Supervisors OK Parks Bond Issue for Ballot

Despite criticism that tax-weary voters will reject it, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday asked voters to approve a $319-million bond measure in November designed to improve parks, buy open space and provide new recreational facilities.

The average homeowner would pay $6 to $7 annually for 20 years if the measure is approved by voters in the November general election. Supervisors voted 4 to 1 to put the measure on the ballot, agreeing with arguments that the chance to create better parks and obtain more open space is vital to provide county residents with a better quality of life.

“Its not just for us, but for future generations,” said Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, who introduced the measure. “It isn’t about parks and open space, it’s about doing something constructive.”

The bond proposal, drafted by the environmental group Trust for Public Land, would pay for such projects as renovating the Hollywood Bowl and Los Angeles Zoo, acquiring property for a natural woodlands in Santa Clarita, making improvements in inner-city parks, building a greenbelt along the Los Angeles River, and acquiring mountain and canyon lands in the San Fernando Valley and other areas.

Supervisor Gloria Molina was the only board member to vote against the bond proposal.

“I am very concerned at the kind of message we are sending to the taxpayers of Los Angeles County,” said Molina, citing a school bond issue on the November ballot. “Particularly with all these other tax measures facing people, I don’t think the voters are going to support it.

“We don’t have the money to incarcerate felons, but we have the money to maintain trails,” Molina said, referring to the county’s inability to open up the Twin Towers jail.

The proposal is patterned after 1992’s Proposition A, a $540-million parks bond that won the approval of more than 64% of county voters.

Molina said the ballot is crowded, citing a proposed Los Angeles Unified School District bond issue to be decided at the same time that would boost taxes $75 annually for every $100,000 assessed valuation. Anti-tax sentiment was also evident, Molina said, in the negative reaction to the school district and the Los Angeles Community College District--both of which recently imposed a tax without voters’ approval.

Molina said it was more important for the county to concentrate on providing constituents with health care than new parks.

“This is frankly a tax assessment for a nonessential service,” she said. “We need to put real essential services on track.”

Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke said that parks are particularly important in highly populated urban areas such as the district she represents.

“The inner cities need parks and open space,” she said. “And those parks are used. For $6 all year, the whole family will have something they don’t have in their backyard. Disneyland costs $35.”

Supervisor Mike Antonovich, who opposed the measure last week, changed his mind Tuesday after Yaroslavsky agreed to shift an additional $5 million to areas of the 5th District in San Fernando Valley and Westside.

“This will enhance our unincorporated areas in the north part of the county,” he said.