`IT'S A STUDY!'; CITYHOOD ADVOCATES CELEBRATE.

Byline: Deborah Sullivan Daily News Staff Writer

Hoping for the birth of a new city, leaders of the campaign Sunday showed off their ``baby shower'' gifts: 21 ribbon-wrapped boxes containing 205,000 signatures calling for a study of San Fernando Valley secession from Los Angeles.

``All of you worked so hard to get us to this point,'' attorney and civic leader David Fleming told more than 150 jubilant volunteers in Valley Voters Organized Toward Empowerment. ``It's a grass-roots crusade. We should all be proud.''

Valley VOTE leaders and volunteers threw themselves the party in a light-hearted ending to a hard-fought petition campaign. Pink and blue streamers and balloons adorned the Valley Presbyterian Hospital Auditorium in Van Nuys. Valley cityhood leaders wore pacifiers on their lapels. Teddy-bear posters proclaimed, ``It's a study!''

The party was the culmination of six months of labor by 1,500 volunteers to gather enough signatures of registered voters to trigger a study on whether Valley cityhood is feasible. It is the first step toward a potential ballot measure on the question.

The effort required signatures from 131,750 registered voters, 25 percent of those in the Valley. Volunteers and paid petition gatherers brought in more than half again that many, assuring a comfortable margin of success.

Assemblyman Tom McClintock, R-Granada Hills, hailed the petition drive as an affirmation of the democratic process.

``This really is a defense not only of the principle of self-determination but of democracy itself,'' he said.

``It is our right to decide for ourselves what kind of community we will be and what kind of city we will have. And no bureaucrat or army of bureaucrats will stand in our way.''

Valley VOTE chairman Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Association, said even the campaign's darkest moment - when Van Nuys airport security guards evicted petitioners from an air show in July - contributed to its bright future.

The mishap led to a 90-day extension in the petition deadline, which had been at the end of August. This gave Valley VOTE time to collect the big number of extra signatures.

``We would like to thank them for making today possible,'' Close joked about the security guards' conduct that prompted outrage when it happened.

In its editorial pages, the Daily News has strongly endorsed Valley VOTE's drive for a public study of secession to determine whether a new city would be economically viable and whether a breakup would be revenue-neutral to the remainder of Los Angeles. The newspaper also contributed $60,000 to the petition-gathering effort.

Valley VOTE leaders plan to deliver the boxes of petitions to the Local Area Formation Committee on Wednesday, said the organization's president, Jeff Brain.

If election officials find enough signatures are those of registered voters residing in the affected area, LAFCO will begin an exhaustive, $1 million study of Valley secession.

If the study shows secession would not harm the Valley or the remainder of Los Angeles, LAFCO members would vote on whether to send the question of Valley secession to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. Supervisors would then decide whether to place the matter on a citywide ballot.

``There is no reason why we cannot leave the city, stand up tall, and become the sixth largest city in America,'' said former Valley Assemblywoman Paula Boland.

``I frankly feel that once the information comes back and we can examine it, we will find it is logical to secede,'' said Valley VOTE volunteer Eunice McTyre of Chatsworth, seated in her wheelchair in a flowing red gown and cradling a bouquet of red roses she received for her dedication to the petition drive.

``And then we have to go to the voice of the people and see if they agree with us.''

While Valley VOTE volunteers rejoiced at the end of the petition drive, they acknowledged that their battle isn't over.

``The good news is that there are 205,000 signatures in those boxes,'' said Close.

He compared the legislative groundwork and petition drive to the first and second quarters in a football game. The second half - the study and a ballot measure - are still to come.

``The bad news is our work has just begun,'' he cautioned Sunday.

The previous day, more than 50 Latino community leaders met to discuss potential Valley secession and said they fear it could lead to a loss of political clout.

But Sunday was a day for Valley VOTE to focus on its successes.

Laura DiGilio was one of the top two petition gatherers. She brought in more than 1,200 signatures and said she is prepared to hit the streets again.

``If it's feasible for the Valley to become its own city,'' she said, ``I plan on working just as hard to see us become our own city.''

CAPTION(S):

3 photos

PHOTO (1 -- color) Volunteers carry ribbon-wrapped boxes of petitions calling for a study of Valley cityhood feasibility.

(2) Petition-gathering volunteer Philip Baron, left, and Marcus Allen Frishman, an aide to Assemblyman Jan Goldsmith, look at proposed borders for a new city in the San Fernando Valley.

(3) Pacifiers attached to name tags boost the birth of a new Valley city.

Gus Ruelas/Daily News