CSUN, Parks--and Prison--Get Boost in State Budget Accord : Funding: Foes of the proposed Lancaster penal institution vow to continue their fight and say they will press a lawsuit that the city has filed aimed at blocking construction.

Higher education and parks in the San Fernando Valley area were among the apparent big winners in the $55-billion spending bill that the Legislature sent to Gov. George Deukmejian on Saturday, marking an end to the protracted deadlock on the budget for the fiscal year that began July 1.

The Senate and the Assembly also approved a $305-million reauthorization of state prisons planned for downtown Los Angeles and Lancaster, a key element of the compromise package.

Deukmejian had said he would not sign the main budget bill unless he was also sent the prison reauthorizations.

Lancaster prison foes vowed Saturday to continue their fight and said they would press a lawsuit that the city filed against the state in January aimed at blocking the prison’s construction at the Mira Loma site.

“We will have to look at our options,” Lancaster City Atty. David McEwen said. “But we would go forward with the lawsuit until there is some indication that the entire prison idea is going to be dropped for good.”

The lawsuit, which argues that the state did not conduct an adequate environmental review of the site, is scheduled to be heard Aug. 24 in Lancaster Superior Court.

“I think that for the governor to be so mule-headed in his determination to get a prison in East Los Angeles to the point of jeopardizing the entire state budget is ludicrous,” said Danielle Marvin Lewis, head of the Antelope Valley Prison Committee, which opposes the Lancaster site.

The citizens committee opposes the prison at the Mira Loma site because it is in the city’s residential corridor, Lewis said.

Lancaster is heavily Republican, but “this issue is making us lose a lot of faith,” Lewis said.

The spending items that directly affect the Valley area could still change when Deukmejian blue-pencils $417 million that Senate budget staff members calculate will have to be cut to rebuild the state’s depleted emergency reserve to $1.3 billion.

The largest single Valley-area appropriation was $25.9 million to Cal State Northridge for a four-building complex that will serve 3,900 full-time business, economics and education students. Construction is expected to begin this fall on the building, which is supposed to relieve campus crowding.

“It will allow us to keep growing and serving the community,” said Gordon Watson, a campus spokesman.

CSUN would also receive about $5 million for four other building projects, including a library conversion, science building renovation, engineering addition and electrical rewiring.

Following higher education, area parks are targeted for a big shot in the arm from the budget.

Nearly $13.4 million was earmarked for parks, including $10 million for the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, which purchases land for open space in the mountains that ring the San Fernando Valley.

Sen. Alan Robbins (D-Tarzana), who sits on the six-member Assembly-Senate budget conference committee, said Valley lawmakers “planned for a bare-bones budget at the beginning of the year.” He cited efforts by local lawmakers to set aside money for open space from park bonds, instead of unrestricted pots of money subject to being raided for other purposes.

Moreover, largely because Deukmejian in 1989 slashed nearly $20-million worth of pet projects from the budget, Valley-area lawmakers reviewed their priorities this year with more care, Robbins said. “This year, we tried to come up with a veto-proof list of items,” he said.

The parkland appropriations in the budget include:

* $10 million for the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy for open space. Julie Zeidner, a spokeswoman for the parks agency, said just about the entire amount will be designated to buy key parcels for the proposed 6,000-acre Santa Clarita Woodlands State Park.

* $1.1 million to the state Department of Parks and Recreation for acquisition of 150 acres in Malibu Canyon to expand Malibu Creek State Park.

* $173,000 for access roads and restrooms at the Hungry Valley off-highway vehicle park near Gorman. Last year, Deukmejian blue-penciled $800,000 to the Valley Fair to develop facilities at the park.

* $115,000 to the Department of Parks and Recreation for completion of the Garnier House at Los Encinos State Historical Park. The house, built in 1872, will be used to exhibit a number of artifacts from archeological sites around the park.

* $145,000 to the state Department of Fish and Game to study the hydrology and bird life of the Los Angeles River.

* $100,000 to the state Department of Forestry to study the cause of excessive loss of chaparral in Southern California mountain ranges, including the Santa Monica and San Gabriel mountains.

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