State Pulls Back Funds for 300 Local Projects

Los Angeles and other California communities are set to lose millions of dollars set aside but unspent for parks and community improvements, a casualty of the state’s $12.5-billion budget shortfall.

Lawmakers agreed with Gov. Gray Davis’ plan to take back the money, allocated by the state over the last three years, as part of more than $2 billion in budget cuts and adjustments that Davis signed into law Saturday.

The loss of the park money has left some critics wondering why city and county officials did not spend it. In one example, Los Angeles will lose nearly $1 million that was to have been spent improving Ernest E. Debs Regional Park in Montecito Heights.

“City officials have just sort of dropped the ball on this one,” said Louis Quirarte, chairman of the Friends of Debs Park, a community group.

Davis and the Legislature are returning to the general fund $42.2 million earmarked for local parks during the 1999 and 2000 budget years and $30 million more that the state approved last year for museums, community centers and dozens of other projects.

Los Angeles stands to take some of the biggest hits. The county will lose nearly $5 million set aside to beautify Tujunga Wash. The city will lose more than $3 million for a variety of park projects.

Local governments and community groups typically have as long as three years to apply for funding after it has been budgeted by the state. Many agencies apply quickly for the money, however, knowing that an economic downturn might materialize at any time and the state might take the funds back.

In this case, would-be recipients either failed to apply for the funds now being rescinded or their completed applications were frozen.

Jane Kolb, director of development and marketing for the Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks, said the city was slowed by lengthy environmental reviews and has limited staff to handle such matters. That was the case, she said, for the $985,000 the city will lose for planning and restoration of Ken Malloy Harbor Regional Park. Money allocated in the state’s 1999-2000 budget for the regional park and two other projects is now set to be returned to the general fund.

“We had three years, and frankly we didn’t feel the sense of emergency,” Kolb said. “The economy was booming, we had a lot of projects in place, and we planned to add these.”

The state is also set to take back $985,000 earmarked for Debs Park, triggering criticism from advocates who want to turn the land into a nature preserve.

“They probably put this on the back burner and just let it go hang,” Quirarte said.

Los Angeles County, meanwhile, will probably scale back plans--at least temporarily--to beautify the Tujunga Wash area in the San Fernando Valley without the $5 million in state funding, said Rod Kubomoto of the county Department of Public Works.

The county is trying to spruce up the area by adding landscaping, a footpath and a bikeway, and by creating a stream.

“The beauty of this project is that you are taking an urban concrete jungle scenario and trying to beautify it,” Kubomoto said. “But to draw money from the state, you have to have all your permits and approvals. You need a resolution approved by the county Board of Supervisors and environmental reviews.”

In all, funding for more than 300 projects around the state is at stake, including a skateboard park in San Bernardino, a multicultural health center in Long Beach, a library in La Canada Flintridge and playground safety projects in Orange.

Such local projects championed by individual legislators to benefit their home districts or a pet cause are known around the Capitol as pork. Lawmakers covet these budgetary morsels for evidence of their effectiveness in the Legislature, particularly during election years like this one. Consequently, some are quietly fuming that funding for projects in their districts is being dashed.

Nonetheless, lawmakers approved Davis’ reduction plan last week in a bipartisan vote, which the governor described Saturday as both “remarkable and historic.”

“I understand the difficult policy choices we must make in addressing budget shortfalls,” Davis said.

The $103-billion spending plan Davis signed in July included $65.5 million for requests by individual legislators, finance officials said. About half the amount has not been spent, and Davis wants it returned to the general fund to help balance the budget.

Such projects constitute a small portion of the budget but can make a big difference on the local level.

In Sherman Oaks, for example, homeowners characterize $50,000 to plant trees along Ventura Boulevard as crucial to their community.

“Fifty thousand dollars out of a $103-billion budget is nothing, but to Sherman Oaks, it’s important,” said Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn. “To our community, this a major project.”

City officials in El Cajon, near San Diego, say they were caught off guard by news that $147,000 the state had allocated for a skate park in their community during the 1999-2000 fiscal year is in jeopardy. The city has paid a landscape architect $30,000 and awarded a contract for the project, which is also receiving money from the city and county.

“It’s hugely disappointing to have received a correspondence from the state that you have received the money” and then have Sacramento “pull that all away once you’ve committed the dollars,” said Lori Beliveau, director of recreation for El Cajon.

Not everybody is finding fault with the state for targeting pork projects, however.

Tax watchdogs frown on the practice of using state funds to pay for lawmakers’ pet causes as opposed to issues of statewide concern, such as building highways and funding schools.

“These pork projects are really sort of outside the rational budget process,” said Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn. “It’s like a king throwing out pennies to the peasants.... It’s more of a luck of the draw, or who’s quicker or more powerful, as opposed to where the money is needed.”