Negotiators Optimistic on Ahmanson Agreement : Development: The deadline for closing a deal passes, but officials say most glitches involving the project, which would impact the West Valley, have been resolved.

The deadline for closing the $1-billion Ahmanson Ranch deal passed Wednesday without a final agreement, but key negotiators expressed confidence they are within days of rescuing the complicated compact, which last week appeared near collapse.

The March 31 deadline was imposed by the National Park Service, which set aside $19.5 million to buy thousands of acres of parkland as part of the deal, and has lost up to $8,000 a day on money tied up in a non-interest-bearing escrow account.

However, despite missing the deadline, Donald Brackenbush, president of the Ahmanson Land Co., predicted Wednesday that “I think it’s going to go through . . . within a week or so.”

That optimism encouraged other parties involved in the long-awaited deal, which would result in construction of a 3,050-dwelling mini-city just across the Ventura County line west of the San Fernando Valley and the transfer of nearly 10,000 acres of mountain land to park agencies.

Joseph T. Edmiston, executive director of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, expressed confidence that an agreement is imminent. He said the National Park Service has now been offered a financial incentive to keep its $19.5 million in escrow to keep the deal alive.

“It’s looking positive,” Edmiston said. “People are universally upbeat about it. No party I’ve talked to thinks it’s unresolvable.”

Although the National Park Service’s regional superintendent, David Gackenbach, declined comment Wednesday, he has previously said he would extend the deadline if negotiators “came up with . . . some kind of incentive.”

Gackenbach has complained that the park service has lost far too much money by keeping $19.5 million in escrow. He said he planned to say today whether the park service will extend its deadline.

Developers and parks officials have been working for 1 1/2 years on the deal, which requires entertainer Bob Hope to sell more than 7,000 acres of open space to state and federal park agencies in exchange for $29.5 million and a share in profits from the Ahmanson Ranch project.

Edmiston said his conversations with Gackenbach and other principals in the deal Wednesday convinced him that a final agreement could be announced as early as today.

His comments come in sharp contrast to recent forecasts that the deal was in jeopardy.

Although the virtual collapse of the agreement last week drew expressions of dismay from officials of Ventura County, which will get most of the parkland and profit from the huge development’s taxes, it was greeted with delight by opponents in Los Angeles County.

Critics of the development, based in the San Fernando Valley, contend it will destroy nearby open space and pour traffic onto West Valley streets, without adding money to Los Angeles city or county coffers to deal with the effects of expanding the Valley’s urban zone to the west.

Mary Wiesbrock, director of Save Open Space, one of the groups battling the development, said Wednesday she was still convinced “the development will never happen. It’s an environmental disaster, an obscene plan to destroy 457 heritage oaks.”

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Joy Picus, who has led the city’s efforts to oppose construction of the Ahmanson development, said she would withhold comment until the project’s fate is clarified.

Rosemary Woodlock, attorney for the Woodland Hills and West Hills homeowners who are suing to block the development, said the groups hope that the entertainer’s lands become publicly owned, regardless of the outcome of the current negotiations.

She said the zoning change and General Plan changes approved by Ventura County to allow the Ahmanson project to go forward will not be revoked even if the complicated deal to acquire Hope’s lands falls apart.

If the deal finally closes and lawsuits are resolved, the Ahmanson project will transform 2,800 acres of Ahmanson Ranch into an upscale community with 8,600 residents, a 300-room hotel, two professional quality golf courses and a town center of dozens of shops and government buildings.

In return, the deal would turn over more than 7,000 acres owned by Hope, and Ahmanson would donate about 2,600 acres, all on ranches in the Simi Hills and the Santa Monica and Santa Susana mountains.

Although Ahmanson, Hope and Hope’s developer did not meet the Wednesday deadline, they have reached a provisional agreement that pays the National Park Service for keeping its funds in escrow, Edmiston said.

Past delays have surprised parks officials, who expected to close the deal by the end of January and open the new parks to the public by late spring.

Developers, parks officials and Hope all agreed to the deal’s rough outline in 1991, a year before the Ventura County Board of Supervisors approved the parkland acquisition and Ahmanson project as a single package in December.

But since then, Hope has balked at selling his mountain ranches. Other negotiators said he fears that he will not reap income from the Ahmanson development for years, until nine lawsuits seeking to halt the project move through the courts. Another concern for Hope, negotiators said, is that the massive housing and commercial project might not be built at all, and that he would end up with $29.5 million as total compensation for giving up his mountain ranches.

Another wrinkle holding up the deal is the Ventura Board of Supervisors’ insistence that the conservancy place a deed restriction on two of Hope’s properties, Runkle Ranch and Liberty Canyon, which would preclude future development and significantly lower the land’s value.

Conservancy officials have expressed concern about the legality of paying top dollar for land with a lower value.

But Edmiston said Ahmanson has agreed to offer the conservancy a payment to make up for the lower property value, and that the money will be passed along to the park service to compensate for its losses from the prolonged escrow.

Times staff writers John Schwada and Richard Lee Colvin contributed to this story.