‘Loophole’ Left in Plan to Restrict Development

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a plan to restrict growth in the county’s booming urban fringes, but the approval came only after Supervisor Ed Edelman lost a last-ditch bid to strengthen the measure.

The plan, designed to control growth in the fastest-growing unincorporated areas of the county, was approved unanimously. It applies to the Santa Clarita, Antelope and east San Gabriel valleys, the Las Virgenes area and Malibu.

The vote was the culmination of a long fight in Superior Court between the county and a coalition of environmental and civic groups. The coalition brought suit contending the county was choking its communities by rubber-stamping building projects without appropriate consideration of their impact on traffic, schools, the water supply and other environmental factors.

The plan, the result of a court-approved settlement, calls for the use of a sophisticated computer program, called the development monitoring system, to predict the consequences of proposed projects. County officials generally would have to deny a project if the computer program determined there would be insufficient services, including schools and fire protection, to support the new residents the project would bring.

Supervisors had been expected to give their approval to the settlement without much discussion Tuesday. But Edelman, echoing the sentiments of environmental and homeowner groups, moved to change the language to close what he saw as an escape hatch for developers.

‘Overriding Considerations’

Edelman wanted to change a provision that allows the county to approve otherwise unacceptable construction if there are “overriding considerations” which make it necessary. At a public hearing last month, a dozen leaders of homeowner and environmental groups urged the supervisors to eliminate the provision, or at least define what the term meant.

“I am concerned . . . that the provision allowing the finding of overriding considerations weakens the control this proposal is intended to achieve,” Edelman said.

But the other three supervisors present--Mike Antonovich, Deane Dana and Pete Schabarum--remained unswayed. Edelman’s motion, to require the approval of at least four supervisors to invoke the “overriding considerations” clause, died for lack of a second.

Supervisors instead unanimously approved a motion Antonovich offered as a compromise. It leaves the controversial provision intact but puts the authority for deciding on such projects with the board, not with the planning staff.

Edelman praised the monitoring system in general, but after the vote he warned, “We will have to watch it carefully so we don’t open up a big loophole.”

Disappointed With Vote

Sherman W. Griselle, the chairman of the group which in 1973 filed the suit that resulted in Tuesday’s vote, said he was disappointed with the outcome.

“Now the board, when they feel so inclined, can override the standards of the development monitoring system,” said Griselle, who had been hoping that an amendment such as Edelman’s would be approved. “It’s exactly the kind of back door to development which we hoped would not be included in the DMS.”

Griselle said the group’s last chance to amend the plan rests with Superior Court Judge Norman L. Epstein. Next Tuesday, Epstein is scheduled to either approve or reject the plan, which originated through a series of compromises in his courtroom. The plaintiffs will ask the judge to strike the “overriding consideration” clause and to maintain a court-appointed referee for one year to ensure the program is run properly.

But Antonovich was optimistic, saying: “Hopefully we will be able to address their concerns in a positive way.”

Norman Murdoch, director of the county’s Department of Regional Planning, praised the plan as “a very major breakthrough in California planning practices. . . . Los Angeles County may be the only county in the state to have such a monitoring system in use.”