L.A. Council Votes to Seek Control of Elsmere Canyon

The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday took a step to preserve land north of the San Fernando Valley as a future garbage dump, despite warnings the action would strain relations with the future city of Santa Clarita.

The council voted 11 to 2 to ask the Local Agency Formation Commission to include Elsmere Canyon within Los Angeles’ “sphere of influence.”

Councilman Hal Bernson, who requested the action, said the city needs to head off an effort by Santa Clarita to include the area within its sphere of influence. That could block Los Angeles from developing a landfill on the site.

Bernson said the sphere-of-influence designation would give Los Angeles more of a say in the development of the outlying area and a chance eventually to annex it. Elsmere Canyon, near Interstate 5 and the Antelope Valley Freeway, is between Los Angeles’ northern city limits and Santa Clarita’s southern boundary.

“This area is absolutely essential to the future of the City of Los Angeles,” Bernson said, citing projections that Los Angeles will run out of places to dump its garbage in 1993.

Worried About Relationship

Councilwoman Joy Picus expressed concern that the action would hurt Los Angeles’ relationship with the future city, which will be incorporated next Tuesday.

“I wonder about how advisable it is to get off to what may not be the best of relationships,” she said. She noted that Los Angeles may need Santa Clarita’s help to rezone 520 acres of land owned by Los Angeles in the new city. Picus, however, supported the council action.

Councilman Ernani Bernardi objected to the City Council voting without giving Santa Clarita officials an opportunity to comment. Joining him in opposing the council action was Councilman Nate Holden.

Bernardi said Los Angeles has “plenty of areas” for landfills with in its city limits. “We don’t need to go outside into another city’s jurisdiction,” he said.

Bernson, however, said, “Our first obligation is to the people of Los Angeles, not Santa Clarita.”

He picked up support when he warned his colleagues that if they did not support the action, they could find unpopular trash incinerators or landfills in their districts.

Jo Anne Darcy, a Santa Clarita city councilwoman, said she will ask her City Council at an informal meeting tonight to request that the Local Agency Formation Commission to give Santa Clarita “equal consideration” in determining the sphere of influence for Elsmere Canyon.

Darcy said that Santa Clarita residents are concerned about the threat to ground water from a landfill in Elsmere Canyon.

The Los Angeles City Council also voted to ask the commission to include Sunshine Canyon in the city’s sphere of influence. Bernson said the designation would help him defeat the proposed expansion of a landfill, above Granada Hills, which is part of his district.

Ernest Debs--a former Los Angeles city councilman and county supervisor who nows works as a lobbyist for Browning-Ferris Industries, owner of Sunshine Canyon--warned council members that “you will be in rubbish above your heads” if they seek to stop the landfill’s expansion.

“The problem with this landfill is it is 1,600 feet from homes,” Bernson said.