City Council Result Boon for Projects

The election of three pro-business candidates to the City Council increases the likelihood that several ambitious development projects-that backers say will revitalize the local economy--may be brought to reality in the next few years, political leaders said Wednesday.

Tuesday’s election of Ray Di Guilio, Jim Friedman and incumbent Jack Tingstrom--the best-financed of the 12 candidates vying for three open council seats--secures the predominantly pro-growth slant of the seven-member panel.

And it improves the odds that more than $120 million in key projects will be approved, including the expansion of the Buenaventura Mall, and building a proposed baseball stadium complex and 900 new housing units downtown.

“It is a status quo election,” said outgoing Councilman Gregory Carson, who decided not to seek a second term. “I would hope that they would carry on with the visions of the current council and past councils.”

The three winners, who were backed by the Ventura Chamber of Commerce and the associations of the city’s police and firefighters, raised the most money during the council race, outpacing their challengers by a wide margin, according to campaign disclosure statements.

Friedman was the top money raiser, accumulating a $22,733 war chest. Di Guilio raised $22,322 for his election bid and Tingstrom raised $16,508.

The three successful candidates, who take office on Dec. 4, campaigned on similar platforms that emphasized improving public safety, establishing partnerships with businesses to encourage economic development, and boosting tourism--views that fall in line with the current direction of the council.

“I believe everything that has been a plan for the last four years will be pursued, probably aggressively but not overbearingly,” said Tingstrom, a 60-year-old business consultant.

The outcome of Tuesday’s contest continued a shift away from environmentally active councils of the late 1980s. It leaves Councilmen Steve Bennett and Gary Tuttle as the only staunch environmentalists on the dais for the next two years.

But environmentalists won their own battle Tuesday with the passage of Measure I, one of two nearly identical land-use measures on the ballot aimed at restricting development of farmland in and around the city. As Tingstrom said during the council race: “That is their candidate.”

Measure I prohibits farmland development until the year 2030 unless a majority of the voters decide otherwise. City leaders said it will force them to push redevelopment within existing land uses and look at putting housing in downtown Ventura instead of in the city’s east end, where most new homes have been built in recent years.

“It has always been easier and more profitable to take farmland and develop it,” Tuttle said. “I hope the developers out there will refocus their emphasis downtown and on the Avenue. The east end is taken care of.”

The redevelopment challenge is one the newly elected group says it welcomes.

“The people in the community have said, ‘We want you to look at economic growth not residential growth,’ ” said Tingstrom. “And I am ready to do that--let’s go.”

In the next few years, the big issues before the council include projects aimed at increasing sales tax revenue for the city, such as a $50-million expansion of Buenaventura Mall, a proposal to create the $70-million minor league baseball stadium complex known as Centerplex near the Ventura Auto Center and a continued emphasis on downtown redevelopment.

“I think the key issue will be our economic vitality,” said Di Guilio, 59, an administrator at Moorpark College. “And that includes things such as the mall, the downtown and possibly the Centerplex if packaged in a more meaningful way.”

This summer, the City Council rejected a proposal to spend $15 million to subsidize the baseball facility. Developers are now working with city officials to devise an acceptable funding plan.

But beyond those proposals, the new council faces a more subtle but equally significant challenge: An often divisive group of strong-willed individuals, the City Council has bickered openly and left wounds that some say need mending.

“It is a tough council because the egos are so huge,” Tuttle said. “I am sure these other two guys are nice guys and will form their own opinions as they go.”

Friedman said Wednesday that his top priorities will be to quickly learn the ropes of City Hall and to address the issue of cooperation.

“I hope the biggest change would be that there would be a cohesiveness on the council,” the 39-year-old financial consultant said. “I think that if we begin with an understanding that we want to set a good example, put the respect back in government by conducting ourselves as ladies and gentlemen . . . then I think we would have laid the groundwork.”

Di Guilio also said the council needs to improve its public image.

“I believe the council has to model for the community the kind of behavior that brings people together,” he said.

Council veterans said the council’s new makeup looks promising in terms of its ability to work together.

“I see them working together as a team,” Councilman Jim Monahan. “I think it will be a very good council--I think a lot stronger than we have had in the past.”

Monahan credited the two newcomers with being “the kind of people who can make decisions and get on with business.”

“I think the debate will be less confrontational,” Tingstrom added. “It will be more intellectual.”