Several Shades of Green

Few things gnaw like buying something and then finding it on sale a few days later. That is, some would say, unless you are the Los Angeles City Council with a wad of public money burning a hole in your pocket. Some environmentalists question whether the city has overpaid for raw land in the Santa Monica Mountains and they warn against spending so much that other parts of Los Angeles are robbed of new parks.

It’s not the buying of open mountain land that irks critics, but the prices. In particular, they are angry over the proposed purchase of 239 acres in Mandeville Canyon from Galpin Ford owner Herbert Boeckmann for $5 million--or about $21,000 an acre. Curiously, though, some of the same critics decrying the Boeckmann deal in 1997 urged the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to buy 36 acres along Mulholland Drive near Tarzana for $2.5 million--or about $70,000 an acre.

Preservation of open space in Los Angeles often is as much about emotion as it is about science and the dry details of an appraiser’s report. Few would argue that wide stretches of the Santa Monicas should not be preserved for recreation and conservation. The wise stewardship of such an ecological treasure is a gift to future generations. But achieving that noble green goal is fraught with politics and constrained by another, far more intoxicating kind of green--money.

Money seems to flow uphill in Los Angeles. Because the Santa Monicas enjoy such a high profile--both geologically and politically--they are the focus of most parks acquisition programs, creating the impression that city and state agencies are more interested in protecting land near rich homeowners than in buying parks in poorer parts of the city. It’s a valid complaint: Parks development in poor neighborhoods is woeful. But the Santa Monicas are a regional resource. Protecting them from excessive development provides a unique natural retreat for millions of people in neighborhoods from San Pedro to Chatsworth. Pitting neighborhoods against each other for parks money is counterproductive.

Has the city paid more for mountain land than its appraised value? Absolutely. In 1991, the city bought 63 acres in Fryman Canyon near Studio City for $10.4 million. Granted, that was at the height of the real estate boom, but even then the land had an appraised value of just $8.7 million. And last year, the city bought 79 acres in Deervale Canyon near Sherman Oaks for $4.5 million--about $900,000 more than the appraised value of $3.6 million.

In these sorts of transactions, though, the city and other public agencies must act like any other buyer. True, the city has the power of eminent domain to compel property owners to sell, but that’s no way to cobble together a mountain park system--as the conservancy’s ill-fated fight with Soka University demonstrates all too well. Instead, parks agencies must look for sellers willing to transfer property at reasonable prices. Property owners have the right to hold onto their land and to bargain for the best possible price.

Whether that price is right is a matter of public policy. By some measures, Boeckmann’s property is a great deal. His appraisal values the land at $13.9 million, but he is willing to sell for $5 million and take a $8.5 million tax write-off. Critics say that’s because the land has so many geologic problems that would be expensive to remedy. Developers, they say, should not have their bad mistakes erased by overly generous public agencies.

We agree. But there is a price to not buying land when it becomes available. Once foundations are poured and subdivision streets are carved, open land is lost forever. It becomes just another block in the urban mass, and the things that made it special--the rustle of wind through wild grass, the prints of animals just passing through, the gentle gurgle of a spring--are buried and forgotten.