Neighbors Fight Parole Office Plan

Hastings Ranch area residents have stepped up a legislative campaign to block the opening of a parole office in eastern Pasadena.

Neighbors of the proposed office on Foothill Boulevard have made lobbying forays to Sacramento and directed more than 600 postcards to state senators, urging them to support a bill that would prohibit parole offices within 500 yards of public schools, parks or residential neighborhoods.

The measure, which passed the Assembly in January, was written by Assemblyman Pat Nolan (R-Glendale) and is scheduled to be considered by the Senate Appropriations Committee on June 18.

The Corrections Department is negotiating for office space at 3400 E. Foothill Ave. to serve 1,000 parolees. The agency is under pressure to close one parole office in Alhambra, which now has two.

Residents of Alhambra and Monterey Park have been lobbying for two years to move Alhambra’s Garvey Avenue parole office, which is next to a residential neighborhood.

“Not only is it adjacent to homes, but it’s about 300 or 400 feet up (the street) from an elementary school,” Alhambra City Manager Kevin Murphy said.

Alhambra city officials would not comment on the problems the parole office has brought to the city. But Alhambra police reported that crime in the area increased 37% during the first three months after the office opened in 1988.

The Pasadena Board of Directors passed a resolution last year requesting that the parole office not be located in the city.

“There’s been an impaction of institutional uses currently in Pasadena,” said Mayor Jess Hughston, who represents the Hastings Ranch area.

Former Lower Hastings Ranch Assn. President Harold Britton said the Foothill Boulevard site is within 250 yards of homes on Sierra Madre Villa and less than a mile from Hastings Ranch.

Last year, the association successfully fought the designation of an office on Rosemead Boulevard for a parole office.