‘Hardship’ Tracts Top Priority : $6 Million Targeted for Park in Santa Monicas

Congressional negotiators have earmarked $6 million to buy land for the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. The Senate had pushed for zero funding, while the House had targeted $8 million for the parklands in the fiscal year that began Oct. 1.

The $6 million represents nearly 12% of the $52 million allotted by the conferees for expansion of all 337 units of the national park system.

The compromise also would restore $200,000 in operating and maintenance funds that were lopped from the national recreation area’s budget during the last two years.

However, the land-acquisition money--included in an omnibus federal spending package that awaits approval by the full House and Senate and President Reagan--would come with restrictions that could cloud plans to buy a key tract owned by Quaker Corp. along Mulholland Highway in Calabasas.

In an unusual step, congressional negotiators directed the National Park Service to put a priority on “hardship” cases in the Santa Monicas. These usually involve small tracts and financially pressed owners who want to sell quickly.

Strings Seldom Attached

In most years, what money Congress has provided has come without strings attached, and Park Service officials have concentrated on purchasing especially large or scenic tracts that are threatened by development.

According to congressional and Park Service officials, there are 26 hardship tracts remaining in the Santa Monicas that cover about 750 acres and will cost about $4.2 million to buy. That would leave about $1.8 million for other purchases the coming year.

“I’m glad to hear that language is finally being put in” to deal with hardships first, said Bob Heagy of Malibu, president of Concerned Citizens for Property Rights. The landowner group lobbied for years against funding for the mountain park because members hoped to hold onto their land. But, recognizing that the park is here to stay, the group has shifted course, campaigning instead for available funds to go to small landowners, which it claims have gotten short shrift.

Don Knowles, a staff member of the Senate Interior subcommittee, said the budget language is not intended as criticism of Park Service purchase priorities. The conferees just decided “it would be an appropriate thing this year to encourage the Park Service to address hardships,” Knowles said.

Dan Kuehn, superintendent of the Santa Monicas park, said he would be “extremely pleased” to get the $6 million. He said the hardship directive probably sold the appropriation to those conferees who opposed any “money for land acquisition at all, with the deficits the way they are.”

But Kuehn denied that small landowners have been overlooked, pointing out that more than $1.6 million of last year’s $8 million appropriation went for hardship purchases. He said that, of the 144 tracts purchased during the park’s eight-year existence, more than two-thirds were smaller than 40 acres.

Las Virgenes Valley Land

But Kuehn said that the hardship directive could hinder efforts to acquire the 272-acre Quaker Corp. property in the Las Virgenes Valley in Calabasas, envisioned as part of a visitor center with picnicking and camping.

The national recreation area reserved $3.5 million from last year’s appropriation to apply towards purchase of the Quaker property, which is now being appraised. Some Park Service officials say privately that the cost could be considerably higher than $3.5 million.

Kuehn said that, if the added $1.8 million still does not cover the cost, Park Service officials probably will ask Congress for permission to divert some of the hardship funds.

Subdivision Approved

The Quaker Corp. has received state Coastal Commission approval for a housing subdivision on the tract. If it is not acquired during the coming year, “I think we’ll lose it” to development, Kuehn said.

The money for the Santa Monicas is buried inside $560 billion worth of spending bills to run virtually every department from Interior to Defense. The House and Senate are expected to vote this week on the budget package, which would then go to President Reagan.

Established by Congress in 1978, the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area is actually a network of local, state and federal preserves interspersed with private lands and covering 150,000 acres between Griffith Park in Los Angeles and Point Mugu State Park in Ventura County.

The federal government has acquired 11,900 of the 36,000 acres it intends to own as its part of the huge area.