Community Support for University Questioned

LONG BEACH — Troubled by the public acrimony surrounding a plan to transform Camarillo State Hospital into Ventura County’s first public university, Cal State Trustee William D. Campbell on Tuesday once again raised concerns about splintering community support for the conversion effort.

With the project on hold because of a legal battle aimed at blocking the hospital’s closure, Campbell stressed the need to take a hard look at whether the public is willing to back a push to turn the old mental institution into the Cal State University system’s 23rd campus.

“The community now seems to be very split, or is becoming very split,” Campbell told a Cal State committee on campus development. “There doesn’t seem to be the united front we talked about six months ago.”

Back then, even as Cal State officials began showcasing the proposal to transform the state hospital into a college campus when the facility closes June 30, they warned that the project would fail without substantial public support.

In response, university boosters organized rallies and began spreading the word that Ventura County was ready and willing to embrace a Cal State campus.

At the same time, however, hospital advocates began stepping up their own campaign to spare the facility from closure.

In March, parents of Camarillo State patients filed a lawsuit seeking to halt the shutdown. More recently, legislative support for the conversion project has begun to falter, with some state lawmakers questioning whether the needs of state hospital patients have been adequately addressed.

Faced with those developments, Handel Evans, president of the proposed Cal State Channel Islands campus, told members of the campus development committee Tuesday that efforts to convert the psychiatric hospital into a four-year university have been suspended until the lawsuit is resolved.

A hearing on the matter is scheduled this morning in Los Angeles Superior Court.

For Campbell, the issues are reminiscent of past battles in Ventura County to find a home for a state university, an effort that goes back about three decades and that has always met with resistance.

“It seems to be a repeat of what happened before,” said Campbell, who raised the same issue earlier this year when the conversion project was still taking shape.

“I have faced that battle before,” he added. “All we ever had was a community fight and it all blew up. I really have some understanding and have real empathy when they discuss land-use issues in Ventura County. I think it’s an issue we need to work out. We wouldn’t want to do something the community wouldn’t want us to do.”

What some members of the community want is for Cal State officials to embrace a proposal to create a treatment center on the state property for patients with families in the immediate area.

For months, mental health advocates have been lobbying elected officials to include such a program in future plans for the university campus.

Earlier this month, Assemblyman Tom McClintock (R-Northridge) weighed in on the issue, firing off a letter to Evans, threatening to withdraw his support for the conversion effort unless Evans warmed up to the treatment center concept.

“I am writing to express my increasing sense of unease with what appears to be the University’s haughty and hostile attitude toward our community,” wrote McClintock, whose district includes portions of eastern Ventura County. “Specifically, I am concerned over your out-of-hand dismissal of the request by the County of Ventura to utilize the children’s unit at the Camarillo State Hospital to continue treatment for mentally ill patients from the tri-county area.”

McClintock later explained that his letter was prompted by complaints from parents and elected officials that they were being put off by Cal State officials. And he said he was hopeful that a compromise could be reached.

“If the university trustees and the university administration are unwilling to take a cooperative posture with the county on a legitimate county concern, one wonders what kind of neighbors they would be to our community on a wide range of other issues that may arise in the future,” McClintock said.

Still, other state legislators are maintaining solid support for the conversion effort, including Sen. Jack O’Connell (D-San Luis Obispo), who earlier this year introduced a bill that would transfer possession of the property to the Cal State system once the hospital closes.

While he supports the right of hospital advocates to bring the lawsuit to try to keep the hospital open, he said he hopes that that will have no effect on development of the Cal State campus.

“We can’t dictate to them utilization of the facility,” O’Connell said. “If they feel that the treatment center can be part of their plans, that is fine with me. However, if CSU officials feel that is incompatible with their development plan . . . then we need to respect [that] opinion.”

For his part, Evans has maintained all along that closure of the hospital and creation of a treatment center are unrelated to the development of a university campus.

He said he is anxious to continue mapping out conversion of the state hospital to a Cal State campus. That process could restart as soon as today if hospital advocates lose their bid for a temporary court order blocking the shutdown and future patient transfers.

“I think we are being dragged into a situation that we are not a part of,” he said. “It’s an issue that is presently in the courts and I think it needs to be resolved. I think the issue from our perspective is very simple: Is the hospital available for us? That’s the bottom line, and right now it isn’t.”

Correspondent Nick Green contributed to this story.