Senate Rejects L.A. Prison Site in a Blow to Governor

In a stunning setback for Gov. George Deukmejian, the Senate reversed itself Thursday and rejected his controversial plan to build a state prison near downtown Los Angeles.

Supporters, however, served notice that they will seek to have the action reconsidered. The governor’s urgency appropriations bill, previously approved by the Senate, was scuttled by a 23-12 vote when it refused to concur in Assembly amendments. Concurrence requires 27 votes.

If the measure ultimately fails to gain Senate concurrence, it would go to a two-house conference committee, where it would face an uncertain future.

As more than 100 prison opponents from East Los Angeles looked on, the action constituted a surprise move and a setback for the Republican governor, who had made the Los Angeles prison a top priority.

The measure’s strongest opponents suggested that there is room for compromise. But with little more than two weeks left before the Legislature’s Aug. 29 scheduled adjournment and major disagreement over where Los Angeles County’s first state prison should be built, supporters were pessimistic.

Rodney J. Blonien, Deukmejian’s undersecretary of the Youth and Correctional Agency, predicted that Senate rejection at this late date would “make it unlikely” that the prison plan could be approved this year.

The issue was debated as several hundred Boyle Heights residents, whose homes are within a few miles of the prison site, converged on the Capitol for two days of intensive lobbying in a last-minute attempt to derail the measure.

After a preliminary vote showed that the measure was heading for defeat, leaders of the group, who came prepared for the worst, were elated.

“Our community has already taken more than our share,” said Frank Villalobos, a Boyle Heights resident and an organizer of the protest. “We will have an opportunity now for the community to speak out again.”

Added Carlos Garcia, of the El Sereno Chamber of Commerce: “Our elected officials know they will have to be accountable now.”

The fight over location of a Los Angeles prison has raged in the Legislature for more than four years, with both Los Angeles legislators and local elected officials trying their best to keep the facility out of their districts.

Top Priority

But momentum built behind the downtown proposal, which would be located near 12th Street and Santa Fe Avenue, after officials in Los Angeles at first appeared to support the site and the governor made it a top priority of his Administration.

More recently, however, the estimated $150-million prison became a political football, passed by the Senate, blocked in the Assembly but later approved by the lower house when Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) suddenly dropped his opposition.

It was clear that the strong show of community opposition had a major impact in Thursday’s Senate debate.

As protesters arrived in Sacramento, top Administration officials, unsure of their Senate support, considered delaying a vote until next week. But Sen. President Pro Tem David A. Roberti (D-Los Angeles), who supported the prison measure last year, reversed himself and pressured Sen. Robert Presley (D-Riverside), the measure’s author, to bring the matter to a vote.

Cites Pressure

“I don’t want to hassle you, but I want to get these people off my back,” Roberti told Presley as the two huddled in the back of the Senate chamber.

The Administration’s plan calls for a 1,700-bed, medium-security prison on a 30-acre parcel in an industrial area two miles southeast of the Civic Center. Because of its urban location, the $13-million purchase price for the land would be the highest ever paid by the state for a prison site.

A 4-year-old state law meant to pressure Los Angeles County into accepting a state prison requires that a site in the county must be selected before several new prisons are occupied elsewhere in the state. With some new prisons scheduled to open before the Nov. 4 elections, rejection of the downtown site could spell political problems for the governor and leave legislators open to criticism that they were soft on crime.

The major point of contention, aside from the location of the downtown prison, was the Administration’s plan to complete a required environmental assessment only after the property is purchased. Two other prisons that would be authorized in the same bill--one in Del Norte County and another in Madera--would have full environmental studies before any steps are taken to purchase property.

Roberti seized on that disparity as he told the Senate that “we in Los Angeles want to be treated like the rest of the state. If another prison gets an environmental impact report, we want one too.”

Earlier in the day, Sen. Art Torres and Assemblywoman Gloria Molina, the Los Angeles Democrats leading the fight to defeat the downtown prison, released state documents showing that a parcel adjacent to the prison site was contaminated by toxic substances and is being proposed as a storage area for cancer-causing chemicals.

Torres charged that the Administration had kept that information from the community and that the documents underlie the need for a full environmental assessment before purchasing the property.

“We accept the fact that Los Angeles needs a prison,” he told the Senate. “But the legislation ought to incorporate an environmental impact report.”

Great Concern

Torres added that the Department of Corrections’ recent decision to consider using the Los Angeles prison as a detention center for mentally disordered offenders had created great concern among residents.

Presley, seeking to appease opponents, offered to drop the plan for a medical-psychiatric center from the bill. But he predicted that if the measure is rejected, there is little likelihood that another acceptable location would be found in Los Angeles County in the forseeable future.

“It seems to me we’ve been very patient with Los Angeles County,” Presley said. “The rest of us are accepting prisons all around the state and I just think it’s time, in equity and fairness, that Los Angeles accepts a prison.”

The bill authorizes the Department of Corrections to spend $31.4 million to buy the downtown site for a 1,700-bed work-based prison, medical-psychiatric facility, reception center or a combination of the three.

It also provides that once a site is selected, no other prison could be built within 15 miles. And it permits corrections officials to purchase the site before an environmental impact report is prepared.