Now that the land has been purchased for preservation, speculation includes how to preserve the endangered San Fernando Valley spineflower and the California red-legged frog, as well as developing children’s programs on the ranch.
By P.G. O’Malley/Special to The Malibu Times
It’s official-after more than 10 years of opposition, with claims by two developers that they would persevere, the state Public Works Board on Oct. 10 approved the purchase of Ahmanson Ranch as public parkland, and escrow is expected to close by the end of the month.
Now that it’s a done deal, the question is what will happen to the almost 3,000 acres of pristine land that environmentalists and a host of local and regional elected officials have called too environmentally valuable to develop?
According to Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy Executive Director Joe Edmiston, the conservancy, which actually purchased the property, will retain ownership, probably through its joint powers agency, the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (MRCA).
Edmiston indicated that, although this hasn’t always been the case with land that it owns, the conservancy has no plans to hand over the property either to the state Department of Parks and Recreation or the National Park Service (NPS), the other two large landowners in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area and the Santa Monica Mountains Zone. (In Malibu, Solstice Canyon was originally conservancy property but is now owned and managed by the NPS, which has recently undertaken a major overhaul of the park’s facilities, sparking criticism by some Malibu residents.)
The conservancy will largely keep the Ahmanson property, which is accessed off Mureau Road in Calabasas, the way it is. Native Americans will have access to sacred sites, from which they claim they’ve been restricted, and the public will be able to hike, bike or ride a
horse through a variety of different landscapes, including rare California grasslands and riparian canyons.
Just how public use of the property as a park will accommodate preservation of endangered species found on the site has not yet been defined. Presumably conservancy managers will develop polices to protect the endangered San Fernando Valley spineflower and the California red-legged frog, which up until now have been the responsibility of the Las Virgenes Institute, an independent nonprofit agency funded by Washington Mutual.
According to conservancy documents, the ranch’s resources include valuable raptor habitat, including golden eagles, almost 4,000 coast live oaks, one of three remaining red-legged frog populations in Southern California and one of two known populations of the recently rediscovered spineflower. The ranch is also used by wildlife-from cougars to weasels-which use it to cross back and forth between the Santa Monica Mountains to larger habitat blocks in the Santa Susana Mountains and the Los Padres and Angeles national forests.
Edmiston said the conservancy plans a children’s education center to be housed in the old ranch house, the only flat section of the property.
Chad Griffin, who with producer Rob Reiner and HBO executive Chris Albrecht co-chaired the opposition group Rally to Save Ahmanson Ranch, has announced that Reiner will donate $1 million toward developing children’s programs at the new conservancy facility. Edmiston said his organization would match that amount, without specifying where the funds will come from.
California State Parks Foundation President Susan Smartt said an Ahmanson Ranch Park Foundation has been established to provide guidance during the development of programs, which will benefit residents from as far away as Downtown Los Angeles, who are expected to visit the new parkland.