Down From the Mountains

Voter support for Measure A, the county park bond measure approved last month, is translating quickly into practical action. In the coming months, workers should begin turning a trash-strewn storage yard into an urban retreat in South-Central Los Angles. Measure A will provide a large share of the funds for this $3.5-million project.

The agent of the transformation, the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, is taking on a welcome new challenge--its first inner-city park--and signaling an expanded regional presence as well.

The conservancy envisions the eight acres at Compton and Slauson avenues as a “nature park,” not another cookie-cutter playground. When completed, the facility will include trails, meadows, oaks and sycamores, shrubs and a community garden. There is even talk of a man-made stream.

The concept grew from long-running discussions between the conservancy and Los Angeles City Councilwoman Rita Walters, in whose district the property sits.

Walters posed a question: Why should residents of her district support the conservancy’s ongoing efforts to acquire wilderness in the Santa Monica Mountains when they had little expectation of being able to visit those remote resources? The discussions evolved into an effort to build a park that local residents could reach easily.

Measure A and the Department of Water and Power will enable to conservancy to move quickly. The DWP, which has owned the lot since 1909--it is now home to thousands of rusting pipes--is leasing the land to the conservancy for $1 a year. The city Recreation and Parks Department will manage the facility.

The conservancy’s involvement here builds on other projects distant from the mountains. In 1982 the state Legislature directed the conservancy to forge recreational links between its mountain holdings and urban resources. Toward that end, the conservancy is helping to clean up, create walking paths and “green” the banks of the Los Angeles River at Elysian Valley near downtown. It’s a small step but one that could, someday, encourage residents to regard the river as more than just a graffiti-covered storm drain.

Measure A extended the conservancy’s reach to park development along the entire river and its tributaries. And it gives the agency, for years hard-pressed financially and under siege from mountain property owners, a presence across the county as far east as the Whittier-Puente Hills. The imaginative plans for South-Central’s new park are a welcome next step for the conservancy and this region.