No on Measure C

We cannot endorse Measure C, the first public vote under Ventura’s Save Open Space and Agricultural Resources (SOAR) law, for the same reasons we did not support the countywide SOAR initiative last year:

Like SOAR itself, Measure C leaves too many questions unanswered, too many potential pitfalls unaddressed. And so we must say no.

The problem is not the concept of the proposal. In Measure C, the First Assembly of God seeks permission to rezone its 25 acres of cropland so it may build a 2,000-seat sanctuary, preschool, gym / auditorium, ball fields and running track. To win the SOAR-required majority of Ventura city voters Nov. 2, the church has emphasized its intention to allow the public to use its new recreational facilities.

If anyone seriously objects to this use of the wedge-shaped parcel at the corner of Montgomery Avenue and Bristol Road, they haven’t complained very loudly. The property is farmland, yes, but a relatively small piece of it with a residential neighborhood to the east, railroad tracks and the Santa Clara River to the south.

The problem is that the proposal, as it appears on the ballot, is undetailed and unenforceable.

As the first test of the SOAR vote concept--a concept adopted countywide and by five other cities in 1998--Measure C will set an important precedent for future SOAR votes. The theory on which SOAR won the support of two-thirds of Ventura County voter is this: If developers know they need to win the favor of a majority of registered voters--not just a majority of a five- or seven-member city council--they will need to propose much better projects. They will need to convince the public that their proposal is good for the entire community, not just for the builders. And they had better deliver what they promise.

As Pastor Anthony Cervero explains it, the congregation has grown greatly over the past few years. It needs a more spacious sanctuary and facilities--and that’s why it bought this land back in 1986. Church leaders were in the process of working with city officials on revising the Comprehensive Plan to allow their project in 1995 when voters passed Ventura County’s first SOAR initiative.

Unfortunate timing, Cervero shrugs, but the church is eager to play by the community’s new rules.

To attract voter support, church leaders emphasize that everyone would be welcome to use its proposed sports facilities and auditorium and to enjoy its landscaped grounds. Critics point out that there is no guarantee of this and note that the actual zoning requested is residential, with a limit of one house per acre. To that, church leaders respond that Ventura does not have a zoning designation specifically for churches and that one-acre residential is the most restrictive of the options city officials presented them.

The lack of detail in this proposal contrasts with the project that is likely to be Ventura County’s second SOAR election, on the March 2000 ballot. In that one, the Brothers of Saint John of God religious order seeks to expand its St. Joseph’s Health and Retirement Center in Ojai. In that case, a complete design has been drawn up (and modified to address neighbors’ concerns about traffic, noise and light pollution) and a plan has been identified to compensate for the removal of 464 orange trees from 5.84 acres of land by planting more than 1,000 new trees on 10 acres elsewhere. Support for that project should be near universal, even in growth-phobic Ojai.

Cervero says his church chose not to spend $100,000 on architectural design until the zoning change is assured. There is merit to that sort of caution, as Thousand Oaks discovered when it spent $2 million on studies and design work for a golf course project that ultimately was scrapped.

The Times did not endorse SOAR precisely because we believe land-use decisions are never as simple as SOAR proponents portray them. If Measure C fails, will it be because this is a bad proposal or because some people don’t like churches, don’t like kids or don’t want to see the construction of anything anywhere?

For 60 years, the First Assembly of God congregation has been a good neighbor in Ventura. Nonetheless, we must say no to Measure C. We believe that democracy depends on a fully informed electorate; that is why we devote so much time and space to explaining and investigating important local issues. Measure C is simply too vague. By approving it, voters would suggest to other developers that unenforceable promises are all they need to offer.

We encourage the First Assembly of God to bring forth a more detailed proposal for what sounds to us like an excellent plan. But on Measure C, we say vote no.