Review Concludes Picus’ Office Did Not Misuse Funds

The office of Los Angeles City Councilwoman Joy Picus did not act improperly by approving the use of public transit funds to pay for a bus trip to City Hall by homeowners allied with Picus on a controversial zoning issue, according to the city attorney’s office.

Picus’ office was blameless because it was unaware that the homeowners planned to engage in political activity at City Hall, Assistant City Atty. John F. Haggerty said in a letter released Friday by a Picus aide.

Haggerty’s opinion concluded a review of an incident Dec. 12 in which three dozen members of the Woodland Hills Homeowners Organization took a bus to City Hall where they joined with Picus to protest a controversial proposal to build seven commercial office structures on Warner Ridge. Under pressure from Picus and the homeowners, the City Council rejected the proposal this month.

Picus’ office authorized the expenditure of $178 of Proposition A funds to pay for the group’s bus trip.

Proposition A funds come from the half-cent sales tax Los Angeles County residents pay for public transportation programs. Each of Los Angeles’ 15 City Council members are allocated $30,000 of Proposition A funds each year to pay for “recreational” charter bus trips, such as outings for senior citizens and youth groups.

Haggerty held that the tax dollars should not be used, however, for “group political activity.”

His opinion has set in motion a review of Proposition A spending guidelines, said James McLaughlin, acting chief of transit programs for the city’s Department of Transportation. McLaughlin likened current guidelines to “Swiss cheese.”

Picus, in comments to the Los Angeles Times a month ago, said that she felt no qualms about funding the homeowners’ trip and that it would be wrong for her office even to quiz groups about the purpose of their trips.

However, Michele Gagan, Picus’ chief deputy, said the controversy over the bus funds has prompted the office to adopt a policy of discouraging groups from seeking Proposition A funding for political trips. The leaders of groups seeking funding will be warned that members of their group who might use the trip for political ends “need to make other arrangements,” Gagan said.

Gagan added that if Picus’ office had known the intent of the homeowners’ trip, it would not have authorized funding for the buses. “But we didn’t know they were going to be lobbying,” she said. Helping citizens see the workings of City Hall is “as legitimate as going to a zoo and probably a lot more entertaining,” she said.

The homeowners group was a longtime foe of the Warner Ridge project and worked closely with Picus to defeat it.

Robert Gross, president of the homeowners group, said the group paid for the Dec. 12 trip shortly after it became controversial. They also arranged through Picus’ office to rent two buses from the city’s charter bus program to carry its members to a Jan. 24 City Council meeting to lobby against Warner Ridge, Gross said. But both the buses were paid for by the homeowners, he said.