‘What you are charged with here is keeping the city moving forward on this project and the community informed,’ said Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski in her opening remarks to the 16-member Potrero Canyon Citizens Advisory Committee. The group, headed by former Community Council chairman George Wolfberg, held its first meeting last Wednesday at the Palisades Recreation Center. About 20 residents, most of them having followed the Potrero saga for several years, showed up. Miscikowski explained how she sees the committee’s role in ‘what is now the longest-running project in the Palisades,’ a 20-year effort, so far, by both the community and the City of Los Angeles to ‘finally’ bring Potrero Canyon to completion. She explained that the major task facing the advisory committee, which was selected by Miscikowski and Community Council chairman Norm Kulla, is the completion of Potrero Park itself, a mile-long expanse which extends from the Rec Center down to PCH. Thus far, the city has spent $30 million on Potrero’$13 million to acquire 35 landslide-impaired lots on the rim, and another $17 million to buttress and fill the canyon, the councilwoman said. However, work was brought to a halt over two years ago ‘when the city lacked the $1.2 million needed to complete Phase II.’ In an effort to break the logjam, Miscikowski put forth a motion (which was approved by L.A. City Council in December) to sell two of the lots’both on Alma Real (at 615 and 623), both with houses that the city currently leases. These lots have now been declared surplus by the city, with 100 percent of the net proceeds to be deposited in a designated Potrero Canyon Trust Fund. The proceeds, expected to be as much as $4 million, ‘will be used exclusively for completion of Phases II and to begin Phase III,’ Miscikowski said. Current plans for Phase III call for a riparian habitat and a hiking trail with limited amenities (washrooms and a parking lot) to be built at the mouth of the canyon. This final part of the project is expected to cost from $7 million to $12 million. Miscikowski said that another challenge for the advisory committee will be how to handle the sale of the city-owned lots in Potrero. She noted that the city cannot offer the two lots, which will be sold at public auction, ‘without California Coastal Commission approval,’ which is not expected to come before June. When the Coastal Commission originally approved the Potrero project in 1986, it placed restrictions on the sale of the city-owned lots until all three phases of the project were complete and funding for inspections and maintenance had been identified. When it became clear last year that these conditions would be impossible to meet, Miscikowski began negotiations with Coastal Commission staff to clear the way for the immediate sale of the two Alma Real lots to finish Phase II, where work is 95 percent complete. Three landslides still need repairing and ‘there is final grading to be done,’ she said. The other 33 city-owned lots, which were condemned starting in 1964 when the canyon was first found to be too unstable because of landslides, are located on Earlham, De Pauw, and Friends. As soon as all the lots are deemed to be stable [a two-year process], they can be certified by the city and gradually sold off as funds are needed for Phase III. Miscikowski noted that there is now ‘ample opportunity to have significant input into the final design, especially the riparian habitat,’ which she suggested should be integrated into the existing natural environment ‘as much as possible.’ Miscikowski described the original proposal for the habitat, which had some artificial elements to it and has since been scrapped, as ‘a Disney waterworks.’ She said while she has applied for grants from the state to help fund Phase III, none are forthcoming at this time. And while she emphasized that the city would ‘not’ be putting any more money into Potrero, she acknowledged that funding would be needed to deal with any further landslides, which ‘are a real possibility.’ Following Miscikowski’s presentation, the committee asked her for two things: (1) a market evaluation of all the lots, and (2) a realistic assessment of what it will cost to finish Phase II. This second request came after member Rob Weber, an attorney who lives near the park, asked when the last construction estimate ($3.5 million, which includes the remaining landfill and $376,000 that is still owed the contractor for work done in 1997 and 1998) was done. He was told five years ago. ‘Five years ago!’ said Weber. He wasn’t the only one who was surprised. After the committee listened to several other presentations, which included a history of Potrero (by Randy Young); the status of the city’s motion that will go to the Coastal Commission (which Jane Adrian from the Bureau of Engineering said she is currently writing); and a description of the existing plans for the 7.4 acre riparian habitat (which was described in detail by Pam Emerson, the supervisor of regulation and planning for the Coastal Commission), it came up with an action list of its own. First will be a walking tour of Potrero set for this Sunday, February 27, ‘so that everyone can see what we are talking about,’ said Young, who will lead the tour beginning at 10 a.m. in the parking lot off Frontera by the tennis courts. The public is invited, and heavy footwear is recommended. The committee also requested aerial photos of the site from Adrian, and a copy of the approved plans for Phase III from Emerson. Committee member Ellen Travis, a Lombard resident who lives adjacent to the canyon, was more concerned about the proposed change to the Coastal Commission agreement’the sixth amendment to date’than the cost of the project. ‘Right now, the only protection residents have is the plan that exists,’ Travis said. ‘What’s going to happen if we keep changing it?’ The next meeting of the Potrero committee is scheduled for March 16.
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