Malibu Is Not Liable for Road, Judge Rules : Litigation: Rambla Pacifico is deemed county’s responsibility. Action means city won’t be a party to $6-million suit by 6 landowners who lost their homes in firestorm.

A Superior Court judge has ruled that Rambla Pacifico Road is the county’s responsibility, upholding for a second time this year Malibu’s use of an obscure law to exclude the calamitous road from its city limits.

The ruling means that the city will not be a party in the lawsuit filed by six Las Flores Canyon landowners who lost their homes in the Nov. 2 firestorm last year and are seeking more than $6 million, which they claim was the value of their property before the fire. They are also seeking money for emotional damages.

In a lawsuit filed in August, 1992, landowners blamed both the city and the county for their loss, arguing that the closure of Rambla Pacifico, which was destroyed by a 1984 landslide, blocked access to their houses during the fires and exacerbated ensuing floods and mudflows.

The city maintained that the street was not under its jurisdiction. State law says that newly incorporated towns can choose not to accept responsibility for certain streets. When Malibu was incorporated, it chose not to include Rambla Pacifico, says City Attorney Christi Hogin.

In his ruling last week, Superior Court Judge Alan B. Haber exempted the city of Malibu from liability, ruling that the county has always been and continues to be responsible for the dilapidated road. No trial date has been set.

“The county is going to have to face a legal trial on the same basis that they lost in an earlier (lawsuit),” said Richard D. Norton, the attorney representing the property owners. “We will be asking for fair market value for the properties before they were damaged and for damages in emotional distress.”

The decision followed the lines of an earlier ruling in a 1989 claim filed against the city and county by a group of homeowners who were seeking to force the two government entities to rebuild the road.

After the city was excused from that action, the county denied liability in the case, which is scheduled to go to trial in July. County attorneys argued that rebuilding the road would be too costly.

“We’re delighted with the (latest) ruling,” said Steven H. Kaufmann, an attorney who represents Malibu in both lawsuits.

“The city doesn’t believe it was a proper party in either of the cases and all the problems predated the formation of the city. Nonetheless, the city is going ahead with its application to the Federal Emergency Management Agency and to the state Office of Emergency Services” for funds to repair the road and buttress the hillside.

Earlier this year, the city and county jointly applied for about $11 million in state and federal funds to correct flooding problems in Las Flores Canyon and to stop the landslide from causing further damage in lower Las Flores Canyon.

The city called for federal acquisition of nine or 10 Las Flores Canyon properties, all of which are located in the lower canyon. A colossal dirt buttress would have been placed there to stop the slide.

But after complaints about the proposed acquisition from three Las Flores Canyon property owners who said they wanted to rebuild their burned properties, the City Council directed Public Works Director John P. Clement to design yet another plan that would spare the properties and still block the landslide.

The remaining six property owners don’t want to rebuild because they believe it is too dangerous to live in the canyon, Norton said.