Picus Proposes Scrapping L.A. Planning Panel : Government: The councilwoman seeks to replace the commission with four regional bodies. The mayor calls the plan unworkable.

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Joy Picus on Tuesday urged that the existing citywide Planning Commission be abolished and replaced by four regional panels to give city residents a greater chance to flex their muscles in the land-use arena.

Several planning experts and Mayor Tom Bradley criticized the plan as unworkable. But others praised the plan, saying the plan at the very least would set the stage for a much-needed debate on how decisions are made on transportation, housing and development issues.

Residents now are frustrated when trying to shape planning issues because the city’s Planning Commission is often too busy or indifferent to their concerns, Picus said.

“This would open it up,” the San Fernando Valley lawmaker said. “That’s good for democracy, especially at times of alienation.”

The plan, requiring a City Charter amendment, would be subject to voter approval. Picus said she wants her measure placed on the spring 1993 ballot, timing that would make it a sure-fire debate topic during next year’s mayoralty race.

The current commission does not have intimate knowledge of local planning issues and often gives only “short shrift” to the views of homeowner groups, Picus said at a City Hall news conference.

Under her plan, the city would be divided into four areas--San Fernando Valley, Westside, Harbor and Central-East--with a five-member commission having jurisdiction over planning issues arising in each.

The commissioners, as they are now, would be appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the City Council. The commissioners also would have to live in the area of the city they represent.

Picus’ proposal is a remedy drastically at odds with recent prescriptions for curing the city’s troubled planning process. To many of its critics, the problem with the city’s planning system is the absence of a citywide perspective.

“The voice for the whole in Los Angeles is already too weak,” said Richard Weinstein, dean of the UCLA Graduate School of Architecture and Planning. “This proposal would institutionalize the Not-In-My-Back-Yard problem. We already have enough planning thrombosis in Los Angeles.”

In a widely discussed speech last year, Mayor Bradley also chided city planners for allowing their professional judgment to be shaped by political considerations and said they were often too responsive to vocal homeowner groups who called for development curbs.

Picus’ plan would “bring politics into the planning process,” Bradley spokesman Bill Chandler said. “Councilwoman Picus is known for her shortsighted proposals that don’t go anywhere.

“The mayor expects the commission to respond to the needs of every section of the city and not cater to the needs of any one district at the expense of others,” Chandler said. “The existing Planning Commission meets that objective.”

Paul Zucker, a San Diego planning consultant who last year completed a highly critical management audit of the city’s planning system, would not endorse or reject Picus’ proposal.

But Zucker said there is “certainly a need to bring decision-making and the bureaucracy closer to the people.” In San Diego, he said, a welter of local planning boards--whose members are elected--advise a citywide Planning Commission.

Before asking voters to support her proposal, Picus must persuade her council colleagues to place it on the ballot. On Tuesday, the council referred it to a planning committee.

Giving her motion a “courtesy” second was Councilman Joel Wachs. “I’m not sure I support it exactly as proposed,” Wachs said. “I think it should be used as a vehicle for discussing the role of communities in the planning process.”

Councilman Hal Bernson, chairman of the council’s planning panel, said: “It’s a good idea to have more public input, but there are other ways to do it, like setting up advisory panels that would do this. The big drawback is that you would lose the citywide perspective.”

Picus replied that her plan could include a provision that the chairmen of the four regional commissions form a special panel to deal with citywide issues.

Picus also blasted Bradley, saying it was hypocritical for him to decry political interference in the planning process.

Picus cited a recent report in The Times about Bradley’s intervention to expedite the city Planning Department’s review of a golf club project in Big Tujunga Wash, which was proposed by a Japanese developer who had contributed $30,000 to Bradley’s political coffers.

“Here’s the mayor saying get our dirty little paws out of the planning process when he’s got his big dirty paws in the process,” Picus said.

Last week, the head of the city’s ethics committee declined to investigate whether Bradley had acted improperly concerning the golf club project.

BACKGROUND

Councilwoman Joy Picus has proposed creating four planning commissions to oversee separate sections of Los Angeles. A single five-member commission now reviews planning proposals throughout the city. The members are appointed by the mayor, confirmed by the City Council and serve five-year terms. Two commissioners, Ted Stein and Suzette Neiman, live in the San Fernando Valley, and the commission regularly meets in the Valley.