HELP WANTED: Eight months after Ventura County...

HELP WANTED: Eight months after Ventura County Community College District Chancellor Thomas Lakin died, district officials are still looking for a replacement (B1). . . . The loss of Lakin has forced some administrators to take on other duties, causing some upheaval in the ranks . . . Trustee Timothy Hirschberg, however, said the district does not want to rush the search for Lakin’s successor. “A district chancellor can be eaten alive by the various constituents if there isn’t a good fit,” he said.

BIG WHEEL: Driving a 35-foot-long, 35,000-pound bus through the streets of Ventura and Oxnard can be quite a challenge in itself. But that’s a cakewalk for bus driver Vicente Carrera, who used his skill recently to win first place for the second year in a row at the South Coast Area Transit’s Bus Roadeo . . . Now Carrera is headed to San Antonio to compete in a national bus driving tournament in October. Said SCAT spokeswoman Maureen Lopez: “He’s pretty jazzed. San Antonio is his old stomping grounds.”

DRESSING UP: Garden Grove Elementary School in Simi Valley was the first public school in the county to adopt a uniform-optional policy for students. . . . Now other schools in Ventura, Moorpark and Oxnard are considering doing the same (B1). . . . But some Simi Valley parents are not convinced the uniform policy there has worked . . . Indeed, some students think the navy-blue-and-white outfits “were totally disgusting looking,” according to one parent.

WAITING GAME: Residents of Moorpark’s Villa Campesina neighborhood have waited years for a park and playground to be built in their neighborhood. So they were a little upset to learn recently that a flood-control channel may be constructed along part of the park site (B1). . . . Melissa Harris, whose family lives near the site, said residents of the neighborhood would not give up their fight. “We’re going to do everything we can. These kids need a place to play.”