SHERMAN OAKS : Agency Begins Work Near Park Entrance

You can’t fight City Hall. So the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy has quit trying.

The state agency began work this week to clear a mountain of dirt that is blocking the entrance to Dixie Canyon Park in the hills of Sherman Oaks.

After waiting more than 18 months for permission to do the work, conservancy officials said they have about given up on the city.

Conservancy officials fear that a strong rainstorm will send tons of mud onto nearby residences, so they say the work cannot wait any longer. On Wednesday, a contractor hired by the conservancy began to survey the job, which is expected to take about a month to complete.

“We applied for the permit and have been lost in this long, protracted process,” said John Diaz, chief of land acquisition for the conservancy.

Then, voicing a complaint made by many who deal with government bureaucracy, Diaz said, “We do everything they ask and then they change the condition or ask for a new condition.”

Diaz said the conservancy simply wants to move a huge pile of dirt that was put there illegally by the developer of 10 nearby residences. The developer, Ilya Kleinman, agreed to pay for the restoration work in 1988, but only after the city withheld permits to occupy the new homes, Diaz said.

Actor Warren Beatty had donated the 20 acres to the conservancy for the canyon park in 1986. A trail was built a year later.

But in 1988, workers grading on conservancy property for the Kleinman development made a mess, making the park virtually inaccessible, conservancy officials said.

Five years later, the conservancy decided to take matters into its own hands. In a Nov. 24 letter to the city Department of Public Works, Diaz wrote, “If we are unable to receive permission or if the permit process continues its indefinite delay, the Conservancy will enact its emergency powers authority and commence repairs and restoration to Dixie Canyon Park on December 1, 1993.”

The City Hall response?

“I know that we got the letter, but no determination has been made,” said George Groves, assistant Valley district engineer.