A meeting took place in June with officials from the city, California Department of State Parks and Recreation, and the National Park Service. A state parks spokesperson said the department determined that no more meetings should take place.
By Jonathan Friedman/Assistant Editor
Last week’s announcement that the Crummer property, located next to Bluffs Park, is officially on the market has not inspired city or California Department of Parks and Recreation officials to rush toward a resolution on the dispute over ball fields at Bluffs Park. The city has previously indicated it wants to acquire the property next to the park, owned by Roy E. Crummer, for ball fields.
No formal discussions have taken place since June, when a task force composed of officials from the city, state parks and the National Park Service met. State parks spokesperson Joe Rosato said it was determined nothing new came out of the meeting except to reinforce the idea that a site for ball fields in Malibu needs to be found, so no further sessions are planned.
The dispute between the city and state parks has been dragging on for several years. In 1982, state parks sought a permit from the California Coastal Commission to evict Malibu Little League from its ball fields at the Malibu Lagoon, which state parks wanted to convert to native wetlands. Following a flurry of lawsuits, a settlement agreement filed in August 1982 in Los Angeles Superior Court granted the Little League a home at the state-owned Bluffs Park through 2002.
As the end of the lease approached, state parks made it clear to the city that it was not interested in renewing it. The city was able to persuade state parks to allow it to keep the ball fields at the park until a new location could be found. City officials have said their goal is to obtain the Crummer site. Councilmember Jeff Jennings said last week that he did not believe the property being placed on the market for $26 million meant that the city was out of the running to buy the property. When asked whether the city and state still had first priority on purchasing the land, Crummer’s Realtor, Paul Grisanti, said, “The city and state have had first priority for several years already. How much time do they need?”
No state parks officials representing Malibu returned phone calls or would respond to questions. The department’s spokesperson only would say that the state is continuing to look for possible lands that the city could acquire for ball fields.
In April 2003, Jennings told The Malibu Times that he believed it was just a matter of weeks until the situation would be coming to a close. He said Tuesday that he believes a major reason why that never came to be is because priorities have changed in Sacramento, although he stressed that he did not know that as a fact.
“With the change in the [state] administration, it meant that some of the priorities of some of the players had changed, or it was recommended that they change,” Jennings said.
Jennings said another problem is that in 2003 it was believed that there was more grant money available for property acquisition than actually existed. He said that included incorrect assumptions of what certain bond funds could be spent on. Jennings added that he believed other organizations that were once interested in this issue no longer had it is as a priority. “We were left with less money than we thought to achieve the goal,” Jennings said. “That’s why we’ve been kind of restructuring what we were going to do.”
If Malibu is able to acquire property for ball fields, it will be a costly effort to move them to that site. The city has applied for a grant in which it would put up $750,000 and then receive $2.8 million from the state. City Manager Katie Lichtig said Malibu had not received word yet on whether it would be getting the grant.