VENTURA : Farmers Pledge Loan to Fight 2 Measures

Joining Ventura’s latest battle over urban development, the Ventura County Farm Bureau on Thursday pledged a $20,000 loan to help defeat twin ballot measures that would preserve farmland in and around the city for 35 years.

“We see this as a threat to the entire industry, not unlike the Medfly,” said Rex Laird, executive director of the bureau that represents 1,100 growers across the county.

Although the farm bureau is concerned about the county’s diminishing farmland, its directors see the two conservation measures on Ventura’s Nov. 7 ballot as a violation of their members’ property rights.

The measures would prohibit housing projects or other development on Ventura’s agricultural greenbelts until the year 2030--unless the developer receives permission from the city’s voters.

Slow-growth activists, who collected the signatures needed to qualify the measure for the ballot, said they expect farmers to put up a fierce and expensive fight so they can retain their rights to cash out to developers. “They are funding a campaign of fear against these initiatives,” the activists wrote in ballot arguments.

Laird said the issue has galvanized the bureau’s board members, who agreed to loan 10% of the bureau’s annual income to a group called Farmers, Family and Friends Against Irresponsible Regulations, or FAIR. Some growers also plan individual political donations.

“If an initiative like this passes, it will trickle around to cities like Oxnard and Camarillo and I’m going to be in the same boat,” said Thomas P. Pecht, immediate past president of the farm bureau.

Pecht said the measures are an insult to farmers because they have been singled out for restrictions without being consulted.

“If you are going to make rules about farmers,” he said, “it might be a good idea to have farmers involved.”