‘Lost Village’ Preservation Bill Is Opposed by State Panel

A bill that would provide state funding to preserve more than 2 million artifacts uncovered at “The Lost Village of Encino” was dealt a crippling blow Friday when the state advisory panel for Indian affairs voted unanimously against the measure.

Members of the Native American Heritage Commission said state financing would only encourage other developers to dig up sacred Indian grounds and appeal to the state for “bail-out” money to preserve them.

Without the support of the commission, composed of nine Indians representing tribes throughout the state, the bill, sponsored by Sen. Alan Robbins (D-Van Nuys) may be doomed.

“We will not work in opposition with the Indians,” Robbins said. “I don’t think the time to push for an Indian museum bill is when there is a group of Indians opposing it. I learned the lesson of General Custer. I can count.”

A Large Collection

Nancy A. Whitney Desautels, the archeologist who excavated the site at the southeast corner of Ventura and Balboa boulevards, described the artifacts as the “largest archeological collection from a single site in the state of California.”

Without the money to preserve the artifacts, which include pottery, stone tools, shell beads and animal bones dating from 5,000 BC to the late 1800s, the items may disintegrate, Desautels said.

The Robbins bill would provide $975,000 to preserve and catalogue the artifacts, believed to have belonged to the Gabrieleno tribe.

A separate bill, approved by the Legislature and recently signed by the governor, appropriated $50,000 for a feasibility study to determine whether the state should purchase land adjacent to Los Encinos State Historic Park in Encino to build an Indian museum to house the artifacts. The cost of the museum has been estimated at $8 million.

In a telephone interview Friday night, Robbins said he would work through the weekend to try to develop amendments to his $975,000 bill that would address the commission’s concerns. The measure was approved by the Senate on June 18 by a 29-to-2 vote and is scheduled for a vote by an Assembly subcommittee on Monday.

If he cannot amend the bill to the satisfaction of the commission by Monday, Robbins said, he will put it on hold until September, when the Legislature reconvenes after an August recess, or try again at the beginning of a new session in January.

Robbins said the Encino excavation is “something that can be of great benefit to the schoolchildren of the San Fernando Valley for decades to come. It will give them a chance to see how people lived in the San Fernando Valley for thousands of years in the past.”

Commission chairman Paul Gary Beck said, however, that the bill would take money away from other Indian projects across the state and would set a precedent, prompting developers who uncover Native American artifacts to rush to the state with museum proposals. Beck also said the $975,000 would fall far short of what is needed to properly display the items.

“The bill is contingent upon something that may or may not happen down the road,” Beck said, in reference to the museum study. “You’re asking us to take possession of artifacts when there is no place to store and display them.”

The “Lost Village,” believed to be a community described by Spanish explorers but not rediscovered for two centuries, was found last summer when First Financial Group Inc., an Encino development firm, began grading the site for construction of an office building.

Archeologists Required

State law dictates that developers hire archeologists to supervise construction in areas where significant artifacts are believed to be buried. The developers must pay one-half of one percent of their construction costs toward preserving the artifacts.

J. Robert Hayes, a consultant to the state Senate, said First Financial has spent $1.7 million for the archeological work, far more than required by law. Desautels said her firm has spent another $350,000 since the payments from the developer ceased, and that she hopes to be reimbursed from the $975,000 appropriation in the Robbins bill.

Another $500,000 worth of preservation work remains, and the preservation work and studies are expected to be concluded in August, 1987, Desautels said.

“Legally, the developer has surpassed his legal obligation as far as the law is written,” Hayes said. “We don’t want to dump the artifacts in the garbage. We want the state to step in and do what it is supposed to do, protect the people of this state.”

But Desautels said she believes that a second state law, commonly called the Dead Bodies Act, which governs how Indian burial grounds should be treated, takes precedence over the first law and requires First Financial to pay the full cost of preserving and housing the artifacts.

Skeletal Remains

The remains of at least six Indian skeletons were discovered at the excavation site. First Financial paid for the remains to be reburied in April at an undisclosed location at Los Encinos park, in a sacred ceremony conducted by the Gabrieleno tribe.

Should the Robbins bill fail, Desautels said, she may be forced to sue First Financial to recover her costs.

The artifacts from the excavation, which was completed in March, are being housed at Desautels’ firm, Scientific Resource Surveys Inc. in Huntington Beach. The items legally belong to First Financial, but the company from the start has offered to donate them to the state Department of Parks and Recreation.

Desautels said that, as an archeologist, she has a “moral obligation” to continue with the preservation.

“We can’t just walk away,” she said.

However, Desautels added that her firm has exhausted a $300,000 savings account to carry workers through slow times and she does not know how much more expense she can absorb.

Storage Solution

Desautels said rangers from Los Encinos park told her that a storage building at the park is large enough to house the collection but needs to be renovated to make it safe. She said the cost would be minimal and might enable the preservation work and display of the collection to be financed with the $975,000 appropriation.

However, testimony before the commission by Barbara J. Rathbun, assistant director of the state Department of Parks and Recreation, which opposed the Robbins bill, conflicted with Desautels’ assessment.

“Local rangers are neither architects, planners or developers and have no idea of the cost of restoration,” Rathbun said, putting the cost to refurbish the building at more than $1 million.