Deukmejian Cuts Area Pet Projects Worth $20 Million : Funds for Mental Health, Park, Rail Programs Slashed From State Budget

SACRAMENTO — In a setback for the San Fernando Valley area, Gov. George Deukmejian on Friday slashed most legislative pet projects--worth nearly $20 million--from the $49.3-billion state budget.

Among the Valley items trimmed from the 1989-90 spending plan were about $10 million to improve commuter train service, nearly $2 million for soundwalls on the San Diego Freeway and $500,000 for Hansen Dam. He also vetoed $2 million for a child crisis center in Ventura County and assorted park projects, including land acquisition by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy.

The vetoes--included in a total of $646 million statewide--were released as Deukmejian signed the state budget Friday. Valley-area lawmakers immediately expressed disappointment.

‘Extremely Disappointed’

In a prepared statement, state Sen. Alan Robbins (D-Tarzana) declared: “I am extremely disappointed that the governor has shown such a low level of sympathy and concern for San Fernando Valley issues.” Robbins spokeswoman Teri Burns summed up the situation by saying the governor “killed us.”

As the only Valley lawmaker on the six-member legislative budget conference committee, Robbins championed a variety of projects for the Valley and adjoining legislative districts in Ventura County, many of which were squirted into the budget after Deukmejian sent it to the Legislature in January.

Jesse Huff, Deukmejian’s finance director, maintained that the governor did not single out the Valley. He said many Valley items were cut because they were inserted by lawmakers outside the normal budget process, in which competing projects are reviewed by state agencies before being submitted to the Legislature.

“It wasn’t aimed at the Valley,” Huff said. “Alan Robbins was successful in getting Valley interests ahead of everyone else” in the budget. But he said Deukmejian vetoed many projects “regardless of where they might be located if they short-circuited the normal review process” for the spending plan.

Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) voiced hope that some of the vetoed Valley projects would be resurrected before the Legislature adjourns for the year in September. “We’re not out of the picture,” he said. “We’re going to try again.”

One of the largest single cuts announced by Deukmejian was $116 million earmarked for local mental health programs--funds that local lawmakers had hoped could be set aside to reopen the East San Fernando Valley Mental Health Center in North Hollywood and to keep other facilities from closing.

Among the other funds removed from the budget were:

* $500,000 to rehabilitate Hansen Dam Park in the East Valley, which was cut as part of the governor’s veto of a number of parkland items. Katz, who pressed for the funds along with Assemblywoman Marian W. La Follette (R-Northridge), said he has been unable to determine whether Deukmejian had specific concerns about Hansen Dam or whether his action was prompted by a more general disagreement with the way that the parks and resources funds were divided up.

“I need to go back to the governor and try to make him understand,” Katz said. “This was a wonderful resource that we had years and years ago and it’s only because of neglect that it’s in its current state.”

Hansen Dam was once a regional lake and park, but the lake filled up with silt during storms and the surrounding area fell into disrepair. Now the area, which is owned by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers but leased to the city of Los Angeles, serves primarily as a haven for the homeless. The House of Representatives on June 28 approved $780,000 in federal funds to rehabilitate the lake.

* About half of $20 million to improve commuter rail service from Santa Barbara to San Diego. Deukmejian said he believes that $10 million “is sufficient for needed rail improvements” in the next year.

Of the $20 million, about half was to go to upgrade the track along the northern leg, from Union Station to Santa Barbara, to pave the way for up to three commuter trains a day. Lawmakers said they will push to spend some of the remaining money for those improvements.

* $800,000 to renovate a Los Angeles County-owned building at the Van Nuys Civic Center for a child-care facility for children of city, county and state employees. In his veto message, Deukmejian said the project should be submitted during the regular budget process so that it can compete against other projects for funds.

* Nearly $2 million sought by Assemblyman Tom Bane (D-Tarzana) to build soundwalls on both sides of the San Diego Freeway between Victory Boulevard and Sherman Way. Deukmejian said paying for this project--outside the state’s continuing soundwall construction program--”would provide an inequitable advantage to one project over others. Such separate treatment would set an undesirable precedent.” Bane declined to discuss the veto.

* $800,000 in seed money to Valley Fair to develop facilities at an off-highway vehicle park at Hungry Valley near Gorman, in preparation for an annual event, including racing, that was to begin in 1991. Deukmejian said the project should be submitted during the regular budget review.

* About $3 million for the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to acquire land in the Santa Susana Mountains and near Malibu Creek State Park. Deukmejian said there were insufficient funds from a 1984 parkland bond act to buy the property.

* $500,000 from cigarette tax funds for the conservancy to acquire open space in the Santa Clarita Woodlands. Deukmejian said projects allocated from these funds should be submitted in separate legislation “after a comprehensive review of competing needs.”

Joseph Edmiston, the conservancy’s executive director, said he would seek funds for all three vetoed projects from other state sources. “I still think we have a shot at that,” he said.

* $300,000 for parking spaces at Los Encinos State Park in Encino. This was among 23 local park projects that Deukmejian said “should be submitted through the budget development process so they can be prioritized against other similar local park projects.”

In Ventura County, $2 million was removed for a children’s crisis center at Camarillo State Hospital. The money was to be matched by local funds to help raise the $8 million required to build the shelter, according to Ventura County lobbyist Penny Bohannon.

She termed the veto “just a terrible setback” for the planned shelter for abused and neglected children. “We have only 15 beds in the county for children in crisis,” she said. “And we have about 70 children a month in need.”

In his veto message, Deukmejian said: “While I am supportive of efforts to address the needs of abused, neglected and exploited children, typically county children’s crisis centers have been locally funded. Therefore, I believe it would establish an inappropriate precedent to provide funding for a local capital construction project of this nature.”

Times staff writer Amy Pyle, in Los Angeles, contributed to this story.

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