Officials to Meet on Hospital Conversion

With a push underway to preserve a piece of Camarillo State Hospital for some of the patients who live there, Cal State officials will meet Tuesday to discuss efforts to convert the facility into Ventura County’s first public university.

An ad hoc committee of the California State University Board of Trustees will gather in Long Beach for an update on the proposal to transform the 60-year-old mental hospital--scheduled to close by July 1--into a university campus.

On the same day, Ventura County Supervisor John Flynn is expected to ask his fellow supervisors to support a campaign to set aside a portion of the hospital for patients with families in the immediate area.

Flynn wants staff members to lobby state legislators to support a plan to treat patients with families in Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties at the children’s center, a 66-bed facility on a remote corner of the hospital campus.

“The university has such a strong force going, it could blow everything else out of the way,” Flynn said. “I want to keep this issue on the front burner.”

For months, a team of Cal State officials has been studying the conversion of the hospital into the system’s 23rd campus, including analyzing the costs involved and reviewing the academic programs needed in the area. That feasibility study is not expected to be completed until April.

No official action is expected Tuesday. But university officials will get their first opportunity to review the proposal since Gov. Pete Wilson threw his support behind a campaign to solicit local businesses and others interested in sharing space at the Camarillo campus and helping shoulder the financial load.

“I think that suggests that our proposal is still very much alive,” said Handel Evans, president of the proposed Cal State Channel Islands campus.