Monday, December 28, 1998

By David Zahniser

A coalition of 30 San Gabriel Valley cities has begun talks to create a conservancy to protect the riverbeds and hillsides in an area stretching from Pasadena to Claremont.

The San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments is hoping to model the new agency after the powerful Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, which acquires and preserves property and distributes millions of dollars worth of park funding.

The new entity could serve as a clearinghouse for public and private grants to restore and protect the San Gabriel River and its tributaries, as well as the Arroyo Seco in Pasadena.

The organization also could buy up land next to the Angeles National Forest and convert it to park use, said Monrovia Councilwoman Lara Blakely, who is leading the conservancy effort.

"If you look at the mountain range going from Pasadena all the way out to the county line . . . there's considerable undeveloped land that is still owned by private individuals," Blakely said. "Some of those lands abutting the forest can be candidates for purchase, if the owners want to sell it."

No one knows exactly how much money is at stake. But if a new conservancy were formed, it could distribute future park bond monies to dozens of communities in east Los Angeles County, said Nicholas Conway, executive director of the San Gabriel Valley COG.

"Let's put it this way," said Conway. "In the last two park bond measures, Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy received over $300 million."

Though the project is still in the planning stages, city officials believe a new conservancy could help with the purchase of open space in Duarte and Claremont or secure funding for the removal of a storm drain in the Lower Arroyo Seco in Pasadena.

The idea of a local conservancy surfaced last year after council members in a handful of local communities fought Senate Bill 2010, a bill authored by state Sen. Tom Hayden, D-Los Angeles, to allow the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to manage projects along the San Gabriel River.

Though the bill passed the Senate, it died in the state Assembly. Now local council members have resurrected the plan but shifted control away from the Malibu-based conservancy.

"We think our own local issues are unique enough that we don't want to be tied down to the west side of L.A.," said San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments president Algird Leiga, a Claremont councilman. "Let them handle the west-side issues, we'll handle the east-side issues."

Local council members have already begun meeting with state Sen. Hilda Solis, D-El Monte, to craft a new conservancy bill. Solis said she supports a stronger regional voice for the San Gabriel Valley, but warned that any final proposal must give more representation to environmental groups, water interests and the broader community.

"Right now, it looks more like city people and that's not what we want," she said. "We want a diverse group of people."

The current proposal covers the 30 San Gabriel Valley cities as well as 30 cities from the Gateway Council of Governments, a coalition of communities from Whittier south to Long Beach. But the boundaries are far from final.

The San Gabriel Valley COG will need to carve out a conservancy area so that it excludes the city of Los Angeles, Leiga said. The group also needs to hash out flood control issues that are viewed as critical to such communities as Bellflower and Lakewood.

Conway, the COG executive director, said the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy has not paid enough attention to the eastern half of Los Angeles County and has a board whose members live far from the San Gabriel Valley.

No one with the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy could be reached for comment. But Solis said the agency has been a good partner in such projects as an effort to block the expansion of a landfill in Puente Hills.

The true reason for the lack of regional park funding has been a vacuum in political clout.

"We didn't have the vocal leadership," she said.

News-98