Picus Suggests Planning Panels Divided by Area : Development: Councilwoman’s proposal calls for disbanding current commission and creating four boards, each responsible for a different part of the city.

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Joy Picus, a key figure in a far-reaching dispute over the proper role of political pressure in city planning, Thursday proposed disbanding the city’s Planning Commission to increase public input into development decisions.

Calling the current city planning process unresponsive to public concerns, Picus suggested replacing the five-member Planning Commission with four separate panels, each responsible for its own geographic area. The proposal would make commissioners more responsive and give them more time to consider controversial projects, Picus said.

“This creates a greater opportunity for the public to get into the system,” Picus said of her proposal, which would require an amendment to the City Charter. “My feeling is that we need more access, not less access.”

The proposal is directly contrary to Mayor Tom Bradley’s call for moves to shield city planners from interference by council members and local pressure groups and for greater concentration on citywide concerns.

City officials and planning experts quickly expressed worries that Picus’ plan would cater to the parochialism that some critics say already distorts the planning process, putting neighborhood anti-development protests over citywide needs for housing and commercial space. It could inhibit effective management of regional concerns such as traffic congestion and air quality, they said.

“We need to take a look at solving those issues from a bigger picture rather than from a smaller picture,” said Melanie Fallon, interim city planning director. “I think it’s important to have some citywide direction on growth. . . . There is a benefit to having a citywide planning board.”

Picus acknowledged that concern, but countered: “You have to prove to me that the existing Planning Commission has a concern for the city as a whole. I haven’t seen it yet.”

Picus’ proposal, unveiled at a meeting of the Woodland Hills Homeowners Organization, calls for the current Planning Commission to be replaced with four five-member boards appointed by the mayor. Each would have the same powers as the current commission, but its jurisdiction would be limited to its specific district.

Although Picus had not decided Thursday on specific district boundaries, she suggested different panels might preside over downtown, the harbor, the Westside and the San Fernando Valley.

Members would be required to live and meet in the area they would represent, an aspect of the proposal lauded by homeowners groups.

“It’s impossible for one body or one governmental entity to be knowledgeable of what’s happening in the Valley, downtown and San Pedro,” said Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn. “This city is too big geographically and too big populationwise. We need to make planning a local matter.”

Picus has been criticized recently over her intervention in the planning process for political purposes. She is the target of a $100-million lawsuit filed against the city by a developer who said she intentionally blocked approval of his commercial project, proposed for Warner Ridge in Woodland Hills, to appease angry neighbors she feared would vote against her in the next election.

Picus, in a pretrial deposition made public last month, conceded that her positions on land-use issues are based on their effect on her popularity with voters, which brought her widespread praise as well as criticism.

In recent months, various efforts have begun to reform the planning process and limit interference by individual council members. Mayor Bradley last summer called for a Planning Department free from outside influence.

Bradley’s spokeswoman, Val Bunting, said Thursday that the mayor would not support Picus’ proposal because it would create an unwieldy process that would aggravate neighborhood divisions within the city.

Planning Commissioner Theodore Stein Jr. agreed.

“I can’t imagine any part of the city saying, ‘We want a landfill’ or ‘We want a jail’ or ‘We want anything that can be a burden,’ ” Stein said. “The job of the Planning Commission is to look for the benefits to the entire city. And the only way to set citywide policy is to have a body that looks at all parts of the city.”

Picus said she will present her idea to the City Council before Thanksgiving and wants council members to put the concept to a public vote in 1992 or 1993. If implemented, the system would be unique, according to planning experts interviewed Thursday.

“Frankly, I’m astonished,” said Richard Peiser, director of USC’s Lusk Center for Real Estate Development. “It’s such a novel idea. On the plus side, it brings the planning authority closer to the people over whom they are ruling. On the minus side, I think one always worries about parochial interests of parts of the city winning out over the city at large.”