COMPUTER HELPS AGENCY IDENTIFY KEY PLOTS TO BUY; SYSTEM SIMPLIFIES PROTECTION PLAN.

Byline: Michael Coit Daily News Staff Writer

Protecting natural, cultural and recreational resources in the Santa Monica Mountains has gone high-tech as the National Park Service blows the dust off a 10-year-old plan to get more land into the public's hands.

While best guesses were once used to identify land worthy of acquisition and protection, park planners now are plugging a vast array of new information into a computerized mapping system to help them make recommendations.

The mapping is a critical part of a new land protection plan.

``The ability to have enough information and apply it is something new. With every month, we know a little bit more,'' said Art Eck, superintendent for the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. ``When it's up and running . . . it will be the most sophisticated land protection plan anywhere in the country.''

Eck, hoping the system will be in use within a couple of months, says the plan will be a blueprint for identifying desirable property for local, state and federal agencies to acquire for park and recreation land.

The National Recreation Area was established in November 1978, with its boundaries taking in 150,500 acres from Point Mugu to Griffith Park and a vast swath of the Simi Hills north of the Ventura Freeway. The Park Service goal is to increase public ownership of land in the recreation area to seven of every 10 acres, Eck said, and so far, five of every 10 have been acquired.

Conservation groups believe getting the rest of the way will be easier with a new protection plan based on scientific study and mapping of wildlife habitat and movement, vegetation, cultural and recreational resources. Pitches for grants can become more persuasive, and agency negotiators can better recognize what the public needs in purchases or swaps, group officials said.

Paul Edelman, staff ecologist for the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, said new information on wildlife habitat and movement bolstered conservancy applications for public funding needed to purchase 109 acres south of the Ventura Freeway in the Liberty Canyon corridor east of Agoura Hills.

``With the animal-study work they're doing, there's actual data,'' Edelman said. ``What they're doing is very comprehensive.''

Ruth Kilday, executive director of the Mountains Conservancy Foundation, expects an improved protection plan to impress potential donors and help fund-raisers make gains from private sources to offset reductions in public park-purchase money.

The Santa Monica Mountains do not sell themselves, she explained.

``There's not the culture for philanthropy in parks and open space that you would think we might have,'' Kilday said. ``For the future, it will help in perhaps creating new fund-raising projects.''

Eck will talk about the protection plan, as well as priorities and strategies for acquiring parkland for the public, during meetings in Malibu on Wednesday and Woodland Hills on Thursday.

Included in Eck's presentation will be an overview of the computerized mapping, known as the Geographical Information System. While the system is not new, there hasn't been enough resource information to make it useful until recently, Eck noted.

``It's something like a building-block process. Essentially now we have enough building blocks to use the GIS to help us approach judging relative resource values,'' he explained. ``The old saying, `A picture is worth a thousand words' - well, that is what the computer does.''

Three recent projects are providing some of the most advanced resource information:

Park Service ecologists have been using about 50 remote cameras to document movements of bobcats, coyotes, gray foxes and other large predators. Automatically tripped by the animals, the cameras are positions in areas ranging from Point Mugu State Park in Ventura County to Liberty Canyon in Los Angeles County. The ecologists also have trapped coyotes and bobcats and fitted them with collars so they can be radio-tracked.

It is this information that ecologist Edelman used to document the need for habitat protection in Liberty Canyon. Edelman said a wildlife overpass or underpass on the Ventura Freeway would link the Simi Hills, now owned by the Park Service, with land south of the freeway for which the conservancy is seeking state purchase money.

``I was looking for the best information to bolster our grant application,'' he said. ``They've captured a lot of animals on the north side of the freeway, and they're coming right down to where we want to put the permanent crossing.''

Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy rangers and ecologists, previously able to rely only on a compass, are using wireless navigation equipment to improve monitoring of vegetation and wildlife and create maps. The hand-held receivers use the government's satellites for precise positioning and navigation to overcome ravines, mountains and other obstacles.

Soil scientists from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service are beginning a three-year survey to identify soil types and map plant communities. Eroded soil or areas needing erosion protection will be highlighted, and the information can be used to help areas recover after fires. Private landowners will be contacted and asked permission for small excavations.

Eck said the new protection plan will be flexible so it can be updated more frequently than every decade and use the flood of increased information that seems to be pouring in.

Priorities for parkland purchases and acquisitions also can be updated.

``Every time we get money, there are always landowners who want to sell,'' he said. ``We at least will be able to direct the money to its very highest and best ability to meet the goals and mission of the park.

``The reason that is very important is that dollars are very scarce now.''

FACT BOX

The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area was established in November 1978.

Boundary: 150,500 acres

Total public parkland (Includes federal, state, county, city, regional): 69,600

Parkland planned to acquire: 30,632

Average cost per acre: $6,900.

LAND PROTECTION PLAN MEETINGS

Meetings on the recreation area's Land Protection Plan

Wednesday, 7 p.m.; Malibu Community Center, 6955 Fernhill Drive, Malibu.

Thursday, 7 p.m.; Taft High School auditorium, 5461 Winnetka Ave., Woodland Hills.

Information: [phone]

CAPTION(S):

2 Boxes

BOX: (1--ran in Conejo edition only) FACT BOX (see text)

(2) LAND PROTECTION PLAN MEETINGS (see text)