Earthquake Recovery Proposal Withdrawn

Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson yanked a controversial redevelopment plan out of the Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday and began seeking other ways to finance earthquake recovery in his west San Fernando Valley district.

Bernson said the plan would give too much power to the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency.

“We find it impossible to work with the CRA,” Bernson told the council, which unanimously accepted his proposal to kill the plan.

Property owners who opposed the measure from the outset praised Bernson’s move Tuesday.

“The main problem was the area was too vast, no one knew for sure where the damage was and what the extent was and, on top of that, no one trusted the CRA,” said Harold Coleman, who co-chaired the North Valley Property Owners’ Coalition formed to oppose the plan.

The City Council brought up similar issues over the Bernson plan, except for the distrust of the redevelopment agency. The council has already authorized the CRA to launch five other redevelopment plans in the Valley and Hollywood.

Opponents questioned the need to divert property taxes from necessary services to finance a massive project over 45 years, as the CRA wished. Other funding sources have not been pursued adequately, they said.

Local homeowners also worried about the administrative costs accrued by the CRA, the bond debt the agency would create and potential stigmas to property in a redevelopment zone.

“Put yourself in the position of a buyer,” said Rick Weiner, a member of Coleman’s group. “You’re looking at a home and it says it’s in a recovery area. It makes it look bad.”

The Bernson plan would have covered 21,000 acres in Northridge, Chatsworth, Granada Hills, Porter Ranch and North Hills, but attempted to severely limit the powers of the redevelopment agency. When the agency bridled at the restrictions, the citizens advisory committee that authored the plan advised Bernson to pull it out Monday.

Bernson said he will add members to the advisory committee and begin seeking other funding sources in federal, state, local and private sectors.