EDITORIAL OFFICIAL HYPOCRISY AHMANSON RANCH FIGHT CONCEALS LEADERS' FAILINGS.

DON'T be misled by Los Angeles City Hall's hand-wringing over the Ahmanson Ranch project just outside the city and county limits at the end of Victory Boulevard in the west San Fernando Valley.

City officials don't care a whit about overdevelopment, environmental damage or increased traffic on our streets and freeways. Never have.

They continue to approve projects that densify our neighborhoods without providing for the increased traffic. They keep approving more garbage dumping near homes in the Valley.

And they heavily subsidized the Playa Vista project even though it will add at least as much traffic to the 405 Freeway and Westside as Ahmanson will to Victory and the 101 Freeway. Playa Vista also harms the precious Ballona Wetlands area and is built atop a potentially explosive methane gas field. No matter.

County officials certainly have just as bad a record as the city for approving projects that add to traffic congestion and despoil the environment.

Both the city and county have had more than a decade to sit down with Ventura County officials and develop a plan to mitigate the traffic impact caused by Ahmanson but have done nothing about it.

Now, these same officials have the audacity to call their lawyers and threaten to sue while standing on soapboxes and decrying the awful shame of Ventura County in giving the go-ahead to Ahmanson.

Surely, concern for the environment, traffic congestion and overdevelopment are not the cause of all this whining.

Could it be that Ventura County gets the tax dollars from Ahmanson?

Could it be that the genuine concerns of West Valley residents about the added traffic coming their way from Ahmanson, Calabasas and the Thousand Oaks corridor has created such a hot political issue that our local officials are looking for cover to hide their own records?

Could it be they are star-struck by the vast array of Beverly Hills celebrities lined up against Ahmanson - including those who play presidents on television and in real life?

You can bet that all three of those possibilities have far more to do with the posturing on Ahmanson than genuine concern about the environment for humans, animals and plants.

If our city and county officials really cared, they would sit down with leaders from throughout Southern California and come up with real plans for development, transportation and environmental quality.

But that would mean putting people over politics, and policy over posturing.