BOARD OKS AMPHITHEATER, GOLF COURSE IN CAMARILLO.

Byline: Deborah Sullivan Daily News Staff Writer

Despite fears by neighbors and environmental specialists that the plan would harm wetlands and sensitive plant species, Ventura County supervisors on Tuesday approved an amphitheater and golf course project proposed for Camarillo Regional Park.

After more than two hours of testimony by county staffers, state and federal officials and residents, the board concluded that the plan would be a net asset to the county.

``This is a regional park proposal that I think increases the opportunities for use'' of the site, said Supervisor Kathy Long.

However, officials with the National Park Service and Army Corps of Engineers warned that the board's approval does not guarantee that the project as it stands will qualify for a federal permit.

``I'm concerned about the haste with which this project has been pushed through,'' said Lisa Mangione, a biologist for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Debate over the project focused on whether its environmental costs would exceed its cash value to the county.

The county Parks Department projects that the 16,000-seat amphitheater and 18-hole golf course will bring in $400,000 to $500,000 the first year of operation, said Robert Amore, lease development manager for the Parks Department. Within five to 10 years of operation, that amount should increase to $700,000 to $800,000 a year, Amore said.

``The objective of the Parks Department is to design a project that will support itself financially,'' said Peter Pedroff, director of the General Services Agency, which oversees the Parks Department.

The project would sprawl over 377 acres, of which 60 percent would be left undeveloped, Pedroff said. The county already owns 236 acres and has the option to purchase the additional 91 acres, he said.

The county's share of the project's expenses would be about $250,000, he said, including about $100,000 in administrative costs and $151,000 to purchase the land.

Neighbors said the project's projected returns aren't worth the price of its environmental impacts, though.

``To pay $250,000 for $500,000 (in revenues) is not a good deal,'' said Maureen Rocchi of Camarillo. ``I don't think that is a very good cash return, I think it's a very small amount to decimate that land.''

Others complained the project could snarl traffic, damage the site's environment and pose problems for nearby Casa Pacifica, a shelter for troubled youth.

``Our board is concerned that the music and activity from the concert will cause the children to leave Casa Pacifica in a manner that is injurious to them,'' said Caroline Huntsinger, chairwoman of the board of Casa Pacifica.

Although the county Parks Department and the project's developers reconfigured their plan to minimize the project's impacts on wetlands and on Dudleya veritye, a protected plant species, some argued that the impacts still would be too great.

Raymond M. Sauvajot, an ecologist for the National Park Service, said his agency had such serious concerns about the project's potential environmental impacts that it is formally asking the Army Corps of Engineers to subject it to a more rigorous permitting review than previously planned.

The Parks Department had hoped to obtain what the Corps calls a ``nationwide'' permit for the project. That streamlined permit is issued to projects that affect less than three acres of wetlands, have less than minimal environmental impacts, and do not adversely affect the public interest, said Mangione.

Mangione said, however, that all three of those criteria remain in doubt for the amphitheater and golf course project. The project might, therefore, require an ``individual permit,'' which requires a more intensive review, and could force the developers to substantially scale down the project.