DIVIDED PANEL GIVES TOXIC BELMONT A `GO'; 4-3 COMMISSION VOTE FAVORS COMPLETING SCHOOL ON CONTAMINATED SITE.

Byline: Greg Gittrich Staff Writer

Despite years of warnings and bureaucratic bungling, a citizens panel narrowly recommended Wednesday that the $282 million Belmont Learning Center be completed atop a former oil field that seeps poisonous and explosive gases.

The commission voted 4-3, with two environmental experts and a public works director concluding the downtown site cannot be made safe.

The dissenting arguments were not enough to sway the commission's four other members - a former state senator, a labor union representative, a private physician and a former state Supreme Court justice.

``All of us were interested in the welfare of the children,'' said commission Chairman Cruz Reynoso, who voted to finish what would be the nation's most costly high school.

Feeding a controversy that cast Belmont as one of the nation's most egregious public works fiascos, former District Attorney Ira Reiner, the commission's chief executive officer and legal counsel, said he would urge the school board today to close the school.

``It all comes back to this: Belmont is a disaster,'' said Reiner, who could not vote Wednesday in his advisory role. ``The only rational approach is to put an end to it. We need to not expend so much energy and focus on making a disaster right. To say that we are going ahead with Belmont to give children a school is a false promise.''

The vote Wednesday was delayed about an hour as several hundred students from low-income neighborhoods around Belmont walked out of the district's overcrowded schools and marched to the commission meeting to urge the panel to finish building the school.

Packing the boardroom, the protesters, led by school board member Victoria Castro, said their communities had been promised a new school for nearly 20 years. Castro did not address the commission.

Even commission members who supported completion of the school expressed concern that they were sending an ambiguous message to the Board of Education, which has not indicated how it will receive the recommendation.

``I'm saddened we couldn't come to a 7-0 decision. It finally came down to a divided 4-3 vote, which won't be as helpful to the school board,'' Reynoso said.

Creating even greater ambiguity, the commission agreed that the school district cannot be trusted to oversee environmental safety measures at the campus, but rather should hire a private company. State officials are still conducting tests to assess the extent of the downtown site's environmental dangers.

Following two months of testimony on Belmont, the commission concluded that the campus would cost $282 million to finish, largely because of extensive environmental protections.

Commission's role

Following a series of Daily News investigations into Belmont, the school board voted to create the advisory commission in July. The board has made no promises to follow the commission's recommendation.

Board members could not be reached for comment after Wednesday's vote.

Along with Reynoso, commissioners Janett Humphries, president of the Service Employees International Union; Dr. Ira Monosson, a former officer for the state Division of Occupational Safety and Health; and Charles Calderon, a former state senator and assemblyman, all voted in favor of completing Belmont.

The dissenting votes were cast by Craig Perkins, director of Environmental and Public Works Management in Santa Monica; David Beckman, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Fund; and Maribel Marin, a city public works commissioner.

The decision to sign off on the project - despite concerns about methane gas and hydrogen sulfide at the property - came down to providing a new school as soon as possible for students packed into the district's crowded inner-city campuses.

``I think the site can be made safe,'' Calderon said. ``I think the site conditions can be managed by contracting out the mitigation responsibilities to engineers and professionals. It seems to me that it will take much longer to site a new school in that area.''

The entire commission agreed the Los Angeles Unified School District cannot be trusted to safely operate the $60 million gas mitigation system that would be required at the site for the school district to receive approval from state toxic officials before Belmont can be opened.

Those voting in favor of moving ahead with construction said the important responsibilities should be put into the hands of a private company that reports directly to the school board.

But Perkins, Beckman and Marin, as well as Reiner, were adamant the risks would be enormous no matter who was in charge of the maintenance and monitoring. ``We're taking unnecessary risks with kids, and that makes no sense,'' Beckman said.

Perkins argued the commission's own research indicates environmental conditions at the site would prevent Belmont from opening for at least five years. In that same amount of time, the school district could build a similar facility, in the same area, on safe land.

``Given the realities of cost, schedule and risk, we can't go forward with this project,'' Perkins said. ``It makes no sense to me. The only logical reason to go forward would be a fear that we couldn't find a clean and safe site for a school. That fear strikes me as preposterous.

``We need to stop the bleeding, stop the throwing of good money after bad,'' he said. ``We need to stop this project.''

Beckman, Marin and Perkins offered a plan to convert the district's downtown headquarters into a school as a partial solution to ease overcrowding in Belmont's attendance area as the district searched for another site.

Calderon, however, said it was not a meaningful solution.

``Where are they going to site a school in this area?'' Calderon scoffed. ``No one from the district, no one from the board, no one from any source has come in to say where another school could be built. So we are left to wonder. The reality is there is no one else who thinks there is one.

``All of the experts have told us the site can be made safe with mitigation.''

Enrollment crush

The dire need for classroom space proved to be the most influential variable for those who voted to go forward. Calderon and Humphries have been intent on completing Belmont for some time. However, Reynoso and Monosson said they likely would have decided to scrap the complex if they believed the district could build another high school within the time it would take to finish Belmont.

Only 10 minutes before the final vote, the commission rejected an identical motion by a 6-1 count. At the time, several commissioners wanted their approval to hinge on four stipulations attached to the motion. In the end, the commission did not incorporate the conditions into its official vote, but unanimously agreed to insert the criteria into a formal report it gives to the Board of Education.

The commission will present its findings to the board today, with Reiner arguing the dissenting opinion. A written report will be compiled by Reiner and released to the public Tuesday.

That report will note the commission urges the school board to take the following steps before completing Belmont:

The district receive assurance from the state attorney general that opening Belmont does not violate state environmental laws.

The gas mitigation system used at the property must be of the highest quality and comply with the standard presented to the commission.

Funding must be set aside immediately for future maintenance and operation of the mitigation system.

The school board must create a regulatory branch to oversee the mitigation system and pursue state legislation that would require state monitoring of the internal regulatory branch.

Marin called the stipulations a ridiculous attempt ``to make this a perfect world so we should go forward.''

``To go forward with only the hope that this school could be made safe would be irresponsible for me as a professional,'' Marin said. ``For me to go forward with this project would be unconscionable as a parent. I would not accept such conditions at a school for my children.''

The district purchased the Belmont property in the early 1990s. Construction of the 5,000-student high school began in Sept. 1997, despite warnings about environmental problems.

At the urging of Assemblyman Scott Wildman, D-Glendale, the state Department of Toxic Substances Control investigated the property late last year. The state officials ruled the site had not been properly characterized, and safety systems planned for the school were inadequate. The school district partially halted construction in February.

A new round of environmental tests taken this spring revealed the contamination exists in a nearly endless supply and cannot be eliminated. It is likely construction would be suspended completely until additional tests are conducted, including a seismic survey to map out the property's geology. Work would resume with approval from the state.

``With mitigation, I believe this can be controlled and made quite safe,'' Monosson said. ``We're not talking about rocket science here.''