Bernson Proposes Project Concessions for Developer : Porter Ranch: The action would aid a subdivision planned by a political supporter of the councilman.

Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson proposed Tuesday to overrule a zoning official and grant project concessions to his long-time friend and political supporter, developer Ray Mulokas, who wants to build a 21-house subdivision in Porter Ranch.

Bernson, in recommending the zoning action at a meeting of the council’s Planning and Land-Use Management Committee, publicly characterized his own decision in the Mulokas case as unusual.

“I would not normally go along with this,” Bernson said at a hearing on Mulokas’ appeal of conditions imposed on the proposed 21-house tract by the city Planning Department’s Deputy Advisory Agency. “But I think it would kill” the project if the conditions were not loosened, the lawmaker said.

The modified conditions proposed by Bernson for the 14-acre subdivision, located just south of the Simi Valley Freeway and west of Corbin Avenue, is still subject to council approval.

Bernson was the only member of the three-person committee present to consider Mulokas’ project. His decision will be presented to the full council as a personal recommendation, not the endorsement of the full committee.

After the hearing, Mulokas said the concessions were reasonable and denied that he had received favored treatment from Bernson. “This was not favoritism,” said the developer, who was among the first persons that Bernson thanked for his support after he won reelection last June in a hotly contested race.

No one spoke against the project. The concessions Mulokas obtained were twofold.

Bernson recommended that Mulokas not be required to meet Fire Department rules and pave an emergency access road to his project. Projects built on lengthy dead-end streets--as Mulokas’ would be--must have emergency roads to give firefighters greater access to them. Mulokas said the cost of the paved road for his project was about $900,000.

In approving the unpaved road, Bernson said the proposed Mulokas subdivision is not in a hilly area vulnerable to brush fires.

The councilman also agreed “to take the lead” in urging adjoining property owners to approve an assessment district that would spare Mulokas from paying the full $500,000 cost of building a bridge at Corbin Avenue to cross several large city water pipelines.

The cost of the bridge should be shared by the huge Porter Ranch Development Co. project and the Shepherd of the Hills Church to the north, which will also use Corbin Avenue as a major access road, Bernson said.