VENTURA : Council Refuses to Study Taylor Ranch

The Ventura City Council has turned down a proposal by Mayor Richard Francis to recommend that Taylor Ranch be included in the list of potential sites for a state university in Ventura County.

“I’ve been a longtime supporter of Taylor Ranch,” Councilman Jim Monahan told the panel Monday night. “But let’s face it--Taylor Ranch is dead and the university shouldn’t be spending any more money to study the site.”

The council rejected Francis’ proposal to spend $100,000 on an environmental impact study on Taylor Ranch.

The ranch, a 250-acre hillside site overlooking the ocean, had been the preferred site for a proposed California State University campus in the early stages of the site selection process.

But last June, university officials bowed to pressure from environmental and slow-growth advocates in Ventura and decided to reopen the process.

Last month, the university’s Board of Trustees recommended that Taylor Ranch be scratched from the final list of four potential sites, contradicting an earlier decision by the 25-member Citizens Advisory Committee appointed to study potential sites. The board of trustees has final say on where the university will be built.

Francis, a staunch supporter of the Taylor Ranch site, said he hopes that the environmental report will show that the parcel is the best choice. A vote of confidence by the city on Taylor Ranch’s possibilities might change the trustees’ minds, Francis said Monday in an impassioned speech.

But Francis gained only Councilman John McWherter’s low-key support. In the end, the council instructed its two delegates to the advisory committee, Councilman Todd Collart and Community Development Director Everett Millais, to use their own judgment in deciding which site to support.