Goodwill Fund Stirs Squabble : Dumps: Residents near Lopez Canyon Landfill denounce Councilman Bernardi’s proposal to spend $700,000 in Pacoima.

Lake View Terrace and Kagel Canyon homeowners and Los Angeles City Councilman Ernani Bernardi are at odds over how to spend $2 million in a goodwill fund set up to buy amenities for neighborhoods affected by the city’s Lopez Canyon Landfill.

Bernardi has incurred the wrath of the homeowners by considering a plan to spend $700,000 from the fund on a gang prevention program in Pacoima.

The homeowners say Pacoima should not benefit from the Lopez Canyon Community Amenities Trust Fund because it is not affected by the 392-acre landfill, where 4,000 tons of garbage are dumped daily.

A homeowner newsletter, mailed this week, accused Bernardi of trying “to rape” the fund, set up to build goodwill in nearby communities most affected by the landfill’s noise, dust and odors. Establishing the fund was a requirement imposed in January, 1991, when the City Council approved expansion of the landfill, allowing it to operate for another five years.

A total of $5 million in city funds is to be placed in the fund, although the fund now has a balance of about $2 million. Only $28,200 has been spent so far--going to a day-care program operated at the Lake View Terrace Recreation Center.

Homeowners will hold a community meeting to discuss Bernardi’s plan at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Lake View Terrace Recreation Center.

“This is our money,” said Lewis Snow, a leader of the Lake View Terrace Home Owners Assn. “Historically, our area of the city gets nothing, and now that we have something, we’re going to fight hard to keep it.”

Rob Zapple, an officer with the Kagel Canyon Civic Assn., said that it was “outrageous for Bernardi to consider having the money go to Pacoima. This is not his personal checkbook to be spent on his pet projects.”

But Bernardi believes Pacoima is entitled to benefit from the goodwill fund.

“Pacoima is where most of the garbage trucks drive through to get to the landfill,” he said.

The beneficiaries of the fund are to be “everyone around Lopez Canyon, and that includes Pacoima,” the councilman said.

The dispute may be academic, however. Although two sites in Pacoima--Pacoima Park and Hubert Humphrey Park--have been considered for the gang prevention program, three sites in Lake View Terrace also are under review, said David Mays, Bernardi’s chief deputy.

“They are mistaken if they think we’ve picked a site,” Mays said.

However, Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Panorama City) is pressing for a Pacoima site for the program, Bernardi noted. Berman has pledged to match with federal dollars any city money Bernardi puts into the program.

The anti-gang project that Bernardi wants to fund would be part of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Jeopardy program. The Jeopardy program seeks to make recreation and counseling opportunities available to young people who are at risk of becoming gang members.

In Sylmar, an existing Jeopardy program consists of after-school boxing and karate classes. But Bernardi wants his new program to include other activities, such as computer training, Mays said.

Mays also denied other allegations made in the newsletter mailed this week to residents by the Lake View Terrace Home Owners Assn. The newsletter reported that Bernardi intends to spend $1.6 million on the gang prevention program in Pacoima.

In fact, a Bernardi motion, introduced two weeks ago, requests that only $700,000 of the trust fund money be spent on the anti-gang program, Mays noted. The motion urges that another $700,000 be spent to refurbish and expand the Lake View Terrace Recreation Center.