Parks Agency to Foreclose on Developer : Paramount Ranch: Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy purchases the delinquent loans on a 314-acre tract.

A complex transaction between a parks agency and a bank has all but assured the preservation of Paramount Ranch in Agoura, the former Renaissance Faire site long threatened with development, officials said Thursday.

Under the deal concluded this week, the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy purchased delinquent loans on the 314-acre tract and will foreclose on a development firm that is millions of dollars in arrears. In effect, the conservancy will be paying Brea-based Union Federal Savings Bank $17.6 million to acquire the oak-studded property--$1.7 million less than the conservancy offered developers for the land two years ago.

“We’re very pleased,” said Joseph T. Edmiston, executive director of the conservancy, who joined county Supervisor Ed Edelman and other parks officials at a news briefing at the ranch site.

“It means we can now play Simon Legree to the developer,” Edmiston joked. “I’m going to have to get a black silk hat and grow my mustache into a little twirl.”

The conservancy already is seeking bids from firms that prepare notices and other legal details of foreclosure proceedings.

“Under the smoothest scenario, . . . it would take on the order of five months” for the conservancy to gain title to the property, said Ann Rushton, conservancy staff counsel.

The conservancy, a state parks agency, eventually would sell the tract to the National Park Service, which would administer the land as part of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.

But it is uncertain if the current landowner, Paramount Ranch Estates Inc., will go away quietly.

“We own the property, and . . . all they’ve got is a note,” said Benjamin M. Reznik, attorney for the firm. Reznik has said he believes that the conservancy is not legally entitled to own a promissory note. He said the firm might try to block the foreclosure if it is unable to reach a broader agreement with the bank covering millions of dollars in additional delinquent loans.

The conservancy and the bank reached an agreement in principal on Paramount Ranch in March but only consummated the deal this week.

Parks agencies have long coveted the tract, part of a historic movie ranch that was the setting for many Western films. The National Park Service already owns 436 acres of Paramount Ranch adjacent to the privately owned portion. The private tract features magnificent oaks and fine views of nearby peaks. Officials wanted to preserve it for its own sake and to protect the adjacent park service lands.

Those hopes seemed doomed in 1989, when county supervisors--with only Edelman dissenting-- approved construction of 150 luxury homes and developers rejected a conservancy purchase offer of $19.3 million.

But a lawsuit challenging the approval delayed construction. And then Ezra Raiten of Northridge, president of Paramount Ranch Estates, died near San Luis Obispo last September in the crash of his private plane.

Following Raiten’s death, it was revealed that Paramount Ranch Estates owed the bank $23 million in principal and interest for loans on the property. Conservancy officials said bank representatives told them that the firm failed to make a single payment.

Union Federal has been weakened by a spate of delinquent real estate loans and is under pressure from savings and loan regulators to take action to cut its losses. The deal with the conservancy requires the bank to write off several million dollars. The conservancy has paid the bank a down payment of $500,000 and is to pay the remaining $17.1 million by the fall of 1992.

“They own the note now and we’re happy for them,” said Mike Hooper, Union Federal vice president and director of marketing.

Reznik said the bank actually holds more than $50 million in loans on four properties owned by Raiten companies. Besides the Paramount Ranch tract, Union Federal loaned money on a second Agoura property, a residential development in West Hills and another in Bullhead City, Ariz., Reznik said.

He said Raiten’s father, Meir Raiten, and his Raiten Development Corp. are working with the bank toward a global settlement on the delinquent loans. If a settlement is reached, Reznik said, the Raiten firm will probably not fight the foreclosure.

But he said there probably will be a fight if there is no broader settlement with the bank.