Project Need Not Buy Land, Schillo Suggests

Ahmanson Ranch developers said Tuesday they support a proposal that would allow them to scrap the requirement to buy 4,700 acres of range land and put the money instead toward quelling future growth in the Conejo Valley.

But the Ahmanson Land Co. has no interest in scaling back the veritable mini-city planned east of Thousand Oaks near the Los Angeles County line.

Ventura County Supervisor Frank Schillo has proposed that the development firm end negotiations with entertainer Bob Hope to purchase two rugged parcels, property that would then be preserved as open space.

Instead, Schillo said the firm should take the $25 million he estimates it will cost to buy the land and either reduce the size of the 3,050-home development or buy development rights from owners of other land ripe for housing construction in Thousand Oaks and Oak Park.

Mary Trigg, spokeswoman for Home Savings of America, Ahmanson’s parent company, said the developer has no interest in building a smaller project.

But the company would be interested in dropping the range land purchase and paying into a fund that Ventura County could spend to offset future development.

“It would enable us to go ahead with the project at the size it was contemplated,” Trigg said. “That is what the county board approved.”

Trigg said the company had been in discussions with Schillo before his plan was unveiled.

But the proposal released Monday caught Ahmanson’s critics off guard. They say the plan gives the developer an easy way out of a tough promise that was key to gaining the county’s approval for the project.

“The community benefit to building a mini-city between the Conejo and San Fernando valleys is that the public gets the benefit of over 10,000 acres of open space,” said Thousand Oaks City Councilwoman Linda Parks, stressing she was speaking as a private citizen. “To me it is a complete concession.”

Parks came to the County Government Center on Tuesday morning and spoke with Schillo for about five minutes.

But Schillo, who did not sit on the Board of Supervisors when the project was approved in 1992, said his idea comes only as a way to reduce the huge traffic impact the Ahmanson Ranch development will have on surrounding roadways and highways.

Planners estimate that the development will generate about 37,000 daily vehicle trips from its 12,000 residents--most of that dumping onto Los Angeles County streets.

About the size of Fillmore, the development was originally approved by the supervisors on the condition that Ahmanson Land Co. acquire 10,000 acres of range land and turn it over to park agencies as permanent open space.

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Ahmanson has acquired more than 5,000 acres of that land. But negotiations continue over the Runkle and Coral canyons properties, which the company is working to obtain from Hope.

Schillo argues that since all 15 lawsuits filed against the project have failed, there is nothing stopping the development from proceeding.

Moreover, he said, the Runkle and Coral canyons lands are too steep and rugged to accommodate development, and the lands will likely stay open and wild without the land purchase.

“The only purpose I can see to buying that land is that they’re required to do it,” Schillo said.

Ultimately, the proposal and any change to the Ahmanson development agreement would require the approval of at least two other members of the Board of Supervisors, who have not yet reviewed the proposal. Schillo said he will place the matter before his colleagues in January.

“If nobody is going to salute this, it’s going to go away. I’m not going to go uphill on this.”

Times correspondent Coll Metcalfe contributed to this story.