Protected Lands Still Under Siege : Growth: A network of county ecological zones--formed a decade ago--has been neglected and nibbled away by development.

With coastal, desert and alpine landscapes all within its boundaries, Los Angeles County has a natural diversity almost unequaled in the world. In recognition, and under pressure from the courts, officials a decade ago created a network of “Significant Ecological Areas” to save remnants of the county’s rich natural heritage.

Ranging from austere desert buttes and ancient oak savannas to deep canyons, coastal dunes and wetlands, the SEAs were selected for their value as habitat and migration corridors for wildlife, or as strongholds for threatened plants, birds and other animals. Some areas were chosen as the best remaining examples of once-common ecological niches.

The 61 SEAs were mostly privately owned, but the county’s 1980 General Plan made it official policy to protect them from incompatible development and to acquire those most threatened.

Since then, the SEAs have suffered from obscurity and neglect, an investigation by The Times has found. SEAs have been nibbled by development and with other open space dwindling, they are under enormous pressure from big housing and commercial projects, proposed roads and even garbage dumps.

The SEAs range in size from a few acres to thousands. About half, including some of the most threatened ones, are in Agoura and the San Fernando, Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys. One SEA alone--Palo Comado SEA in Agoura--is targeted by four residential and commercial projects. A project of 1,900 houses and a golf course would cover part of an SEA in Valencia and a proposed city-within-a-city with 11,750 housing units and parking for 25,000 cars is to be built on the edge of the Ballona Creek SEA near Marina del Rey.

“I think the SEAs are struggling to survive,” said Tim Thomas, a biologist and member of a county advisory committee on the SEAs. “We’re . . . getting a wave of requests to develop in SEAs, to use SEAs to . . . put trash in and to put houses on, and these things are all incompatible with the intent of the designation of the SEAs.”

These development conflicts would have been reduced had the county given priority to protecting the SEAs. But management of the SEAs has been a serious failure, interviews and public records show. Consider:

* The county did not follow through on its commitment to “actively search for funding mechanisms at all governmental levels” to purchase SEAs to protect them. If a proposed county parks bond issue passes Tuesday, it will provide the first county funds to purchase SEAs.

* County planning officials have not monitored development in SEAs, and don’t know which areas are intact or degraded. Without such basic data, informed decisions on new development plans in SEAs are impossible. Yet county supervisors have turned down requests for funds to study the status of the SEAs.

* The county itself is a threat to SEAs. For example, county transportation plans call for eventual extension of Thousand Oaks Boulevard through the Palo Comado SEA in Agoura, an expanse of grassy hills and stately oaks that supports deer, bobcats, coyotes, and golden eagles.

* The county has also declared Towsley and Blind canyons within the Santa Susana Mountains SEA, and Sullivan-Rustic-Mission canyons, another significant area in the Santa Monica Mountains, to be suitable for use as landfills.

“If we take a so-what attitude towards the SEAs, we’re taking a so-what attitude towards the . . . ecosystems of the rest of the world, and the ecosystems are what support our lives,” said Dick Friesen, a biologist and consultant who chairs the Significant Ecological Areas Technical Advisory Committee, or SEATAC, a panel of biologists that advises the county on development in SEAs.

“If we can’t retain the SEAs in Los Angeles County, where there’s a big population base and a big economic base to do it,” it will be impossible to do in poorer parts of the world, he said.

Even when portions of SEAs have been preserved, it has required big concessions to developers. Consider two agreements last month that have been hailed as environmental triumphs.

In one case, Los Angeles airport officials agreed to preserve 200 acres of the El Segundo Dunes SEA west of Los Angeles International Airport, while developing a golf course on 100 other acres.

In the other case, environmentalists and developers settled years of litigation over the Ballona Creek SEA, which includes one of Southern California’s last tidal wetlands. The developers agreed to preserve and help restore about 270 acres of the wetlands. In return, environmentalists agreed not to fight plans for a huge development overlooking the preserve--including 11,750 single-family houses and apartments, 2,400 hotel rooms and 5.7 million square feet of office and retail space.

In Valencia, developers have proposed building more than 1,900 houses, a golf course and commercial complex on a site that includes about 300 acres of the Valley Oaks Savannah SEA.

Another plan calls for development of two golf courses on more than 600 acres of the Tonner Canyon SEA near Diamond Bar.

Above Granada Hills, Browning-Ferris Industries is trying to expand its Sunshine Canyon landfill into more than 500 acres of the Santa Susana Mountains SEA, a move that would wipe out more than 7,000 trees and redraw the SEA map to delete that portion.

West of Lancaster, the proposed California Springs development--5,700 acres and 21,000 homes --would encroach on the Joshua Tree Woodland and the Fairmont and Antelope Buttes SEAs.

And west of Palmdale, the proposed 7,200-house Ritter Ranch project would encroach on the Ritter Ridge SEA.

Piecemeal house building has pecked away at the Kentucky Springs SEA south of Palmdale, a swath of rugged foothills where a distinct subspecies of Great Basin sage grows in unusual abundance. The northern part of that SEA has been damaged by houses and four-wheel-drive traffic, according to Asenath Rasmussen, a biochemist and research consultant who recently visited the area. The northern part has been “altered so dramatically that it’s not a continuously functioning community anymore,” she said.

Like the agreement protecting the Ballona wetlands, the SEA network grew out of a citizens lawsuit.

In 1973, a group calling itself the Coalition for Los Angeles Planning in the Public Interest sued the Board of Supervisors over deficiencies in the General Plan, including lack of adequate open-space protection. The county had a list of SEAs, but had taken no steps to protect them.

The citizens prevailed in a sweeping decision in 1975 by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge David A. Thomas that voided parts of the General Plan. The ruling temporarily barred development in non-urban areas, freezing “approximately $60 million of planned private construction . . . over the next year,” former planning director Norman Murdoch said in a memo at the time.

The county rewrote its General Plan to better protect open space, including re-designating a network of SEAs. In a report to the county, consultants Sid England and Steve Nelson wrote that the roster of SEAs was a bare minimum and was “not one from which further eliminations can be made.”

Their report said the SEAs should remain in “as near a pristine condition as possible,” and that only a few uses--such as passive recreation and nature study--should be allowed. “Residential, agricultural, industrial and commercial developments necessitate the removal of large areas of natural vegetation and are clearly incompatible uses,” the report said.

Naturally, development conflicts would arise, and saving SEAs “would inevitably require acquisition of areas by Los Angeles County,” England and Nelson said.

Their report was merely advisory, and the General Plan diluted its conclusions in substance and tone. The plan did not rule out construction of housing in SEAs, for example.

Still, the plan declared it county policy “to preserve the County’s significant ecological resources and habitat areas in as viable and natural condition as possible.” And an accompanying county document committed it to making an active effort to find money to purchase the areas.

But the timing could not have been worse for a costly new environmental program. In 1978, the tax-slashing Proposition 13 cut deeply into county budgets.

Moreover, the year the General Plan was adopted, 1980, was also the year Mike Antonovich and Deane Dana joined incumbent Pete Schabarum on the Board of Supervisors, forming a conservative, pro-development majority that receives lavish campaign support from real estate interests.

A 1980s building boom coincided with a steady erosion of county planning staff, making it more difficult to study the impact of development on open space. The county Department of Regional Planning saw its staffing dwindle from 212 employees in 1980 to about 150 today, department figures show.

Moreover, the supervisors did not create a fund to buy SEAs. Two other agencies--the National Park Service and Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy--did buy some tracts in the Santa Monica Mountains that included SEAs. But critics, including some members of Congress, said the supervisors at times were more hindrance than help. By “upzoning” land in scenic areas--allowing developers to build more houses than zoning provided--the supervisors made acquisition more expensive and difficult for other agencies, the critics said.

“The county should be condemned . . . not because they haven’t come up with the money themselves, but because they haven’t cooperated with” agencies that had funds, said Carlyle W. Hall Jr., the Los Angeles attorney who filed the 1973 suit that voided the General Plan.

“You have a Board of Supervisors that’s philosophically opposed to restricting the use of private property, and I think they’re philosophically opposed to the public ownership of land,” said David Brown, an associate professor of history at Valley College and chairman of the Sierra Club’s Santa Monica Mountains task force.

Sherry Teresa, a wildlife biologist with the California Department of Fish and Game and formerly its Los Angeles wildlife unit manager, said high-ranking fish and game officials have essentially written off Los Angeles County. “The attitude is that, within L.A. County . . . development was inevitable, you weren’t going to save anything anyway,” so “fish and game would rather spend their . . . very limited resources elsewhere,” Teresa said.

Supervisor Ed Edelman said he was concerned the county had not made the SEAs “a high enough priority.” He said he expects to introduce a motion asking “why there’s been this failure . . . on the county’s part to maintain these SEAs.”

An Edelman aide noted that the SEAs have not been a big issue for local environmental groups. “You’ve got a lot of commitments to honor and the ones you pay most attention to are the ones where people hold your feet to the fire,” he said.

Lawsuits have been filed over specific SEAs, but not over protection of the countywide network.

Dave Vannatta, an aide to Mike Antonovich, said the SEAs have been reasonably protected. Up to now, Vannatta said, development in SEAs “has been compatible with the resource.”

Vannatta said the county faces critical unmet needs and purchasing SEAs “cannot and does not have that kind of priority.” Besides, the idea is to protect the SEAs, not necessarily to own them, he said.

“Mike’s interest is in protecting the resource,” Vannatta said of his boss. “We’ve been able to protect these lands without taking them off the tax rolls.”

Some SEAs survived the go-go ‘80s because of their remote location or difficult terrain. Their special status may also have scared away developers worried about additional barriers to their projects.

But with open space shrinking, SEAs are increasingly in the gun sights. “You can build anywhere if you have enough money and a big enough bulldozer,” remarked Pamela Holt, a section head with the regional planning department.

As the SEAs’ first line of defense, the county created SEATAC, the panel of biologists that reviews projects in the SEAs.

A developer gives SEATAC a “biota report” on the effect of his project on native vegetation and wildlife. Typically, SEATAC merely determines if the report is complete, and recommends permit conditions to reduce environmental damage, such as clustering houses or building them away from rare plants. Occasionally, SEATAC recommends rejection of a project as overly destructive.

Vannatta is one who thinks the system is working. And Holt, the county planner, also thinks SEATAC is effective. “Developers are finally wising up . . . and redesigning their projects to reflect a greater sensitivity to the environment,” she said.

But some county planners, and SEATAC members themselves, see serious flaws in the system. As SEATAC member Frank Hovore put it, “the process still allows for the slow deterioration of the SEAs.”

One problem is that some SEAs lie within city limits and are beyond the county’s jurisdiction.

Another is that even in the county, many SEA encroachments never come to SEATAC’s attention. Dividing lots requires county approval, but landowners are allowed to build single-family houses and horse corrals or graze cattle in SEAs without SEATAC’s knowledge.

In some cases, SEATAC members said, it appears landowners have graded their property before coming before the panel so as to be able to argue that there are no rare plants to protect.

In other cases, SEATAC recommendations are almost impossible to enforce, such as requirements to minimize destruction of natural vegetation that must be cleared near homes under fire safety rules.

SEATAC members also lack detailed information on the condition of SEAs--information vital to sound decisions. In a clear case of neglect, county officials have never monitored development in SEAs, and can’t say which are in good shape or are too far gone to worry about.

“They can’t give a progress report of how much development has occurred in the area, how much of the SEA has been lost to development since designation of the SEA,” SEATAC member Tim Thomas said. It’s a “constraint on our ability to perform.”

For about three years, SEATAC members have pushed for a study of the status of SEAs--including field surveys and aerial photographs to assess damage and determine which SEAs should be expanded or reduced.

But there has been no study. “I guess it just wasn’t important enough to the county to do,” said Friesen, SEATAC’s chairman.

During budget deliberations two years ago, the Planning Department asked the supervisors for $300,000 for the study, and last year requested $350,000. But the requests were not approved.

Vannatta said that in both years the department sought funds for a number of special projects, and that the SEA study didn’t seem to have any special priority.

Rather than renew the request this year, planning officials instead decided to earmark $40,000 in operating funds to launch the SEA study. But the work has not begun, partly due to the problem of deciding what can be done with so little money.

“In terms of this whole problem,” said Ted Elias, a Planning Department administrator, the $40,000 “is just a very, very minimal start.”

SIGNIFICANT ECOLOGICAL AREAS 61 areas* were designated in the county’s 1980 General Plan. To be protected were wildlife migration corridors and valuable habitat for native plants, birds and mammals. SAN FERNANDO VALLEY

Name & Number Location Natural Feature Chatsworth Reservoir (13) Chatsworth bird sanctuary Simi Hills (14) west of Chatsworth wildlife corridor Santa Susana Mts. (20) north Valley oak woodlands Santa Susana Pass (21) northwest Valley tarweed Tujunga Valley/Hansen Sunland rare, endangered Dam (24) plants Encino Reservoir (39) Encino rare plants Verdugo Mountains (40) Burbank, Tujunga wildlife corridor

SANTA CLARITA/ANTELOPE VALLEYS

Name & Number Location Natural Feature San Francisquito Cyn. (19) north of Valencia endangered fish Santa Clara River(23) Santa Clarita Valley endangered fish Edwards AFB (47) north of Lancaster endangered plants Big Rock Wash (48) Antelope Valley wildlife habitat Little Rock Wash (49) near Palmdale wildlife habitat Rosamund Lake (50) N.E. of Lancaster alkali sink Saddleback Butte east of Lancaster wildlife refuge, State Park (51) desert wildflowers Alpine Butte (52) east of Palmdale wildlife, wildflowers Lovejoy Butte (53) east of Palmdale wildlife habitat Piute Butte (54) east of Palmdale birds, wildlife Desert-Montane east of Palmdale wildlife habitat Transect (55) Ritter Ridge (56) west of Palmdale Joshua trees Fairmont & Antelope west of Lancaster refuge for birds buttes (57) of prey Portal Ridge/Liebre near Gorman diverse plant life Mountain (58) Tehachapi Foothills (59) near Gorman wildflowers Joshua Tree Woodland (60) N.W. of Lancaster Joshua trees Kentucky Springs (61) south of Palmdale Great Basin sage Lyon Cyn (63) Valencia woodland habitat Valley Oaks Savannah (64) Valencia valley oak habitat

AGOURA/MALIBU

Name & Number Location Natural Feature Malibu Coastline (1) Malibu marine habitat Point Dume (2) Malibu marine habitat Zuma Canyon (3) Malibu year-round stream Upper La Sierra Cyn. (4) Malibu woodlands, plants Malibu Cyn and Lagoon (5) Malibu steelhead run, only county lagoon Las Virgenes (6) Agoura rare plants Hepatic Gulch (7) Malibu rare plants Malibu Creek State Pk. Malibu critical watersheds Buffer Area (8) Cold Creek (9) Malibu springs & stream Tuna Canyon (10) Malibu riparian woodland Palo Comado Cyn (12) Agoura oak savannah habitat

SAN GABRIEL VALLEY

Name & Number Location Natural Feature Tonner Cyn/Chino Hills (15) near Diamond Bar oak woodlands Buzzard Peak/San Jose Walnut Calif. walnut groves Hills (16) Powder Cyn/Puente near La Habra Hts. riparian woodland Hills (17) Way Hill (18) San Dimas endangered plant Santa Fe Dam Flood- Irwindale wildlife corridor plain (22) San Dimas Cyn (25) San Dimas riparian lowlands San Antonio Cyn. Claremont desert vegetation Mouth (26) Whittier Narrows Dam Whittier Narrows wildlife refuge County Recreation Area (42) Rio Hondo College La Puente wildlife refuge Wildlife Sanctuary (43) Sycamore & Turnbull near Whittier canyon riparian canyons (44) habitat Dudleya densiflora Azusa endangered plant population (45) Galium grande population (62) Monrovia endangered plant

OTHER L.A. COUNTY AREAS

Name & Number Location Natural Feature Temescal-Rustic- west of 405 Fwy. canyon habitat Sullivan cyns (11) Portuguese Bend Palos Verdes rare birds Landslide (27) Peninsula El Segundo Dunes (28) west of LAX endangered butterfly Ballona Creek (29) Marina del Rey salt marsh habitat Alamitos Bay (30) Long Beach salt marsh Rolling Hills Cyns (31) Miraleste rare birds Agua Amarga Cyn (32) Palos Verdes rare birds Peninsula Terminal Island (33) San Pedro bird nesting sites Palos Verdes Peninsula Palos Verdes Marine, terrestrial Coastline (34) Peninsula habitat Harbor Lake Regional Wilmington freshwater marsh Park (35) habitat Madrona Marsh (36) Torrance freshwater marsh Griffith Park (37) Los Angeles bird, wildlife refuge

* Although numbers go to 64, there are 61 Significant Ecological Areas. Three areas under consideration were not designated SEAs.