EARTHQUAKE: THE LONG ROAD BACK : They’re Finally Paying Heed to San Fernando : Aid: Residents often feel ignored, but help is beginning to arrive in hard-hit town.

Surveying the wreckage, including damage to 22% of his city’s housing stock, San Fernando Mayor Dan Acuna recovered his sense of humor:

At least the city’s long-awaited Metrolink station is open now, he said--too bad it took an earthquake to do it.

Although proud of their independence, residents of this 2.4-square-mile city often complain that they are ignored by Los Angeles city and county, which surround the community. If the station--opening today to help ease the commuter crisis after a year of delays--hinted at San Fernando’s lack of clout, the earthquake hammered it home.

For example: It took a week of political string-pulling, including a visit from federal Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros, before San Fernando got its own disaster assistance center, according to Acuna and others involved in the effort. The center opened at 1245 San Fernando Road on Monday.

It also took until Monday for the city to borrow two building inspectors from Los Angeles County to help assess damage to about 835 structures, San Fernando city officials say. For most of that time, San Fernando, with a population of 23,500, got by with one licensed inspector.

On Saturday, the city hired five private building inspectors and, as a desperate stopgap, had sent two community preservation officers to “condemn” the most obviously damaged structures until licensed inspectors could see them, said Howard Miura, the city’s community development director.

The city now is considering emergency demolition of 30 structures, Miura said.

“We have just now got two inspectors from the county,” City Administrator Mary Strenn said. “But prior to that, our requests for help have not been heeded too well.”

Rep. Howard Berman (D-Panorama City) said he started pressuring federal officials the evening after the quake.

“I told federal officials, ‘Remember, this is not just the city of Los Angles,’ ” Berman said Tuesday. “I told them, ‘Please, tomorrow, bring them into this.’ ”

With few exceptions, response to the disaster in San Fernando was homespun, said Berman. City Hall staffers pitched in, and the Red Cross started serving food, Acuna said. About the only outside agency that responded quickly was the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, which showed up to help the city’s 34-officer Police Department, he said.

“Our own people, I can’t say enough,” Acuna said. “Of course, as you go up the bureaucracy, you run into problems.”

Berman said his efforts paid off last Wednesday when HUD Secretary Cisneros and James Witt, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, toured the city and pledged to open the disaster center.

A week of aftershocks contributed to about 60 water main breaks, and residents continue to be warned to boil their water, Strenn said.

“As of Friday, we really thought we were in recovery mode,” Strenn said. “And then the aftershocks started.”

There were so many breaks in water pipes along San Fernando Mission Boulevard and Kalisher Street that the city gave up patching the pipes and started replacing them instead, she said.

Only half the city’s industrial buildings have been inspected, and even fewer of its residential and commercial buildings have been checked, Strenn said.

The inspection problem has been complicated by a jittery population skeptical of official opinions about the safety of their homes, according to Strenn. About 450 people are still camped in San Fernando Recreation Park, beneath the massive tent erected by GTE even though the inspectors say many of their homes are safe.

“It’s partially human relations and partially inspections of the buildings,” Strenn said. “One of the inspectors said he was surprised at the terror of the residents. He’d had to take people inside and show them the problems were cosmetic”--damage that, however ugly, posed no threat to their lives.

Strenn said the city should have enough reserve funding to support the relief effort, and will seek reimbursement from federal and state sources when the dust settles. She said no one is sure exactly what it will cost San Fernando.

The city also is struggling to keep some of the staff of the San Fernando Superior Court based in temporary offices inside the city. The courthouse was deemed unsound and most of the court’s functions will be moved to Van Nuys during repairs, which could take a year, officials said this week.

“It honestly looks like someone set a bomb off,” said Superior Court Judge Judith Ashmann, who supervises the building’s 12 courtrooms. The San Fernando municipal courthouse survived and will continue operating.