Developers' Funds Back Monorail Committee : Transportation: A citizens group lobbying for the elevated Ventura Freeway route is headed by a builder with ties to Supervisor Mike Antonovich.

By HUGO MARTIN

Aug. 17, 1992 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

A self-described citizens committee backing a Ventura Freeway monorail project is well-financed by developers and other businesses and is headed by a developer with strong ties to county supervisor and project proponent Mike Antonovich, according to campaign statements and interviews.

The group, known as Citizens Committee for Monorail, last year raised more than $70,000 to promote building the line, which has been a pet project of Antonovich, a member of the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission. Many of the contributions came from companies that have also been top Antonovich campaign contributors, including the Newhall Land & Farming Co. of Valencia, Dale Poe Development of Agoura Hills, and Baldwin Builders Inc. of Irvine.

Those firms and others that contributed to the group have either built developments or are seeking approval to do so within Antonovich’s district, which includes the Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys.

Much of the money raised by the group since its 1990 formation has been spent on mailers, literature, billboards and radio advertising to win community support for monorail.

As proposed, the $2.6-billion, 16.2-mile monorail line would be built on 20-foot-tall columns in the freeway median. It would connect Universal City to Warner Center with about 14 stops in between.

Also being considered by county transportation officials, however, is a $3-billion, 14-mile extension of the Metro Rail Red Line that would follow the Southern Pacific’s little-used right of way from North Hollywood to Warner Center. That route is called the Burbank-Chandler line, because it would run parallel to Burbank and Chandler boulevards, and would be built as a subway in most residential areas and above ground in commercial areas.

William J. Korek, a former Antonovich appointee to the Transportation Commission and head of Van Nuys-based Korek Land Co., is co-chairman of the pro-monorail committee and has lent the group $40,000 of his own money. He says the group has a mailing list of more than 200 people.

Dirk Gosda, a developer at Korek Land Co. is treasurer of the committee.

Korek and representatives of other businesses that have contributed to the group said they gave because they believe the San Fernando Valley is in dire need of a rail transportation line that can be built quickly and cheaply.

“We’ve always been very supportive of exploring different transportation methods,” said Marlee Lauffer, a spokeswoman for Newhall Land, which has donated $2,500 to the monorail group since its formation in 1990. “We think monorail appears to be a positive and viable solution.”

But opponents, including a coalition of homeowner groups along the proposed route between Universal City and Woodland Hills, say a monorail would cause a visual blight that would lower property values and would cause traffic to knot up at stations. They also question the motives of developers and other big businesses who have contributed to the pro-monorail committee.

Monorail opponents have suggested that some donations to the committee were intended to make points with Antonovich so that he will be inclined to treat their projects favorably.

“I think the real reasons are hard to find,” said Gerald A. Silver, president of Homeowners of Encino and the anti-monorail group Coalition of Freeway Residents, which represents six homeowner groups. “But I know this is not about transit--it’s about hidden agendas.”

He also criticized the monorail committee for describing themselves as a citizens group.

Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn., also questioned the motives of the business leaders active with the committee. In addition, he said he was skeptical of Antonovich’s reasons for backing the monorail because his district no longer includes the proposed freeway route.

Several large contributors to the pro-monorail committee rejected such charges.

“We support the monorail project because it makes sense to us, not because someone endorses it,” said Jeff Stevenson, vice president of Dale Poe Development Corp., which has contributed $2,150 to the monorail committee.

But Michael Lewis, president of Lewis, Jenkins & Associates Inc., a government lobbying group based in Anaheim, said his company donated $150 to the monorail committee at the request of Antonovich.

“We gave because Mike had a fund-raiser,” Lewis said. “He is a big supporter” of monorail “and he asked his friends to support his efforts.”

A spokesman for Antonovich said the supervisor supports monorail because it could be built more quickly and for about $400 million less than the Burbank-Chandler route.

Antonovich spokesman Dawson Oppenheimer said that, although Antonovich has cooperated with the citizen committee, he is not orchestrating its work. He said he could not speak for the donors as to why they gave to the committee but rejected the assertion that the gifts were aimed at currying favor with Antonovich.

Although actual construction time for the monorail would be two years, acquiring the freeway right of way would double the project’s completion time, county officials say. The Burbank-Chandler line would take four years to build but the right of way for that route has already been purchased.

Korek said he probably would not use the monorail regularly if it were built but said he supports it because it is needed to help ease traffic congestion in the Valley. He said he became interested in the monorail proposal long before Antonovich appointed him to the Transportation Commission in 1989. He left the commission less than a year later.

The pro-monorail committee is made up of “concerned taxpayers,” Korek said. “Some are friends and people we know.”

The group’s latest campaign was launched last month when it spent about $9,000 to send mailers to about 25,000 residents along the proposed monorail route. The mailer was signed by Antonovich and urged supporters of the project to endorse and return a form letter backing monorail. Korek said Antonovich plans to use the letters to show other members of the Transportation Commission the depth of support for monorail.

In a letter mailed to Antonovich Friday, Korek said that almost 2,600 residents have responded favorably to the mailer while only 98 have responded by saying they oppose the monorail plan.

“Supervisor, the community is behind you and your dedicated efforts aimed at bringing clean, quiet, common sense transit solutions to the San Fernando Valley,” he said in the letter.

Silver said the anti-monorail coalition plans to respond to the mailer campaign by collecting a total of $1,000 from the six homeowner groups to pay for a flyer to go out next week to more than 10,000 residents along the freeway route.

In addition to urging residents to oppose the monorail, Silver said, the flyers will tell residents that the pro-monorail campaign is being “funded by developers, bankers and other vested interests.”

But Korek and other monorail supporters said their project has community support, as evidenced by a 1990 advisory referendum in which 48% of Valley residents voted for the monorail option; 21% favored a light-rail line in a shallow trench along the Burbank-Chandler route.

An environmental study has been approved for the Burbank-Chandler line and a committee of the Transportation Commission last week approved an environmental study on the monorail alternative. On Aug. 26, the entire commission is scheduled to vote on whether to approve the monorail environmental study. That vote will set the stage for a meeting sometime before the end of the year in which the commission will decide which of the two rail lines should be built.

Contributors in Common

Contributors common to Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich (1991-92) and the Citizens Committee for Monorail (1990-92):

* Baldwin Builders Inc., Irvine, residential developer

To Antonovich: $5,350

To monorail: $1,750

* The Carney Group, Acton, consulting firm

To Antonovich: $6,650

To monorail: $1,500

* Castaic Brick, Castaic, brick manufacturer

To Antonovich: $6,350

To monorail: $250

* Dale Poe Development Corp., Agoura Hills, residential and commercial developers