Vote Sought on Hillside Homes

Responding to critics of proposed development on 5,000 acres in the hills behind Ventura, the mayor is asking that voters be allowed to approve or reject the project.

Mayor Sandy E. Smith said Monday he will ask the City Council next week for a November ballot measure that would require a public vote on any planned hillside development.

The action was greeted enthusiastically by residents opposed to a plan for luxury homes onthe rugged, chaparral-covered slopes that form the city’s backdrop.

“We’re reacting favorably to it,” said Martha Zeiher, of a group called Ventura Citizens for Hillside Preservation. “By the mayor putting this forth, I hope he’s indicating that the council will be listening to the people of Ventura.”

Zeiher said her group tentatively has dropped plans for its own ballot measure.

A representative of the four family-run corporations that own the land said they too support a public vote.

“Last November, we requested a vote of the community before we moved ahead with our plans,” said Jim Anderson of CommonWealth Partners, a Los Angeles consulting firm.

“Our feeling was that within the city of Ventura, the tendency was to have public votes for planning, rather than going through the normal process of bringing a vote to the City Council. We presumed there would be a referendum.”

Many Ventura residents, however, weren’t so sure.

Smith said his proposal seeks to fulfill city promises that the public would be able to vote on the project.

“There was a lack of belief that we meant what we said,” Smith said.

Confusion over whether there would be a public vote deflected attention from “more pressing issues,” such as funding a conservancy to purchase some of the hillside property, Smith said.

Under the proposal, voters in November would determine whether the city’s Save Open Space and Agricultural Resources ordinance would be extended to include the hillsides.

The SOAR law mandates a public vote on the development of farmland. Unlike similar measures throughout Ventura County, it currently does not include land zoned as open space, like most of the hillside property.

Approval of a ballot measure in November would set the stage for a later vote on the hillside development.

Smith said he would be open to limited development of the property--not on the hillsides but in canyons removed from public view.

In return, he said, he would want “a vast percentage” of the land to be placed in a conservancy and protected from development.