Voters Were Misled on Bond Issue, Say Homeowner Groups : Prop. 2: The prospect of two police stations built with money from the $176-million measure was dangled before a crime-weary public, they contend. They now feel deceived by City Hall.

Nearly a year before voters approved a $176-million bond issue in 1989, city officials were warned that the measure would not cover all the police construction projects it was intended to fund, including new police stations for the San Fernando Valley and Mid-Wilshire areas.

However, as they urged the bond measure’s passage in the weeks before a special election, police boosters and city officials repeatedly cited the prospect of building two police stations, a tempting proposal for voters concerned about rising crime and police-response times.

Today, as police planners pursue a severely scaled-down construction program, a review of City Council records shows that the new police stations touted during the campaign had been cut from the list of projects by the time the city began selling bonds last year.

Angry homeowner leaders in the Valley said they felt used because an additional police station had been the most appealing item on the ballot measure.

“It looks like we were baited to approve it and then they switched the project,” said Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn. “Even more troublesome is if they knew ahead of time there wasn’t going to be enough money and it was a case of misleading the public in order to get their vote.”

An analyst in the office of the city administrative officer, which reviews budget proposals, said it was clear early on that construction of two police stations was extremely unlikely.

“In our mind, the CAO’s office’s, they were never considered a real part of the proposal,” said analyst James T. Sobject.

“I’m not sure what voters were led to believe,” Sobject added. “Our office knew and tried to convey to the council that $176 million wouldn’t be enough.”

The bond measure--Proposition 2 on the April 11, 1989, ballot--was approved by 69% of city voters after Mayor Tom Bradley and Police Chief Daryl F. Gates decried the condition of the department’s 18 police stations, some half a century old.

Gates wrote in an opinion piece for The Times on April 7, 1989, that the measure will include “funds for a new station in the San Fernando Valley and a second new facility to serve the growing Mid-Wilshire and West Los Angeles area.”

The bond measure itself said only that the funds raised would be used for “acquisition, expansion, construction and/or renovation of police facilities.”

A ballot argument in favor of the measure listed “possible construction” of two police stations among the funded projects. The endorsement was signed by Bradley, City Controller Rick Tuttle and council members Richard Alatorre, Joan Milke Flores, Joel Wachs, John Ferraro, Marvin Braude, Hal Bernson, Joy Picus and Michael Woo.

But the city’s ballot description listed the two new police stations first among proposed projects that included a new police academy, a driver-training course and modernization of other facilities.

The borrowing measure will add a projected maximum of $13 a year in property taxes for homes with an average assessed value of $139,000.

Today, the list of construction projects to be built with the money has been whittled down to 11 citywide from an initial wish list of 32 building jobs of varying size.

Police officials said this week they had honestly believed new police stations would be built, so much so that panels were set up to choose their architects and sites after the borrowing measure was approved.

The $176-million figure placed on the ballot was a ballpark estimate of funds needed, police and city officials said, adding that everyone involved realized costs would have to be refined and spending priorities set after the election.

Capt. Garrett Zimmon, who shepherded the issue as former head of planning and research, remembered a 1988 CAO’s report, which said the $176 million “would be insufficient to provide for two new area stations.” The report put the price tag for all projects on the Police Department’s wish list closer to $224 million.

Zimmon said the plan to build two stations was not dropped because police planners believed that new construction might relieve overcrowding and make expanding the old stations unnecessary.

“We thought we could develop a building plan that would achieve the overall needs,” Zimmon said. “But once we got into the actual processing of it, that’s when we found out there were some hidden costs, things no one mentioned to us before.

“I don’t think anybody was deceived,” Zimmon added.

The presidents of two prominent homeowners groups disagreed.

Close recalled bond boosters telling his group that a new police station in the Valley would cut police response times because officers would have shorter distances to drive.

Although several construction projects were outlined, bond promoters emphasized a new station for the Valley, Close said.

Don Schultz, president of the Van Nuys Homeowners Assn., said he also voted for the measure in the belief that it would provide an additional police station. He said he was “horrified” that plans for a new station in the Valley had been suspended, especially since crime has been rising.

Sgt. Dennis P. Zine, a Valley traffic officer who also serves as a spokesman for the Police Department, recalled being dispatched to community meetings and talking about prospects for a new station.

“No one wants to be used,” Zine said, “and I think if we were misled and someone misled us, we misled the public. And I’m appalled that someone would do that to us.”

Zimmon and Cmdr. Scott LaChasse, the construction program’s current supervisor, said that after the bond measure passed, they were caught off guard by expenses such as asbestos removal at old stations and hiring consultants for environmental-impact studies. No one in City Hall warned police planners about those costs, even though the CAO’s office and the Bureau of Engineers had been consulted, they said.

“We’re not architects,” Zimmon said. “Try being a cop and learning how to build a police building.”

A spokesman for Gates, Cmdr. Robert Gil, also blamed City Hall for failing to provide police with adequate guidance. He said Gates was angry when he learned the two stations could not be built.

“The figures, the costs of all that building, wasn’t done by sworn officers of the LAPD, who have no expertise in that area,” Gil said. “It was done by engineers, the CAO’s (office), by a variety of consultants.”

Sobject, the city analyst, said the Police Department came up with its own numbers. “They did not do a real thorough study,” he said.

Bradley spokeswoman Vallee Bunting said the mayor’s office would have no comment until records could be reviewed.

Councilman Bernson, a member of the council’s Public Safety Committee who represents a Valley district, said through a spokesman that he was disappointed a Valley station would not be built, but that a new station had been only one of many projects that might be funded by Proposition 2.

“The key element of the whole package was the police-training facility,” said Bernson’s spokesman, Ali Sar.

Glenn Barr, a deputy to Councilman Braude, said that regardless of who was to blame, the city’s credibility has been tarnished.

“I don’t know if it’s a question of whether the council didn’t pay sufficient attention, if the police misrepresented things, if the CAO didn’t adequately stress its concerns, or if the council decided to take what it could and try for more later,” Barr said.

“It’s clearly good public policy to cost the project out correctly rather than do a partial job and say, ‘Oh, folks, we didn’t ask you for enough.’ It’s a regrettable situation.”