NORTH HOLLYWOOD : Redevelopment Cap Expansion Fought

In a move to put a lid on the city Community Redevelopment Agency’s plans to expand a budget cap, former City Councilman Ernani Bernardi is creating a citywide citizens group, beginning with a Valley meeting today of CRA critics.

“This is a citizens movement,” said Bernardi, who has long crusaded against the CRA. “We’re setting up a meeting and starting a citizens committee to preserve the $750-million cap on the central business district and put a lid on the CRA.”

The invitation-only meeting in North Hollywood will draw together a handful of CRA opponents from North Hollywood, Hollywood and Van Nuys, Bernardi said. The volunteer group, which as yet has no name, will initially set up a framework to enlist the public’s support.

“The public is not aware of what a massive tax rip-off the CRA is,” Bernardi said. “The CRA has made an almost religious practice of selling long-term bonds, not to eliminate the blight, but to keep themselves in office.”

Bernardi’s first priority will be to preserve the $750-million central district spending cap that he successfully sued the city for in 1977. Gayle Anderson, a CRA spokeswoman, confirmed that CRA officials are looking for ways to increase the cap on the central business district.

“There is an effort to raise the cap, yes,” Anderson said. “Since the central business district is reaching that cap, there is discussion among the CRA, the city and the county. The new spending cap is undetermined.”

A new cap could be requested as early as this winter, CRA officials said.

The CRA oversees 17 redevelopment projects and three revitalization projects throughout the city, one of which includes the central business district downtown. The agency’s budget, about $385 million for 1992-93, is funded primarily from property tax increments, developer fees, bond sales and interest and program income, CRA officials said.

CRA spokesman Marc Littman welcomed Bernardi’s return to community issues.

“We welcome citizen participation and certainly Councilman Bernardi has many years of experience,” Littman said. “And although we have differed with him in the past, we welcome his input.”