State Senate Bill May Hurt Soka Land Buy

The state Senate has approved legislation that critics say could hamper efforts by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to obtain meadowland in Calabasas from Soka University.

The measure, authored by Sen. Nicholas C. Petris (D-Oakland), cleared the Senate 25 to 0 last week and was sent to the Assembly.

At issue in the legislation is how to determine the value of land owned by such nonprofit groups as churches and schools when public agencies want to condemn the property for their own use.

The bill would allow some nonprofit groups to increase the value of their land to include the cost of rebuilding in the same area. Government appraisals now reflect only the value of the land and the depreciated value of existing buildings.

The bill would be a big blow to the efforts of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to purchase the Soka property, said Joseph T. Edmiston, the executive director of the state parks agency. He estimated that it would add $10 million to the price of the 248 acres that the conservancy wants to buy in conjunction with the National Park Service.

Although the exact purchase price would be subject to appraisals, conservancy officials have said they plan to offer up to $30 million to buy the Soka property, southeast of Las Virgenes Road and Mulholland Highway.

Administrators of Tokyo-based Soka University are seeking to develop their land as part of a 4,400-student college. But the conservancy wants to acquire the property for the headquarters of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.

If the bill is approved by the Assembly and signed into law by Gov. Pete Wilson, it will take effect Jan. 1. But in a letter delivered to Edmiston last week, Petris offered to delay the effective date of the measure for areas of the Santa Monica Mountains that the conservancy wants to purchase.

Sen. Herschel Rosenthal (D-Los Angeles), who suggested the revision, said he thought the delay should last for about a year to give the agencies “a little more time to work out an arrangement for Soka.”

Petris did not indicate how long a delay he would seek and said he was “not overly thrilled with the prospect” of aiding the conservancy. He said the agency should have condemned the Soka property in 1986, when the Japanese school instead bought the acreage at an inflated price.

The Petris bill is sponsored by the Lynwood Seventh-day Adventists Academy, which has been embroiled in a dispute with the Lynwood Unified School District over the value of church-owned property in Lynwood, according to the Senate Judiciary Committee analysis of the measure.