EDITORIAL DOUBLE JEOPARDY CITY HALL LOOKS TO PAY TWICE FOR ITS OWN LACK OF PLANNING.

IN case anyone wonders why the city of Los Angeles is so short on both housing and cash, look no further than the spectacle unfolding in Lake View Terrace.

In 1999, city officials agreed that a 2.6-acre parcel on Foothill Boulevard overlooking Hansen Dam would be an appropriate site for a 48-unit affordable-housing complex.

The city's Housing Department approved $3.6 million in loans to Neighborhood Empowerment and Economic Development, a nonprofit developer charged with building the $12 million project.

Meanwhile, local residents fumed about the prospect of low-income housing in their community - an understandable response in a city where such decisions are made willy-nilly and with little regard to community interest.

Neighbors have argued that the project would greatly increase traffic and destabilize soil on the bluff. They also contend that the site would be better used as a park, complete with a vista point and observatory.

After four years of complaining, their efforts have finally paid off. City Council President Alex Padilla now proposes scrapping the project and leaving the site as open space.

The problem is, the city doesn't own the land, NEED does. Moreover, NEED is none too eager to sell the property without getting back the money it's already sunk into the project, which exceeds $1 million.

Pulling the plug on a development the city has been subsidizing for years could ultimately cost Los Angeles taxpayers millions of dollars more.

NEED would end up collecting city funds twice, first for building the development, then for not building it.

For all the investment of time, money and effort, Los Angeles wouldn't get any of the new housing city leaders keep telling us they're so committed to building. Because the property would become open space, it would be made unavailable for development of any kind, which in itself is fine, but absent a larger growth strategy, would only contribute to L.A.'s ever-worsening housing crisis.

That's the heart of the problem.

As this sad story of bureaucratic bungling all too painfully illustrates, the city of Los Angeles scarcely has a clue, let alone a coherent growth strategy.

It's a problem that reappears over every development, densification or transit project. With no overall vision for how the city should expand, the result is a feeding frenzy of developers looking to buy off politicians, and local residents forced to choose NIMBYism over victimization.

The task of sitting down and hammering out a regional, long-term growth strategy is one that local leaders understandably resist. It would require thoughtful planning and tough decisions. It would also hamper their ability to shake down developers and community groups for campaign cash.

But it beats the ludicrous alternative of our current situation, with city leaders offering to use taxpayer money to kill a project heavily financed with taxpayer money.

That kind of management won't resolve L.A.'s burgeoning housing needs. It will only exacerbate them, while bankrupting the city in the process.