$10 Million Sought to Expand Parkland

Making his 16th and final plea, retiring Rep. Anthony C. Beilenson (D-Woodland Hills) asked a House subcommittee Wednesday for $10 million next year to further expand the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.

“In terms of serving the greatest number of people now and in the future, there is probably no better place to spend parkland acquisition funds than in the Santa Monicas,” said Beilenson, who wrote the legislation creating the park in 1978 and has been its most ardent supporter since.

In what has become an annual exercise, Beilenson appeared before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on the Interior to try to divert money to the Santa Monicas. This year, as he prepares to leave office, the budget situation is grimmer than ever before, with the Interior Department still operating without a budget for this fiscal year.

Beilenson, whose district includes Thousand Oaks, Malibu and portions of the San Fernando Valley, said he will head into retirement with his dream for the park about two-thirds fulfilled. The National Park Service, which now owns about 21,000 acres of land in the Santa Monica Mountains, is still hoping to acquire another 15,000 acres to complete its original plan.

About two dozen parcels of land, surrounded on all sides by federal property, have yet to be purchased, Beilenson said.

“We are doing a great disservice to those lien holders if we do not provide the funding the National Park Service needs to purchase those properties,” he said.

Beilenson said the $10 million is desperately needed to buy land along the Backbone Trail, in Zuma and Trancas canyons, adjacent to Rancho Sierra Vista, and in other areas.

Park supporters agree that expansion is essential to maintain a sense of wilderness.

“When you’re in the Santa Monicas, you can enjoy the illusion that you’ve escaped the city for the beauty of wilderness,” said Dave Brown of the Sierra Club. “But once the city intrudes, you shatter that illusion.”