CITY COUNCIL ELECTIONS / 12th DISTRICT : Campaign Strategies Diverge on Issue of Porter Ranch Plan : Julie Korenstein: The challenger, if elected, will try to enact either ‘a building moratorium or a motion to change the square footage.’

If elected to the Los Angeles City Council, Julie Korenstein would seek to slash by 90% the maximum size of the office-tower complex permitted by the Porter Ranch plan, as part of a bold--some say, unrealistic--strategy that would face tough legal and political obstacles.

In a recent interview, Korenstein described her alternative plan for Porter Ranch, the huge development proposal that has dominated the 12th District council race between Korenstein, a Los Angeles school board member, and the incumbent, Councilman Hal Bernson, now seeking a fourth term. The runoff election is June 4.

Only 600,000 square feet of commercial space is needed at Porter Ranch, not the 6 million authorized by the council last July when it adopted the Porter Ranch Specific Plan for the 1,300-acre site, Korenstein said.

She also opposes a Porter Ranch plan provision for a shopping mall. “It’s crazy and insane to develop another regional mall here,” said Korenstein, who lives in the Porter Ranch area. “We’re already inundated with malls. I live only eight minutes from the Northridge Fashion Center.”

Finally, the 3,395 dwelling units in the plan should be sharply rolled back. “I’d even go down to 1,000,” she said. “That’s more than enough.”

Her first move against Porter Ranch, if elected, would be “to set up a committee of community activists from the 12th District, and we’d work out whether to try for a building moratorium or a motion to change the square footage,” Korenstein said.

Such an ambitious agenda would put Korenstein on a dramatic collision course with Porter Ranch developer Nathan Shapell.

In fact, some believe Korenstein’s plan is unrealistic. According to City Hall observers and land-use experts, its implementation would face formidable political and legal obstacles.

Skeptics also point to Ruth Galanter’s experience.

In 1987, Galanter was elected to the City Council with an angry mandate to dismantle the Playa Vista project near Marina del Rey, a development often compared in magnitude to Porter Ranch. But today, the ex-urban planner is attacked by her former allies for moving to reshape Playa Vista through quiet negotiations rather than dismember it publicly.

Galanter herself observed recently that Shapell--like the powerful Playa Vista entrepreneurs she has faced--is “well-connected, smart and not about to roll over for a council person just to avoid an argument. . . . When you’re dealing with an influential developer, that’s an inhibiting factor.”

As for Bernson, he angrily dismisses Korenstein’s alternative for Porter Ranch as “political rhetoric.”

Indeed, the full promise of her Porter Ranch agenda may be hard to keep, Korenstein acknowledged. “It’s very difficult when a project is this far along,” she said. “I can’t offer any guarantees. But there is a guarantee that, if Hal Bernson is reelected, everything about the project will go through. If I’m there, I’ll guarantee I’ll try to make drastic changes.”

Three potential arenas for clashes between Korenstein and the Porter Ranch developer exist:

* One would be over a so-called “development agreement” in which the city would immunize the Specific Plan from changes for 20 years in exchange for additional community benefits, such as road improvements, paid for by the developer. Such an agreement is now being discussed by the city and the developer. Korenstein opposes an agreement, and certainly one negotiated without her input.

* If there’s no development agreement, the second theater of potential warfare would be the Specific Plan itself, which authorizes far too much development and needs to be sharply revised, Korenstein said.

* Finally, if the existing Specific Plan remained in place, there could be protracted conflict over each of the many land-use and building permits the developer would need from the city before Porter Ranch could be built. “If we have to, we’ll try to take Porter Ranch apart subdivision by subdivision,” Korenstein vowed recently.

Korenstein’s political acumen and muscle would be rigorously tested in all these fights.

Her central political problem would be to get the council to reverse its 14-0 vote of last July to adopt the Specific Plan.

Although the unwritten rule is that council members get their way on local land-use issues, it may be a different case when the stakes are high and powerful forces are involved. For example, Councilmen Zev Yaroslavsky and Marvin Braude have lost council floor fights on land-use issues important to them and their Westside constituents against oil companies and high-rise developers.

As a first-term council member, Korenstein would face an equally tough opponent in Shapell, whose veteran City Hall lobbying team includes former Planning Commission President Dan Garcia and ex-Councilman Robert Wilkinson. And strengthening their hand is big money. Over six years, Shapell and his Porter Ranch associates have donated at least $410,000 to city officials’ campaigns.

Paul Clarke, a spokesman for the developer, scoffs at Korenstein’s talk of undoing Porter Ranch, saying her options are limited.

“She can stand in the middle of Tampa Avenue and stamp her feet,” he said.

Powerful restraints based on property rights also could handicap Korenstein’s effort to dismantle the project.

Although Korenstein has made noises about council adoption of a development moratorium at Porter Ranch, such an initiative might be legally untenable even if it could be accomplished politically, city planning officials say.

Moratoriums are typically used--and legally justified--to stop impending development in areas where existing land-use plans are outmoded and are in the midst of being updated. With the Porter Ranch plan still fresh, this rationale would not work, city planning officials say.

If the Specific Plan remains intact, precedent also would limit any move to reject or gut--rather than modify--the individual permits and approvals Shapell would need from City Hall to start building. A specific plan “sets the climate” for later land-use decisions, especially if the plan is quite new, said Robert Sutton, a top Planning Department executive.

Actual building entitlements may permit less development than would a specific plan. But they cannot be too discrepant without risking legal challenge, Sutton said. “You try that, you get sued, and you lose,” he said.

It may be tough to overturn or gut a huge project with a recently adopted specific plan and a strong developer behind it. But some, like Galanter, say such building plans can be moderated by a tenacious lawmaker.

Playa Vista will be big, but it will be a better, more responsible project because of her influence on it, Galanter said. She has no doubt that her influence stems in part from the developer’s unwillingness to be constantly “at war with the local council member.”

Korenstein, meanwhile, said she hopes Shapell would not want “to be seen as the evil demon of the north Valley” and would seek a compromise. “If I were a developer, I would not want to come out of this with a bad image in the community.”

But if he does not see the light, “we’ll come out fighting,” Korenstein said.