HAYDEN CONDEMNS LEGISLATION CHANGES; LAUSD LAWYER DEFENDS UNAUTHORIZED ADDITIONS.

Byline: Greg Gittrich Daily News Staff Writer

A Los Angeles Unified School District lawyer argued Thursday his unauthorized changes to proposed legislation strengthened environmental protections on school sites - a claim state Sen. Tom Hayden ridiculed as an attempt by the bureaucrat to save his job.

Meanwhile, the Senate Environmental Quality Committee has concluded the proposed legislation has been flawed since March and must be changed to ensure schools are required to report petroleum contamination.

Senate Bill 162 has been amended four times since being introduced in January; however, the last set of changes made last week sent Hayden, D-Los Angeles, into fury.

The controversy flared on May 7, after Hayden noticed the amendments and sent an angry letter to Superintendent Ruben Zacarias stating that the changes exempt districts from reporting oil contamination at schools to the state.

Hayden scheduled a May 21 hearing to determine why the changes were made. The bill's author, state Sen. Martha Escutia, D-Montebello, and the district both said they didn't support the changes, and Zacarias launched an investigation, which has run four days without any public findings.

Brad Hogin, the LAUSD's assistant general counsel who took responsibility for the amendments without having sought approval from Zacarias or the school board, said Thursday his proposals expanded a reference to hazardous substances to include wastes covered by any applicable federal or state law. He also added a direct reference to a federal law that governs the cleanup of Superfund sites and exempts petroleum contamination.

Potential petroleum contamination problems at the Belmont Learning Center downtown have caused the district to halt construction of the school, which has become America's costliest high school at $170 million.

Hogin said by expanding the reference to include ``any applicable federal or state law,'' he strengthened the bill and was only citing the federal Superfund legislation as an example.

``I was completely making sure everything was covered,'' Hogin said.

Hayden called that claim absurd, charging it was another attempt by the district to avoid responsibility.

``He's spinning it. The district has agreed this amendment should be taken out of the bill. If they're such good ideas, as Mr. Hogin now says, why have they been removed in such haste,'' Hayden asked.

``They're not taking responsibility and firing this guy,'' he said.

Erik Nasarenko, a spokesman for the district, said he does not know when the district's investigation will be completed.

School board member David Tokofsky, who has led district criticism of Hogin's amendments, was unswayed by the explanations. Tokofsky questioned why the district investigation was being conducted by Hogin's direct supervisors.

``The investigation and who leads it will have to pass the smell test,'' Tokofsky said. ``And unfortunately only some of the stink from Belmont comes from the (methane) gases.''

Regardless of the district's findings, reports from the Senate Environmental Quality Committee show that the bill must be rewritten to include petroleum on its contaminant list.

Since a March 1 amendment, the bill uses the list of contaminants from state and federal laws, which exempt petroleum. The last version of the bill also cites the state water code, which concerns spilled petroleum. Techniques to measure spilled petroleum cannot be translated into soil sample readings, the committee reports state.