Conejo Mobile Home Park residents are rallying to try to prevent their eviction from the only place they say they can afford to call home.

A two-year city moratorium that maintained the status quo and prevented the landowner from redeveloping the property comes to an end in a few weeks.

The City Council is being asked to approve a Planning Commission recommendation that would rezone the park from commercial and trailer park development to high-density residential.

Although this would prevent landowner Joseph Bednar and his company, Newbury 1200 LLC, from carrying out plans to close the park and develop an assisted-living facility and medical office building on the site, it would allow him to force out the park residents and redevelop the property for other residential use.

"Where am I supposed to go?" asked Penny Mayou, a 26-year resident of the park on Newbury Road.

Mayou and her neighbors, who include elderly people and families with young children, say they are worried, nervous and scared. They say they all live on fixed or low incomes and can't afford to move.

"I get emotional thinking about everything that's going on," said Mayou, 53, who said she has survived on disability payments for the past 20 years.

Bednar declined to comment for this report.

Mayou and her fellow residents say they don't know where to turn for help but hope the community at large might support them at Tuesday's Thousand Oaks City Council meeting. Mayou said residents and supporters plan to attend the meeting and beg the council to allow them to keep their homes.

'The city wasn't receptive'

A plan earlier this year by Cabrillo Economic Development Corp. to purchase the land and preserve it as affordable housing failed after it was rebuffed by city officials and the property owner, according to Cabrillo Project Manager Dan Hardy.

"We tried to help the residents buy the site, but neither the city nor the owner was interested," said Hardy. "The seller would not sell for the appraised value, and the city wasn't receptive to providing money to keep it as a mobile home park."

Hardy said if the council decides to rezone the land as high-density residential, the city could still protect the residents by adding an affordable housing overlay zone, which would provide new affordable units to replace the 48 that would be lost.

Park residents could be given priority for the new units, he said. At least the city could give residents, whose homes are valued at $50,00 to $120,000, "decent compensation and help them relocate," he said.

Councilwoman Claudia Bill-de la Peña said she hopes whatever decision the council reaches will not worsen the situation for the residents.

"Mobile home park residents do play a vital role in the community because many of them do have jobs that serve and service the community," she said.

Former Thousand Oaks planning commissioner Janet Wall, who plans to address the council Tuesday on behalf of one of the residents, said council members must adhere to the city's general plan, which calls for the provision of affordable housing.

'We just want to stay here'

"The city is allowing 52 affordable homes to be destroyed," she said. "It has redevelopment funds available for companies like Caruso Affiliated (which developed The Promenade and The Lakes shopping centers) but not for a World War II veteran with nowhere to go."

"The City Council says it wants to protect the mobile home park residents," said Hardy, "but if they follow the recommendation, they are going against that. Hopefully, the council will do the right thing."

But for Penny Mayou, even the idea of moving to "affordable housing" seems out of her reach.

"What's judged to be affordable housing isn't affordable to many of us," she said. "We just want to stay here."