials about turning the centrally located property into a training center for Oxnard police and firefighters.

Whatever project is approved, it will have to be reviewed for safety because of the site’s proximity to the airport, said Scott Smith, the county’s director of airports. The land lies under a so-called “runway protection zone,” where approaching planes descend as they reach ground level.

The airport would make a recommendation about any future use of the campus based on federal guidelines, Smith said. And if a new use required a zoning change, that would have to receive city approval.

“What we don’t want in the runway protection zone are activities that would create congregations of people like hospitals, churches, residences,” Smith said.

But the school district wants to dispose of the site as quickly as possible, Studt said, because upkeep and security cost more than $100,000 a year.

The district may get its wish. A recent appraisal, now being reviewed by the state, places the value of the school site around $4 million.

“We’ve tried to tell those people that it’s not going to go for $7 million; it’s not in the cards,” Studt said. “There’s nobody willing to pay that kind of money.”

All of which is good news to potential buyers like Garcia.

“If it’s $4 million, I think it’s within reason,” he said. “For me it’s a lot of money, but if I have the community support and the city support and the airport’s support, in a few years, it could turn into a beautiful cemetery.”