State Lawmakers Grill Conservancy’s Director Over Soka Issue : Parkland: Senators say they want to know if agency has acted properly in bid to condemn part of Calabasas campus.

Issuing stern warnings that the Legislature could strip it of funding, two state senators Tuesday questioned the head of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy over whether the agency is overstepping its authority.

In the Senate’s first oversight hearing of the parklands agency, Sens. Cathie Wright (R-Simi Valley) and Dan McCorquodale (D-Modesto) grilled Executive Director Joseph T. Edmiston about the agency’s operations and finances.

Of paramount concern, the two lawmakers said, is whether the conservancy has acted properly in trying to condemn a portion of Soka University’s Calabasas campus to acquire it as parkland.

“The fact is, it’s private property,” said Wright. “I have a real hard time having government come in, condemn and take private property.”

In a scolding tone, McCorquodale told Edmiston: “If you run willy-nilly on condemnation, we can always pull you back. It only takes a simple majority of the Legislature to eliminate you.”

An arm of the conservancy, the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority, filed condemnation proceedings in 1992 to seize 245 acres of pristine land in Calabasas that Edmiston described Tuesday as “the most beautiful spot in the Santa Monica Mountains.”

Attorneys for Soka and the conservancy are set to square off on the issue in state appeals court in Ventura on Dec. 16.

Also of concern during Tuesday’s Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Subcommittee hearing was whether the conservancy has been casting its net too far by joining with local governments in forming five so-called joint-power agencies.

Through these entities, the conservancy has purchased property or launched projects in areas that reach well beyond its Santa Monica Mountains jurisdiction--in the San Gabriel Valley, Antelope Valley, eastern Ventura County and South-Central Los Angeles. Condemnation proceedings against Soka were undertaken by such an agency, a move that was designed to limit the state’s liability.

“I urge you to be very cautious about your increased number of joint-power authorities that also increase the power of the conservancy,” warned McCorquodale.

Harold F. Warras, assistant secretary of the state Resources Agency and one of several witnesses to praise the conservancy’s work, said even he was nervous about the joint-power agreements.

“I don’t think we should be encouraging that,” Warras testified. “That seems to be going beyond where the conservancy should be going.”

Defending the agreements, Edmiston said that the separate entities enable the conservancy to move more quickly on land purchases and that the agency has been responsible in its use of them. In addition, he said, the conservancy attracts more federal funding through the agencies, calling them “a magnet for federal money.”

McCorquodale characterized the conservancy as “a hidden government that is hard for people to focus on.” He said it has had his support in the past but, in the future, the conservancy needs to be more accountable to the lawmakers who established it.

The conservancy was created by the Legislature in 1979 to purchase parkland and trails for preservation and public use in the Santa Monica Mountains. Over the years, it has acquired about 20,000 acres at an average cost of about $5,000 an acre, which Edmiston said Tuesday was “a record of accomplishment that can be laid directly at the feet of the Legislature.”

Noting that tough fiscal times call for a tighter review of state spending, McCorquodale warned, “We are constantly looking at reinventing government, and at some point you may get reinvented.”

Said Edmiston, “It’s good for us to remember that the power of the Legislature giveth, and the power of the Legislature taketh away.”

After the hearing, Wright said the subcommittee had managed to send Edmiston a message: “I think Mr. Edmiston has received enough understanding from this hearing that we are going to see more input . . .”