One Suit Filed, Another OKd to Oppose Prisons

Although Los Angeles County contributes about 40% of the state’s prison population, local officials in two separate actions Thursday opposed proposed state prisons for an industrial area near the Civic Center and in the Antelope Valley.

Carrying through on their threats, Los Angeles city officials and Eastside activists filed a lawsuit in the morning to block construction of a 1,450-bed facility on a 20-acre site next to the Los Angeles River. Later in the day, the county Board of Supervisors voted to sue to block a similar facility on county-owned land in Lancaster.

“Nobody wants these prisons,” explained urban planner Frank Villalobos, head of a Latino coalition that opposes the downtown prison next to the Los Angeles River at Santa Fe Avenue and Olympic Boulevard.

At present, there are no state prisons in the county. The two proposed sites were part of a delicate compromise worked out in the Legislature several years ago. They were linked after Democratic lawmakers from Los Angeles complained that Republican constituents in rural parts of the county ought to accept equal share of the prison burden.

Under a legislative compromise, neither prison could be occupied until construction is begun on the other.

But that did little to quell opposition to either proposal.

The lawsuit filed Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court, for example, is but the latest move in the five-year fight against the prison by Latino activists and others who contend that Eastside neighborhoods have more than their share of jails.

The suit said the state Department of Corrections violated state guidelines by ignoring environmental considerations concerning the proposed prison. Although an environmental impact report was approved for the site, the suit argued that the EIR was inadequate because it ignored the impact on the character and social fabric of the surrounding neighborhoods.

The suit said state planners also failed to study possible soil contamination from toxics in the area.

The lawsuit challenged the constitutionality of SB18, the compromise bill that authorized the two prison sites in the county.

“By authorizing two different prisons, neither one of which could be passed without the other in the same legislation, passage of this bill . . . constituted classic ‘logrolling,’ in violation of the California Constitution,” the suit said.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Corrections said she regretted the lawsuit’s filing.

“We are disappointed that the city of Los Angeles did not see fit to work with us on this much-needed project,” spokeswoman Christine May said from Sacramento. “We feel confident that the environmental impact report will pass any scrutiny.”

City Councilwoman Gloria Molina, a longtime prison foe, said it hurt her to review the 113-page lawsuit as it was filed in the downtown County Courthouse.

“It was very painful because, as I’m reading it, I’m reliving all of those years of protests against it,” she said. “It’s painful to see the utter disregard for this community, which doesn’t want this prison.”

State Sen. Art Torres, Assemblywoman Lucille Roybal-Allard and City Councilman Richard Alatorre, all local Democrats, are also plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

The county supervisors, on a 3-0 vote, agreed to sue the state to block the Lancaster prison at the urging of Supervisor Mike Antonovich, who termed as “frivolous” the lawsuit against the downtown site.

The supervisor said he opposes the Mira Loma site in Lancaster because the county has owned the 232-acre parcel of land for 42 years and now needs it to provide the fast-growing Antelope Valley with expanded hospital, police protection, probation, animal care and other services.

“Of all the places, they picked the one owned by the county for 42 years,” Antonovich said. He said the state’s acquisition of that site for a prison would amount to “double taxation,” in that county taxpayers would have to pay for land to replace the Mira Loma site, which is located at Avenue J and 60th Street West in Lancaster.

Antonovich would not say when a suit would be filed by the county, which can legally challenge the prison environmental impact report until Jan. 29. He and fellow Supervisor Deane Dana suggested that the state move the prison to state-owned property in Hungry Valley, a remote area west of I-5 and south of Gorman.

The Lancaster City Council last week voted to authorize a lawsuit to block the Mira Loma prison site but has not yet filed it.