Alliance Kicks Off Sales Tax Campaign

How do you get a distracted, penny-pinching electorate to ante up for open space?

It helps to have money, lots of it, to persuade voters that they will have to tax themselves if they want to keep Ventura County’s rural feel forever, advocates of a conservation tax said Thursday.

Members of the newly formed County Open Space Alliance estimated they would need up to $300,000 to get that message out before the Nov. 2 election, when a proposed countywide 1/4-cent sales tax increase will go before voters.

With a host of state initiatives and competing tax measures on the ballot, it will be an uphill battle to win the necessary two-thirds approval, Ventura County Supervisor Steve Bennett said.

“This is not going to be an easy thing for us to pull off,” he said.

About 40 supporters joined Bennett and his wife, Leslie Ogden, at their hillside Ventura home to begin pledging support, raising money and outlining strategy for the campaign to pass the tax increase.

County Open Space Alliance, formed to run the campaign, announced it had already received pledges of $100,000. The Nature Conservancy and Save Open Space and Agricultural Resources each pledged $50,000, said Jim Engel, an alliance member.

Several representatives of other environmental and conservation groups promised to approach their boards for contributions.

The alliance plans to reach voters through mailings, information sessions and telephone contacts, organizers said.

Measure A would create a special district that buys land and development rights from willing sellers. The district would be funded by the 10-year sales tax increase, which is expected to raise about $25 million a year.

Advocates say they will focus on parcels at high risk of development, such as farmlands that serve as greenbelt buffers between cities. Trails near the Ventura and Santa Clara rivers and hillsides in Thousand Oaks, Moorpark, Simi Valley, Santa Paula and Ventura would also be purchase targets, alliance organizers said.

But making a successful case to Ventura County voters could prove challenging. Though residents have consistently supported growth control measures, polls show they appear less willing to pay for them.

Voters have spurned countywide taxes, overwhelmingly turning down a 1/2-cent sales tax increase for transportation measures in 1990. School bond measures have received mixed results.

In November, money issues will dominate an already crowded presidential election ballot. Besides the open space tax, voters again will be asked to approve a 1/2-cent sales tax increase for Ventura County road projects.

Ojai and Santa Paula are seeking separate tax increases, and school districts in Santa Paula, Oxnard and Port Hueneme have each placed a bond measure on the ballot. At the state level, voters will be asked to choose among two bond measures and a mental health tax.

The Ventura County Taxpayers Assn. is opposing the open-space tax but supporting the transit tax, Executive Director Don Facciano said. With the current 7.25% tax rate, the association decided it wouldn’t support both measures, Facciano said.

“We had some questions about the governance of the district and we noticed some opposition from cities,” he said. “We feel there are other ways to get money for open space other than a sales tax.”

But conservation advocates say they have the momentum to move forward. A diverse 41-member committee, which drew up the blueprint for how the district would work, pledged to see it through, members of County Open Space Alliance said.

Much of the county’s undeveloped lands are protected by strict SOAR growth-control laws that were enacted last decade but that will eventually expire. Permanent conservation is the logical next step, Engel said.

“Most of you have fought the battles, but they keep coming back. We have a chance to really make a permanent change,” he said.

Bennett, a veteran of Ventura County’s growth-control wars, likened the five-month campaign to running a marathon.

“Once you say you want this campaign to be successful, it’s pedal to the metal all the way to November,” he said.