Picus’ Office OKd Busing Backers in Warner Ridge Fight

The office of Los Angeles City Councilwoman Joy Picus authorized spending public transportation money last month to bus 38 Woodland Hills-area homeowners to City Hall, where they voiced support for her efforts to block the controversial Warner Ridge project.

At the request of Picus’ office, the city chartered a privately owned bus for the homeowners, most of whom were members of the Woodland Hills Homeowners Organization, on Dec. 12 to testify before a council committee about a proposal to build a commercial complex at Warner Ridge in Woodland Hills.

Asked about the charter, city officials told The Times it was an inappropriate use of public transit funds meant for non-political purposes. Supporters claim the project gave opponents an unfair advantage at the hearing before the city Planning and Land Use Management Committee.

The committee backed Picus and recommended that the City Council vote down commercial development at the site.

Although payment had not been made as of Thursday, city transportation officials said the charter was to be paid for from funds raised under Proposition A, a countywide half-cent sales tax approved by voters in 1980.

The charter, which cost $178, was arranged at the request of Robert J. Gross, president of the Woodland Hills Homeowners Organization. The availability of the charter program is not widely known in the community. Gross said he knew about it from his experience at City Hall. Picus said she had no qualms about using tax dollars for the trip, saying that it is not her role to question the reason a group asks to spend Proposition A money for a charter trip. Picus said it would be terrible if her office quizzed groups about why they wanted to avail themselves of the program.

“Good God, I don’t want to be an arbiter” of what kind of trips should be funded with Proposition A dollars, she said. “We should be neutral.”

But Judith Sobject, a chief administrative analyst in the city administrative office, said the charter was “clearly not an appropriate use of Prop. A funds.” City records soliciting bids from charter bus companies and other city documents say the program is for recreational, social and educational bus trips for senior citizens and youth groups.

The city, however, has no official adopted policies, guidelines or regulations about use of the funds. For the current budget year, $980,000 of Proposition A funds are in the city’s charter bus account, according to city transportation official Marcia Kellotat, coordinator of the charter bus program. Of that, $450,000 is earmarked for spending by the city’s 15 council members--$30,000 per council office.

Supporters of Warner Ridge said they were not told about the charter.

“If the city was going to offer a free bus trip, it should have been offered to both the pro and con groups,” said Marie Anderson, secretary of the Warner Hill Homeowners Assn. The association comprises residents of a 66-unit condominium project on Oxnard Boulevard across the street from the Warner Ridge property.

Picus said she was not aware that her office had authorized use of Proposition A money for the bus until members of the group thanked her after the hearing. “I deduced it that day,” she said.

Picus has allied herself with the organization in recent months seeking to force developer Jack Spound to drop his plans for the site, at De Soto Avenue and Oxnard Boulevard, and to build a residential project there instead.

Picus is not the only lawmaker who has used the charter bus program to pay for lobbying trips by community groups. Councilman Hal Bernson’s chief deputy, Greig Smith, said Bernson has twice arranged for Granada Hills residents to take Proposition A-funded buses to City Hall hearings on the Sunshine Canyon landfill.

Bernson is allied with Granada Hills homeowners seeking to impose limits on the landfill. Smith, however, insisted Bernson’s use of the funds was evenhanded. All Granada Hills residents were mailed notices telling them of the bus, Smith said. But Smith agreed that 99% of Granada Hills residents agreed with Bernson’s views about Sunshine Canyon.

Other Valley-based council offices said they have not used the Proposition A program to underwrite trips to City Hall by groups seeking to be heard on public policy issues. “We use the program to take senior citizens to parks and on field trips,” said Councilman Michael Woo, who represents parts of Studio City.

Despite the absence of city regulations on the use of Proposition A money, the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission has guidelines on “recreational transit program” funds requiring that if they are used to charter a bus for one group, similar groups must be notified. The commission is the original recipient of the Proposition A money. Picus also said she did not know about the notification requirement.

Neil Peterson, executive director for the commission, and commission transportation manager Pat McLaughlin said it would be improper for Proposition A-funded charter bus services to be available only to groups of a certain political persuasion.