L.A. Ballot Measures

I am appalled and disheartened by your failure to recognize the actual costs and true benefits of Proposition 1 for parklands and open spaces (editorial, “It’s Hard to Say No to Parks,” May 26). Yes, it is true, it will cost each homeowner around $13 a year. That is less than the price of admission for two to the films our city produces regularly--often using our parklands in the process.

Yes, for one missed film a year we can provide improvements in multipurpose centers for our elderly citizens--for their recreation, social and nutritional needs. We can protect and renew our precious outdoor resources that provide beauty and respite for our residents and attract our tourists. They are badly degraded and in need of our care after years of underfunding, another consequence of Proposition 13.

In Runyon Canyon Park we voters can choose to initiate a unique visitors center with an outdoor classroom and playground for children in the heavily populated Hollywood area. That is one of the designated projects in the proposition. These are not “pork barrels” for each councilmanic district. They benefit the entire city, its inhabitants and visitors.

I urge you to reconsider.

ELISABETH O. CLARK, President, Friends of Runyon Canyon