State Helps Buy Land for Park in Baldwin Hills

Literally halting the bulldozers, the state has struck a deal to buy a 68-acre parcel in the Baldwin Hills that preservationists say is critical in piecing together one of the biggest parks in the Los Angeles area.

The $41.1 million paid for the so-called Vista Pacifica property makes it the most expensive urban park acquisition in California history, according to the governor’s office.

On Thursday, state, county and local leaders gathered on a breezy bluff overlooking Jefferson Boulevard to announce the purchase--something they hailed as a sign of a shifting focus in environmental policymaking.

“We used to buy parks way out in the boondocks,” said Stanley Young, a spokesman for the Resources Agency of California. “This is a major change in philosophy and strategy.”

The Baldwin Hills site offers an opportunity to create significant open space in the county’s urban core, preservationists say. Like much of Los Angeles, the surrounding communities have less than one acre of open space per 1,000 residents--far less than state and national standards.

The proposed park will sit at a cultural crossroads between South Los Angeles and the Westside, Inglewood and Culver City. And because many of the ravines and ridges were historically used as oil fields instead of subdivisions, there are large swaths of unpaved land left.

Preservationists hope to patch together at least 1,200 acres of parkland there, including the existing 350-acre Kenneth Hahn State Recreation Area. The acquisition announced Thursday was the first step in that effort. It has not been determined what type of park will be designed for the site.

As the area’s highest point, the 68-acre parcel offers dramatic views that sweep almost full circle from Santa Monica Bay to the San Gabriel Mountains. It is a landmark of sorts to motorists: the big brown hillside seen from the Santa Monica and San Diego freeways.

“In terms of the grander vision, this is the nose of the entire face of the park,” said Mark Winogrond, chief administrator of Culver City, in which part of the parcel is located.

For months, preservationists and politicians have been working behind the scenes to buy the land. With the help of state Sen. Kevin Murray (D-Culver City) and Assemblyman Herb Wesson (D-Culver City), they managed to get approval for state funds from Gov. Gray Davis earlier this month. The state paid $36.5 million, with the rest coming from the county.

Young said the purchase underscores Davis’ commitment to creating urban parks. “People who live in Brentwood and Pacific Palisades can afford views like this,” he said. “The governor wants everyone to afford it.”

The price was hefty--more than $600,000 an acre--because the land was already zoned and partially graded. In comparison, the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy usually spends about $6,000 to $10,000 an acre for land in the Santa Monica Mountains.

Scrapers and bulldozers have leveled the top of the site and graded 20% of it--in preparation for what would have been 264 high-priced homes.

Joe Edmiston, executive director of the conservancy, said he has never purchased acreage so late in the game. “Never when the bulldozers were on-site and started grading,” he said. “That’s brinkmanship.”

Because the conservancy is adept at acquiring land quickly in Los Angeles, it acted as a go-between, negotiating and buying the land on the state’s behalf before signing it over to the park service Thursday. There was a lot of last-minute wrangling over whether the developer, John Lang Homes, would need to make alterations on the site to ensure erosion wouldn’t damage homes down the hill. Edmiston said those details were worked out Thursday morning, just in time for the news conference.

At the event, which drew more than 100 people, speakers included Edmiston, Murray, Wesson, County Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke, Los Angeles City Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas and state Parks Director Rusty Areias.

“We preserved this as the cornerstone for a regional park that is going to be the envy of the world,” Murray said.

Esther Feldman, president of Community Conservancy International and the main organizer of the movement to preserve the hills, said that the purchase was a major coup despite the high price.

“There’s a million people in a three-mile radius, including one of the largest African American communities in the state,” she said. “This is really the crossroads of Los Angeles.”