County bans assembly uses in areas zoned as open space

The Ventura County Board of Supervisors has approved a change to the zoning code, forbidding most places of assembly from being constructed on the county’s remaining pockets of undeveloped land.

The change passed with a 4-1 vote during a supervisors’ meeting on March 2. Supervisor Peter Foy cast the dissenting vote.

The ban includes churches, clubhouses, community centers and private schools but excludes recreational facilities, because they are consistent with the county’s open space goals, and government-owned institutions like universities, jails, police and fire stations because the county doesn’t have the authority to forbid them.

The supervisors’ vote went against a January recommendation by the Ventura County Planning Commission that opposed the land-use ordinance.

Supervisor Linda Parks said the decree is a landmark for the preservation of biological diversity and wildlife corridors in Ventura County.

“To me, the most important thing is that we won’t have to worry about large buildings being built on land set aside for open space,” Parks said.

The ordinance also brings the county into compliance with federal laws, said Supervisor Kathy Long.

“The county started on this path when it was told it didn’t comply with a federal law, so we did this to bring things into conformity without discrimination,” Long said.

The impetus for change was a two-year battle between the county and Cornerstone Community Church in Simi Valley over the church’s plans to construct a 140-acre religious campus.

In 2008, Cornerstone cited the federal Religious Land Use Act when the county opposed its plan to build a church, college and headquarters for a faith-based nonprofit on a piece of land in the Tierra Rejada greenbelt near the Reagan Library.

The county had said the use wasn’t appropriate for open space but eventually approved the church campus––without the nonprofit food ministry.

The RLUA prevents the county from banning churches across the board but does allow the county to prohibit them from certain zones, provided the same restrictions exist for nonreligious enterprises.

To be in compliance with the law, the county, which didn’t permit religious organizations in open-space zones, decided it also had to disallow nonreligious assembly uses, Parks said.

“We no longer solely exclude churches; we now group all assembly uses together equally. We are now a lot more protected from any type of constitutional lawsuits,” Parks said.

The vote in favor of the code change elicited mixed responses from 43 speakers who attended the board meeting last week.

Mary Wiesbrock, founder of the Santa Monica Mountains Save Open Space, supported the ordinance.

“It will help protect open space land from uses which cause urban impact,” Wiesbrock said, later suggesting that undeveloped land should be preserved to grow food and provide breathing space for urban dwellers.

Others felt strongly that the change in law erodes the constitutional rights of private property owners and religious institutions.

“In its attempt not to discriminate against one group (religious organizations), the county will now discriminate against everyone who owns land in the open zone,” said Debra Tash, founder of the Ventura County Chapter of Citizens’ Alliance for Property Rights.

Bill Hicks, a resident of Newbury Park, said the supervisors should have followed the planning commission’s good judgment.

“Benefiting open space proponents on the back of property owners within open space zones is unacceptable,” he said.

Supervisor Foy said he voted against the change because the law discourages people from investing in their properties, thereby reducing land values and hurting the county’s tax base.

“It doesn’t make any sense. The new ordinance is not based on logic or law, only emotions,” Foy said.

Ventura County already has some of the most restrictive landuse laws in the nation, he said, then suggested that the ordinance could also cause lawsuits.

“It’s like taking your bank account and putting a lock on it. It’s taking away the right of landowners to do what they want with their property,” Foy said.

The board decided to allow outdoor recreational facilities because they give the public a venue for activities consistent with the goal of open space, supervisors said.

Parks amended wording in the ordinance to allow night lighting at the Tom Barber Golf Center off the 23 Freeway in Moorpark.

Last month, Tom Barber, managing partner and owner of the golf center, complained to the planning commission that the change in code would threaten the future of his business.

“The county cannot retract approval for the golf center because that would not be fair,” Parks said. “I don’t like the lights because they are so much of a blight in the nighttime, but they’re there, and the center is a wonderful resource.”

Though the golf range may be in the clear, the rule change could foil Rabbi Aryeh Lang’s wish to build a synagogue.

Lang told supervisors that a member of his Chabad Jewish Center in Camarillo offered to donate 5 acres of land in open space to build a synagogue. He said religious institutions should be permitted in rural areas because they provide valuable services to county residents.

“Houses of prayers are not businesses. We’re here to support the community and children,” the rabbi said.

The new ordinance gives official stature to a temporary moratorium passed in May 2009 to restrict assembly uses in county open spaces.