COLUMN ONE REGIONAL REPORT : Battle Cry Echoes in Canyons : Environmentalists and residents face developers eager to build in urban refuges. The conflict between property rights and protection of natural areas gains new urgency.

At a rustic hideaway just a few miles from the bustle of Laguna Beach, Loraine Hollingsworth raises chickens, peacocks and horses, occasionally riding her bicycle into town to deliver fresh eggs to friends. For the 54-year-old painter, home is a remodeled carport tucked away in Laguna Canyon, surrounded by a canvas of towering oak trees and steep, rugged slopes.

She calls it Shangri-La.

It has been 40 years since her father, a carpenter, bought a lot nearby, cutting through the thick brush by hand to build a small house for the two of them. She has lived in the canyon ever since, adding on a small, one-story dwelling for her own daughter and granddaughter.

“It’s so peaceful here I didn’t even realize what was happening around me until about 1985 when I saw mountains being laid out and houses being marched across our hillsides,” Hollingsworth said.

What she saw frightened her. How much longer before her own rural retreat would be invaded by strip shopping malls and thousands of new residents cramped into look-alike homes? She began writing angry letters to newspapers, city officials, congressmen--anyone who would listen: Stop development in Laguna Canyon.

Hollingsworth is not alone. The debate over Laguna Canyon’s future is just one among dozens of similar mini-explosions occurring throughout Southern California as development spills out of the flatlands and nibbles away at the foothills and canyons, the last holdouts to urbanization.

From the brush-covered, desert slopes near the San Bernardino Mountains to the hillsides of southern Orange County, alarmed canyon-dwellers and environmentalists are rising up against developers who have targeted their neighborhoods for luxury apartments, houses, condominiums and golf resorts. From multimillion-dollar estates in Malibu to sacred Indian burial grounds in Palm Springs, to the north shores of Lake Miramar in San Diego County, they are waging one last offensive in the canyons to defend what remains of their natural heritage.

Armed with fistfuls of environmental impact reports, their complaints sound the same: There is already too much traffic. The canyons, located in “environmentally sensitive” areas, are prone to flooding. More homes would displace rare species of birds, bobcat, deer, and other animals. But above all, the canyons are the last large parcels of undeveloped land and should, for that reason alone, be preserved.

“They are separate little worlds that give you peace and tranquillity,” said Laura Lake, an adjunct professor of environmental policy at UCLA. “If you lose them, you lose them forever.”

Issues long the subject of academic debate--when individual property rights end and the public’s right to protect the environment begins, for example, or what role government should play in controlling growth--have taken on a new urgency.

Several developments proposed more than a decade ago are nearing the end of a time-consuming permit process. After numerous costly delays, often because of strong environmental opposition, several of the most controversial projects are close to breaking ground, creating a sense of panic in anti-growth camps. Furthermore, a resurrected Earth Day movement that hailed the ‘90s as the decade of the environment has focused public attention on vanishing natural resources.

“As I’ve always said, until your shorts are on fire, you never bother to pay attention to what’s going on,” said Gordon Murley, president of the Federation of Hillside and Canyon Assns. in Los Angeles.

Like hundreds of Rip Van Winkles suddenly awakened from a 20-year slumber to find progress nibbling at their feet, alarmed canyon-dwellers are clinging desperately to a rural lifestyle reminiscent of an earlier time.

For many, the canyons are symbolic remnants of the rich natural history that originally attracted settlers to Southern California. While the prospect of tackling air pollution or other large-scale environmental issues seems overwhelming, the canyons are tangible, the enemy somewhat identifiable. One need look no further than the bulldozers steadily grading, “savaging” the landscape.

But developers argue that most canyon-dwellers are affluent professionals and artists, suffering from a bad case of not-in-my-backyard syndrome. Landowners have the right, they say, to develop their land as they see fit.

“After all,” remarked an Orange County planning official, “this isn’t Russia.”

According to growth proponents, sparsely populated canyon areas are the next logical direction for expansion to meet the demands of a rapidly growing population.

“There will be 5 million to 7 million new residents in Southern California by the year 2010,” said Brian Kennedy, vice president of the Claremont Institute, a political research center in Montclair. “Now, do we ship them out of the state forcibly, make their lives so miserable they don’t want to live here, or tell them they can’t have any more children?”

It is difficult to determine how many confrontations have occurred between developers and canyon-dwellers in all of Southern California. But in the last year alone, there have been at least a dozen such skirmishes.

For example:

* Last June, 10 protesters in the San Fernando Valley chained themselves to bulldozers for five hours, forcing a developer in Caballero Canyon to stop construction temporarily on a road extension into the Santa Monica Mountains. The road project was part of a 178-home luxury subdivision that already had received government approval. However, environmentalists feared that a new, improved road would speed up development elsewhere in the mountains.

* In November, 8,500 demonstrators marched in Orange County to show their opposition to an Irvine Co. proposal to build a 3,200-home development in Laguna Canyon. The marchers came from across Southern California--and some from as far away as Texas--forming a human chain more than half a mile long. After the protest, the company temporarily put aside its decade-old proposal, allowing the county time to explore the possibility of buying the canyon.

* In April, comedian Bob Hope came under strong attack from canyon preservationists for his plans to option most of his 7,400 acres of undeveloped land in the Santa Susana Mountains to developers intent on building high-priced homes and golf courses, including a 340-acre resort in Malibu. Hope, reportedly stung by criticism that he was selfish and greedy, has agreed to a land swap in which he would transfer 5,700 acres of his mountain property in Los Angeles and Ventura counties to a state parks agency for below-market value, in exchange for some less-sensitive federal land.

* In May, environmentalists in Studio City asked the city of Los Angeles to declare plants and wildlife in Fryman Canyon a “historic monument” in a last-ditch effort to block a 26-home development. The tactic by an environmental coalition whose supporters include actors Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson has sparked a raging philosophical debate between developers and preservationists over the very meaning of culture.

* Residents of Trabuco Canyon in Orange County are fighting a growth plan that would allow thousands of homes to be built where 200 now exist. They are vehemently opposed to a proposal to widen a two-lane country road leading into the canyon, complaining that it would be a first step toward denser development.

“I think people are beginning to understand that when there are no canyons left and only health clubs and Las Vegas to go for recreation, something will be missing from their lives,” said Jean Rosenfeld, a UCLA Fulbright scholar studying people’s relationship to the land.

Subconsciously, she says, people form attachments to the land around them.

“Every human being from the cave people on have established sacred places where they can go, whether for meditation or a retreat,” she said.

When these are disturbed, “people have a sense of utter despair and invasion,” Rosenfeld said.

That sense of desperation has filtered into Trabuco Canyon, a rural hamlet of 400 residents at the edge of the Cleveland National Forest.

“It’s going to be like Custer’s last stand,” said Ray Chandos, a 40-year-old college professor who moved to Trabuco eight years ago. “If they (developers) can get all the land graded before the environmental stuff hits the fan, they’ll get it all.”

Part of what is at stake in Trabuco is a picturesque stretch of roadway that has been called one of the most beautiful rural scenes in Orange County. Here, a two-lane country highway winds through the rugged terrain--covered in sections by a natural canopy of oak branches that creates a breathtaking tunnel effect. County plans to widen the road probably would mean uprooting many of the oaks. In response, the canyon women’s club has started an adopt-a-tree program. For $5, they will attach a white banner to an oak with the donor’s name on it. The proceeds go to a preservation fund.

Usually, those who would preserve the canyons are forced to resort to other methods. They march. They chain themselves to bulldozers. They hire lawyers to find flaws in environmental impact reports, forcing delays in construction.

Some environmental groups have even tried their hand at drafting legislation. In 1988, San Diego County voters chose from two measures that would have protected canyons and other sensitive areas. The so-called “sensitive lands initiative,” written by San Diegans for Managed Growth, would have made any slope steeper than 25% and taller than 25 feet off-limits to builders.

Also on the ballot was the “quality of life initiative,” a tougher development-restricting proposal written by Citizens for Limited Growth. Both measures were defeated, however, by a $2-million building industry campaign. More recently, slow-growth initiatives penned by some of the same groups have made no mention of protection for environmentally sensitive lands.

However, the most unusual tactic yet involves attempts by environmentalists in Fryman Canyon to obtain a city historic designation for the plants and wildlife there. Their argument is that the site has been used by the public for generations and is a “gateway” to the Santa Monica Mountains.

It is a case being watched closely by both camps, raising the fundamental question of whether culture is, by definition, man-made. The outcome could set an important precedent, creating a new weapon for environmentalists to use in their war against developers.

Developers decry the stall tactics, claiming that delays in construction schedules merely drive up their cost of doing business, raising prices of new homes by as much as 20% each year. According to statistics provided by TRW Real Estate Information Services in Anaheim, a new home in Los Angeles County costs an average of $238,102, compared with $256,043 in Orange County, $146,000 in San Bernardino County, $148,073 in Riverside County and $201,184 in San Diego County.

“The canyon situation is a philosophical question of, ‘Do people have the right to stop that kind of construction?’ which is the subject of much heated debate here in Southern California,” said Kennedy, the Claremont Institute vice president. “It’s important to have people living in homes and it’s important to protect the environment, and we have to balance those two concerns.”

Planned residential communities such as Rancho Santa Margarita, while offensive to some canyon residents, provide housing within the reach of two-income professionals and others who might otherwise be shut out of an inflated market.

“The canyon areas are beautiful and it’s important that they be (treated) with care and sensitivity,” said Santa Margarita Co. spokeswoman Diane Gaynor. “But many (homes) are priced at $500,000 and up. That’s wonderful for a certain number of people, but where are all our teachers going to live?”

Developers assert that people living in canyons must look past parochial interests and participate in environmental partnerships with builders to ensure that those areas that are truly the most sensitive are preserved.

“Candidly, I think (they) are going to get a lot more mileage working along with the building industry in their local jurisdictions, because by 2010, there will be another 400,000 people in Orange County alone and they’ve got to live somewhere,” said Mike Lennon, director of community affairs for the Building Industry Assn. of Southern California. “We just can’t afford to dig in our heels and say, ‘This is what I want and no one else can be here,’ or, ‘We’re going to build on every square inch of the land.’ ”

In some areas, environmentalists are putting their money where their mouths are. In Riverside and San Bernardino counties, efforts are under way to form regional park and open-space districts that would oversee the purchase of parkland. Money would be raised through a special benefit assessment of $30 to $35 per household, which would require the approval of a majority of voters.

“I think what has led to it in our two counties is the rapid urbanization and realization by our residents that something needs to be done,” said Steve Messerli, director of San Bernardino County’s regional parks department.

Some observers go so far as to suggest that these open-space districts are the wave of the future.

“I think that a lot of people are looking at what’s going on in Riverside and San Bernardino and saying, ‘We may do this too,’ ” said Bill Havert, a land consultant who has advised both counties on their plans.

Yet the staggering cost will make it hard to persuade voters that outright purchase is worthwhile. In Laguna Canyon, for example, the Irvine Co. is asking a “ballpark” figure of $100 million for 2,150 acres, the proposed site of the controversial 3,200-home planned community. Company officials have put development plans on hold to allow the county time to study the possibility of a bond issue to finance purchase of the land for a state park.

However, in fiscally conservative Orange County, where residents have proved to be among the least willing in the state to tax themselves, few hold out much hope that voters will support such a bond issue. A recent poll by J. Moore Methods showed that only 51% of respondents would vote for a proposed $200-million bond issue to buy open space, including acreage in Laguna Canyon. Two-thirds of voters must approve such measures.

Irvine Co. officials are neutral.

“Is it realistic?” asked Irvine Co. Vice President Larry Thomas. “That’s the real test of public will: Is the property so important that people will pay for it?”

DISPUTED TERRITORY

The canyons of Southern California’s foothills, some of the region’s last open space, have become the latest battleground between developers and preservationists. Here are some of the trouble spots:

1. Corral Canyon--Entertainer Bob Hope came under strong attack for his plans to option most of his 7,400 acres of undeveloped land in the Santa Susana Mountains to developers intent on building high-priced homes and golf courses--including a 340-acre resort in Corral Canyon.

2. Caballero Canyon--Environmentalists are fighting a developer’s plans to build a road extension into the Santa Monica Mountains on the grounds that it would speed up other development.

3. Las Pulgas Canyon--A developer recently abandoned a two-year effort to build 50 homes in the pristine, coastal canyon after hitting a wall of opposition from nearby residents. The 26-acre property is now up for sale.

4. Fryman Canyon--Preservationists are asking the city of Los Angeles to declare the canyon’s plants and wildlife a historic monument in a last-minute effort to block a 26-home development proposed for the canyon.

5. Summit Valley--Residents oppose a 16,000-home development that will bring 41,000 new residents to the rural community of a few hundred homes. The city of Barstow is suing neighboring Hesperia for approving the developers’ environmental impact report on the grounds that there is not enough water in the desert to supply the massive project.

6. Chino Hills--An environmental group is attempting to have Carbon Canyon Road designated a scenic highway to stop development in the surrounding Chino Hills.

7. Modjeska Canyon--Residents are opposing plans by a Riverside investor to build 60 homes on 300 acres in nearby Harding Canyon, arguing that development would change the character of the canyon. In a separate issue, county plans to turn the home of renowned 19th-Century Shakespearean actress Helen Modjeska into a county park have raised fears that it will bring traffic and boisterous crowds into an area that prides itself on isolation.

8. Trabuco Canyon--Canyon residents are fighting a growth plan that would allow thousands of new homes to be built where 200 now exist. They are trying stop the widening of a picturesque country road leading into the canyon.

9. Laguna Canyon--Environmentalists are opposing a 3,200-home development proposed by the Irvine Co. A march last November drew 8,500 protesters from across the region.

10. Andreas and Murray canyons--In a longstanding dispute, environmentalists are opposing plans by a developer to build a country club, hotel, golf resort and 900 homes on Indian tribal land in the rock-studded desert. Plans are on hold while negotiations continue between the two sides.