The San Gabriel & Lower Los Angeles Rivers and Mountains Conservancy (RMC), established by the Legislature in 1999, addresses environmental and public resource needs in eastern Los Angeles County and western Orange County through public recreation and access, wetland restoration, trail development, river parkway improvements and the funding of land acquisitions. The conservancy’s territory stretches across 68 cities and it oversees all or part of four rivers, including the mostly concrete-lined 58-mile-long Los Angeles River. As of 2011, the conservancy had handed out 172 grants worth more than $89 million to local governments and non-profit organizations. The RMC is one of 10 conservancies within the state Natural Resources Agency. 

The Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers used to flow out of the San Gabriel Mountains as meandering streams carrying rocks and sand, never quite carving deep paths on their way to the ocean, but occasionally raging out across the basin in new directions. Their watersheds cover 1,513 square miles but the rivers stopped reaching the sea shortly after 18^th century settlers arrived. Wildlands became farmland. And, then, 50 years later—after the railroad arrived—the rivers nearly disappeared beneath a wave of urban sprawl and, finally, industrialization.     

After flooding in the 1930s, the federal government and the Los Angeles County Flood Control District implemented a strategy to tame the rivers once and for all. By 1960, the Los Angeles River was encased in cement and the San Gabriel River was surrounded by levees. In 1989, a state legislator revisited an idea once proposed in the 1940s, to run a freeway down the river corridor, and it prompted the first serious thought in decades to  “restoring” the rivers by focusing on natural systems and open space.

The freeway didn’t get built, but the U.S. Corps of Army Engineers and the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works (DPW) wanted to begin work in 1995 on a $500 million flood-control project on the Los Angeles River. They expressed concern that a flood of the type expected every 100 years, could inundate 11 towns over an 82-square-mile area and cause $2.3 billion in damage. The corps and the DPW wanted to reinforce levees, build higher concrete walls and modify bridges to accommodate the construction.

Environmentalists pushed back. Alternative flood control methods were proposed, including diverting the flow to groundwater systems, widening the river, adding new reservoirs and adopting measures to reduce urban runoff. What to do with the river suddenly became a topic for debate, rather than a foregone conclusion and the ambitious Los Angeles County Drainage Area (LACDA) was scaled back. 

Los Angeles County adopted a master plan for the Los Angeles River in 1996 that recommended environmental restoration and three years later began developing one for the San Gabriel River. State Senator Hilda Solis, who was the first Hispanic to serve in the state Senate and currently is the U.S. Secretary of Labor under President Barack Obama, introduced legislation in January 1999 to create a San Gabriel River Conservancy. Solis also sought to give the Valley area an infusion of state environmental funds that she felt were being overwhelmingly directed to Los Angeles County’s Westside. After numerous rewrites, the lower Los Angeles River and various cities were included in the final legislation, which passed later that year. 

As a result of the bill’s rewrites, the conservancy oversees the San Gabriel Mountains, the San Gabriel Valley and much of the Los Angeles Coastal Plain.  The Rio Hondo Watershed was also added and, because it connects to the lower Los Angeles River, the latter was included as well.

The intent of the bill was to “give priority to river related projects that create expanded opportunities for recreation, greening, aesthetic improvement, and wildlife habitat along the corridor of the river, and in parts of the river channel that can be improved for the above purposes without infringing on water quality, water supply, and necessary flood control.”

More than 30 years ago, environmental groups began pressing the state to protect California’s urban environments from overdevelopment by using land-purchase agencies, or conservancies.  The RMC, one of 10 state conservancies in the Natural Resources Agency, was the first established for an urban area and was created to not only acquire land, but also to renovate and clean-up ground and river water.

As part of its enabling legislation, the conservancy was charged with preparing a watershed and open space plan with the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy. In October 2001, it produced Common Ground: from the Mountains to the Sea. Its short-term goal (one to three years) was to work with surrounding communities to identify projects along the rivers and tributaries for parks, trails, open space, recreation and improvement of existing facilities while working on a master list of future projects. Its long-term goal (20 to 50 years) was to provide five acres of park space per 1,000 area residents and create a regional, comprehensive network to connect all its disparate parts. 

In 2004, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s California Performance Review called for the devolution of the conservancy and four of its brethren—the Baldwin Hills Conservancy, the San Diego River Conservancy, the Coachella Valley Mountains Conservancy and the San Joaquin River Conservancy—into local joint power authorities. The report argued that work of the five conservancies was not of statewide interest and that a master plan for land acquisition and resource protection at the state level would compensate for their loss. Of the 119 public comments received by the review panel, 110 opposed the change, which was subsequently not approved by the Legislature.   

About Us (RMC website)

Enabling Legislation (Public Resources Code)

California Performance Review (pdf)

Common Ground: From the Mountains to the Sea (California Resources Agency, San Gabriel and Lower Los Angeles Rivers and Mountains Conservancy, and  Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy) (pdf)

The Rivers and Mountains Conservancy’s primary objectives are: acquiring and managing lands within the lower Los Angeles River and San Gabriel River watersheds; preserving the two rivers for protection of life and property; acquiring open space; and providing the public an enhanced recreational and educational experience in its area.

Its territory stretches across 68 California cities, including parts of Los Angeles and South Pasadena, covering eastern Los Angeles County and western Orange County. The conservancy oversees all or part of four rivers: the 58-mile-long Los Angeles River (which is mostly concrete-lined), the partially contained San Gabriel and Santa Ana Rivers, and the free-flowing Santa Clara River.

The conservancy has a 20-member board, 13 voting and seven non-voting. Among the voting members: the governor appoints two (one from the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and the other from a list provided by environmental groups); two are picked from the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments; two come from the Gateway Cities Council of Governments; two are plucked from the Orange County Division of the League of California Cities; one represents the San Gabriel Valley Water Association; and one is a representative from the Central Basin Water Association. The heads of the Natural Resources Agency, the state Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Finance also each pick one member.  

Common Ground: From the Mountains to the Sea

The conservancy’s founding legislation required that it prepare a watershed and open space plan with the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy under the direction of the Natural Resources Agency. In October 2001, it produced Common Ground: from the Mountains to the Sea. While the plan discussed potential future projects, it didn’t specifically recommend any, focusing instead on producing guiding principals for public access, waterways, land acquisition, open space and habitat preservation.  

Green Visions Plan

The conservancy teamed up on the Green Visions Plan in 2003 with the Baldwin Hills Conservancy, the Santa Monica Conservancy and the Coastal Conservancy to form a partnership with the University of Southern California’s Center for Sustainable Cities and GIS Research Laboratory. The plan aims to develop online technical tools and data for needs-based, long-term projects that are made available to agencies, advocates, regulators and the general public. It provides a range of research and reports, including those on watershed assets, historical ecology, hydrology and park access.

National Park Service

The conservancy works with the National Park Service, which is conducting a “special resource study” on portions of the San Gabriel River watershed and the San Gabriel Mountains. Congress authorized the study in 2003 and a draft report was released in late 2011. The study, which could be a precursor to the area being added to the National Park System, presented four alternative strategies and made some early determinations.

The San Gabriel Mountains and Puente Hills were deemed nationally significant and  suitable for inclusion in the national park system. And a collaborative partnership with local and state agencies was considered preferable to an “infeasible” large, traditional national park unit.  The U.S. Forest Service would continue to own and manage the Angeles National Forest in all the scenarios. Two of the four alternatives involved inclusion of a new model for a unit of the park system. A fifth alternative was to do nothing. 

Two New Parks 

The conservancy is developing, as part of a joint powers authority with the Los Angeles County Flood Control District called the Watershed Conservation Authority, two parks. Woodland Duck Farm was home to thousands of notoriously smelly ducks along a stretch of the San Gabriel River until the owner sold his property to the state in 2001. The Authority bought it in 2004 for $4 million and is transforming it into a 57-acre park.

The conservancy continues to add to the Azusa River Wilderness Park, having brought into the fold the 40-acre El Encanto Restaurant site in 2006 and the 26-acre International Theological Seminary property in 2008.

Common Ground: From the Mountains to the Sea (pdf)

Special Resource Study on San Gabriel Watershed and Mountains Released By National Park Service (National Parks Traveler)

San Gabriel Watershed and Mountains Special Resource Study (National Park Service)

Rivers and Mountains Conservancy's Faustinos Sheds Light on RMC's Mission (Interview with Executive Director Belinda Faustinos, The Planning Report)

California’s Land Conservation Efforts: The Role of State Conservancies (Legislative Analyst’s Office) (pdf)

The work of the Rivers and Mountains Conservancy has been funded primarily by voter-approved statewide propositions, and since its inception in 1999 has provided nearly$90 million in bond money through more than 170 grants to local governments and non-profit organizations.

The expenditures have gone to public recreation and access, land acquisition, and funding site improvement projects. Conservancy money has also been used for acquiring new park land, restoring wetlands, trail development, and river parkway and watershed improvements.

Top 20 Projects Funded by Propositions 40, 50 and 84

·        $8.46 million to acquire as part of a joint-authority 60.76 acres for the Walnut Creek Habitat & Open Space Acquisition project.

·        $5.5 million to buy the Bluebird Ranch. The Glendora Conservancy is the land owner and operator with the city holding the conservation easement.

·        $3.5 million grant to the city of Duarte provided for acquisition of Duarte Foothills Reserve and completion of the Pacific Communities Acquisition project.

·        $3.4 million for development of a trail around a recharging pool in the city of Anaheim

·        $3 million for design and construction of a regional San Gabriel River watershed interpretive center at the Whittier Narrows Regional Park.

·        $2.2 million for the Gibson Mariposa Park project in the city of El Monte.

·        $2 million grant to the city of Seal Beach for development of the San Gabriel River Trail project.

·        $1.8 million for work on the Duck Farm project.

·        $1.67 million to acquire 41.2 acres in Azusa River Wilderness Park.

·        $1.51 million for work on Jefferson Park in the city of Pomona.

·        $1.5 million for acquisition of the 26-acre International Theological Seminary property for the Azusa River Wilderness Park project.

·        $1.44 million for creation of a park along Coyote Creek at Los Alamitos.

·        $1.32 million for completion of the Long Beach Aquarium Expansion project.

·        $1.32 million grant for the city of Monrovia to purchase a 40-acre parcel in the foothills of the Monrovia Hillside Wilderness Preserve

·        $1.32 million for work on the Azusa River Wilderness Park where a mobile home park used to be.

·        $1.3 million for acquisition of 51 acres along the San Gabriel River and improvements to the first major park along its shores, where the notorious smells of the Woodland Duck Farm dominated until the site’s purchase in 2004. 

·        $1.17 million grant for Phase I of the Puente Creek Nature Education Center.  

·        $1.1 million grant to the city of Long Beach for restoration of the Colorado Lagoon.

·        $1.07 million to complete the 1,589-acre Claremont Hills Wilderness Park project with acquisition of 240 acres.

·        $1 million grant to the city of Paramount for development at Ralph Dills Park.

One-third of the conservancy’s $1 million wage and operating expenses are covered by the California Environmental License Plate Fund. The rest come from bond funds. No money is received from the state’s General Fund. 

3-Year Budget (pdf)

Cumulative Grant Project Status Summary (RMC website) (pdf)

Grant Program (RMC website)

A River Runs Through It  (by Roy LaBomme and Emanuel Parker, San Gabriel Valley Newspapers)

Former Duck Farm to Become Park (by J. Michael Kennedy, Los Angeles Times)

The Whittier Narrows Nature Center

The proposed San Gabriel River Discovery Center, first conceived in 2001, was viewed by its proponents as the future gateway to a 17-mile stretch of parks and greenways connecting 10 cities.

Opponents thought it ironic that an agency ostensibly dedicated to habitat preservation would want to pave over land in the 400-acre Whittier Narrows Natural Area to build it. Many thought the existing 2,000-square-foot nature center was adequate and that its demolition and construction of a 14,000-square-foot-building, other structures and a 116-car parking lot was ill-considered and, perhaps, illegal.

“It's too huge,” said Eddie Barajas, 71, an avid bird-watcher who frequents the nature area. “I'm not saying we couldn't use an upgrade. But this thing is a monstrosity that will change things forever.”

Attacks on the old center, a cramped wood-frame house filled with terrariums and stuffed animals that would be replaced by a building hosting modern interactive exhibits, prompted its defenders to scornfully say they were being dismissed as a “handful of elderly white docents” incapable of teaching the children of local working-class minority  families who visit.  

The lead agency, a joint-powers authority made up of the conservancy and two water districts, approved the project in January 2010 and two months later the non-profit Friends of the Whittier Narrows Natural Area filed suit in Los Angeles Superior Court to block it. The suit alleged that the approved Environmental Impact Report did not meet state legal requirements and “sacrificed badly needed endangered-species habitat for a sprawling compound.” 

In November, the Gabrielino Band of Mission Indians denounced the plan because, they said, it would be built on ancestral lands. Conservancy Executive Director Belinda Faustinos said the California Native American Heritage Commission had determined that “Native American cultural resources were not identified within one half-mile” of the project.

One of the arguments made by critics was that projects like the center often find it difficult to financially sustain themselves after their initial funding. In the case of the center, financial problems came early. In April 2011, the California State Parks’ Office of Grants and Local Services blew a big hole in the budget when it rejected the request for a $7 million grant to jumpstart the $22 million project.

As the joint authority scrambled to find replacement funding, the Friends of Whittier Narrows dropped an appeal in October that it had filed after losing its case in Superior Court. “One reason we decided not to pursue the suit was why spend more of our dollars when we don't think (the project) will go anywhere?” said Jim Odling, leader of the Friends group.

The joint authority was $12 million short of its fundraising goal.

Furious Flutter over Project (by Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times)

Campaign to save Whittier Narrows Natural Area (Friends of the Whittier Narrows Natural Area) (pdf)

Pave to Save Whittier Narrows? (by Tibby Rothman, LA Weekly)

Gabrielino Band of Mission Indians Denounces Nature Center (by Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times)

Grant Request for Whittier Narrows Nature Center is Rejected (by Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times)

San Gabriel River Discovery Center Sheds Lawsuit, Begins Fundraising for Whittier Narrows Venter (by Steve Scauzillo, San Gabriel Valley Tribune)

Audit Finds Poor Oversight of Bond Money

When the Department of Finance took a look at the books for the conservancy and its joint powers alter ego, the Watershed Conservation Authority, it not only found “inadequate fiduciary oversight of bond funds.” It also noted that issues from a 2006 audit had yet to be corrected.

Among the problems: $2.4 million in grant funds were doled out before immediate cash needs; using bond money to pay for staff was almost certainly prohibited; the conservancy’s project tracking system was incomplete and inaccurate; grant contracts were too sketchy; and the conservancy and the Authority (which were staffed by the same people) needed arms-length separation to guarantee proper bond fund oversight.

The conservancy responded that at least some of the cash advances were actually reimbursements and it was reducing its presence on the Watershed Conservation Authority. But it disagreed that it had inappropriately used bond money for staff, that it doesn’t monitor projects adequately and that the Authority lacks proper oversight.

Audit of Bond Funds (Department of Finance) (pdf)

Woodland Duck Farm

The ducks are long gone. As many as 15,000 of them at any one time, waddling about on 57 acres along the San Gabriel River. They were primarily known for their stench that wafted across the nearby 605 Freeway and few locals had any regrets when the site was sold to the Trust for Public Land in 2001.The conservancy’s Watershed Conservation Authority bought the property two years later for use as a park.

In 2004, the Los Angeles Times said it “will soon become a sorely needed park,” but its progress hit roadblock after roadblock. A projected 2010 debut was pushed back to 2011, then 2012 and now is expected in 2013. The 22-acre park will have scenic overlook of the river, a riparian area and dirt trails with other amenities likely down the road.

But first there was a not-so-small matter that can’t be ducked. Accumulated duck waste and other pollutants required a thorough cleansing using a process called phytoremediation that uses plants to remove nitrogen from the soil that accumulated in dense concentrations. “We grow stuff that suck the toxics out of the ground, then we let it regrow,” explained Executive Director Mark Stanley in November 2011.

The farm also sits on shallow contaminated ground water that was designated for cleanup as part of a larger Superfund project in 2006. That pollution was not considered related to the ducks. Carrier Corporation was required to carry out the $468,000 Woodland Duck Farm Supplemental Environmental Project.

Former Duck Farm to Become Park (by J. Michael Kennedy, Los Angeles Times)

San Gabriel Valley Superfund Site (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency) (pdf)

Duck Farm Park Project (pdf)

Duck Farm: Final Initial Study and Mitigated Negative Declaration (Watershed Conservation Authority) (pdf)

Duck Farm Construction Begins; Open House Set for Saturday (by Steve Scauzillo, San Gabriel Valley News)

The Rivers and Mountains Conservancy is one of multiple state agencies with jurisdiction over facets of the Los Angeles River. In February 2012, state Senator Kevin deLeon introduced legislation that could impact the conservancy’s activities.

State Senate Bill 1201 would establish a Los Angeles River Interagency Council to promote public access and modify the Los Angeles County Flood Control Act of 1915 to provide for public use of navigable waterways for recreational and educational purposes. It would develop a system for eliminating barriers to public access, coordinate permitting, and develop safety warning systems and signage for public users. 

Opponents of the legislation claimed that it would duplicate efforts already underway, and that the Flood Control Act already authorizes the public uses cited by the bill.  

Senate Bill 1201 (California Legislative Information)

FoLAR’s LA River Vision May Require Jurisdictional Coordination & Governance Change (Friends of the LA River’s Lewis MacAdams and Charles Eddy, The Planning Report)

The Los Angeles River

Heather Wylie won’t go in the history books as an explorer, but her 50-mile jaunt down the Los Angeles River in a kayak in 2008 put the waterway on the map, nonetheless. The government biologist with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers helped organize a boating expedition that established the river as a real waterway, not just the concrete-lined sewer envisioned by most people since its “taming” in the ‘30s.

Wylie planned the excursion after learning that the corps planned to adopt regulations (which it did) that would strip the L.A. watershed of Clean Water Act protections. She found a video online of George Wolfe kayaking on the river and arranged the trip with him and some fellow environmental enthusiasts. Armed with a film permit to get them past a Los Angeles Police Department patrol, the group paddled out, mostly on the water but occasionally with kayaks carried through the drier spots. Three days after leaving the headwaters, they reached their goal in Long Beach. 

 It cost Wylie her job. “I got treated as some kind of disloyal traitor,” Wylie told the Los Angeles Times. “But I was happy to sacrifice if it was going to save the river.”

Two years later, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency cited Wylie’s trip and deemed the river “traditional navigable waters,” giving it the protection of the Clean Water Act, making it available for federal funds and helping refocus attention on the river’s potential.

But as relatively small, incremental changes return portions of the river to a more natural state, the debate continues over what should be done.

A Gamble on the River Pays Off (by Hector Tobar, Los Angeles Times)

Los Angeles River Tries On New Role, as Waterway (by Jennifer Medina, New York Times)

Whose River Is It, Anyway? (by Judith Coburn, Los Angeles Times)

Tear Out the Concrete

When paving of the Los Angeles River began during the 1930s Depression, it was an era of big public works projects that gave jobs to the jobless. The work was reinforced by a belief that ambitious technology-laden projects were necessary to improve on nature and, in the case of the river, were inevitable since the waterway was already dead. Concrete, rather than social and land use solutions, were deemed the only way to make cities along the river safe for development.

For some, the concrete-lined river symbolizes an anti-environment attitude “where the concept of community and place continued to erode before the onslaught of freeways, concrete, and channelized riverbeds.”  Denser populations have grown along the river, replacing in many circumstances, abandoned commercial and industrial developments. This has increased the need for open space and recreational facilities.

Friends of the Los Angeles River (FoLAR) have advocated a more enlightened form of urban restoration for two decades. It calls for better controls on toxic dumping in the river, use of flood-protection technologies that emphasize the restoration of a healthy ecosystem, revegetating the watershed to control seasonal flooding and debris flow, better use of reclaimed water for irrigation and recharging of aquifers and restoring natural habitat where possible. The group recommends treating the cause of flooding—urban runoff—rather than the symptom—channel capacity. 

A decision by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2010 to reverse an earlier decision by the Army Corps of Engineers and recognize the river as a navigable waterway was formal recognition that restoration was possible and a new approach a necessity.

Successful projects continue to pop up along the river and more are planned. The 32-acre Chinatown-Cornfields site north of downtown Los Angeles was slated to become an industrial development on the site of an rail yard before it became, instead, the Los Angeles State Historic Park and is now awaiting the next level of development. And the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan has identified more than 240 potential projects to restore habitat, and increase recreation and public access all along its banks.

As Los Angeles's River Runs Again, Designers Determine Its Course (by Alissa Walker, Good Design)

L.A.'s River Clears Hurdle (by Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times)

Re-Envisioning the Los Angeles River: A Program of Community and Ecological Revitalization (Urban & Environmental Policy Institute Occidental College)

The Los Angeles River Watershed (The River Project)

The Los Angeles River: Reshaping the Urban Landscape (American Institute of Architects)

Give Up; It’s Already Water Under the Bridge

The state and federal government have been building dams, debris basins, bridges and channel improvements for more than 70 years to lessen the impact of Los Angeles River flooding that has brought death and destruction throughout the region. Its primary purpose has been flood control since Congress made that declaration in the Flood Control Act of 1936 and five years later authorized the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to build and operate major flood-control facilities.

Due to the topography and climate, the river was never a classic, deep flowing waterway. And now that the city has grown more dense it would be unfeasible to step back in time to simpler days. Unlike most rivers, the Los Angeles River is relatively short (51 miles), and drops precipitously (795 feet) from its headwaters in the San Fernando Valley to its end in Long Beach. It is 45 times shorter than the Mississippi River, but drops 150 feet more. The result is a flow that varies from a trickle to a deluge.

Tearing out the concrete and returning the river to a natural state would be inordinately expensive in an age of diminished economic resources with uncertain consequences. And it defies accumulated data and research that compelled the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers  to recommend in the 1990s a strengthening of the channel rather than its destruction in the Los Angeles County Drainage Area (LACDA).

Director Stephanie Pincetl of UCLA’s Center for Sustainable Urban Systems questions whether work on the river is a restoration or a reinvention. She points out that the river’s original indigenous flow is captured by the Los Angeles Department of Public Works for drinking water and what flows now is largely treated sewage from the Tillman Sewage Treatment Plant upstream and runoff from urban irrigation. Pincetl says that the river’s natural flow is sporadic, seasonal and, if left to its own devices, bound to meander off course, which does not lend itself to visions of a “permanent channel, decoratively revegetated, with manicured access and open spaces.” That would not be a restored nature; it would be an “invented nature” and one that might not be sustainable.

If work on the river were truly a restoration, she says, it would have to account for flora and fauna’s need for natural down time in seasons where native plants are conditioned to go dormant. Development of recreational uses and a regularly flowing river would  reduce the ability of animals to move about freely.

Pincetl also questions the use of the river for recreational and open space purposes. “There is a truly dirty secret about the commercial enterprise that is the restoration of the Los Angeles River,” she wrote on her blog in 2009. “Many sections of the River are freeway adjacent and therefore exposed to high levels of air pollution.”   

Discussion of Environmental Issues/Environmental Analysis (L.A. Department of Public Works)

Restoration, (Re)Invention? The Politics of Nature in L.A. (Director Stephanie Pincetl, Center for Sustainable Urban Systems)

Belinda V. Faustinos, 2002-2011

Mary A. Angle, 1999-2002