City Considers Buying Part of Broome Ranch : Thousand Oaks: The $1-million deal would require a big portion of the 640-acre area be used for a golf course and stables. Some residents want it all kept as wilderness.

The Thousand Oaks City Council will consider spending $1 million to acquire part of Broome Ranch--on the condition that a large portion of the 640-acre wilderness area be developed into a golf course and horse stables.

The money for the flat, wildflower-strewn stretch of Broome Ranch south of Potrero Road would come from the city’s golf course fund, which is earmarked exclusively for public links.

Thus, if the council approves the expenditure on Tuesday, officials would effectively commit themselves to a golf course, even before they can assess environmental impacts or hear public testimony, Councilman Frank Schillo said.

“That is a risk,” he acknowledged. “But it’s such a big piece of property, I can hardly believe there’s no place for a golf course somewhere on it.”

That attitude infuriates some Newbury Park residents, who insist the entire mountainous ranch should remain wild--especially since a huge housing development is slated for construction right across the street. Broome Ranch, a prime wildlife habitat, sweeps through sandstone cliffs and craggy volcanic outcroppings.

“I am so enraged, I can hardly speak,” local activist Michelle Koetke said. “This is an outrage, an insult, yet another back-room deal. When does this hunger to devour pristine lands stop?”

The proposed $1-million expenditure is technically a loan to the purchasing arm of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, which struck a deal last month to buy Broome Ranch for $4.2 million. The Conejo Recreation and Park District will consider loaning the agency another $1.9 million, planning administrator Tom Sorensen said.

The conservancy needs the loans to cover its check when escrow on Broome Ranch closes in mid-October. And the city has no other ready source of cash except the golf course fund, which is supported by playing fees at the Los Robles municipal links, officials said.

If the loans go through, the city of Thousand Oaks and the park district will jointly assume title to the flat stretch of Broome Ranch, a former barley farm now covered with tall grass and prickly flowers.

The financing plan assumes a golf course will be built on that property--both loans are to be paid back over several decades by money generated through playing fees at a future Broome Ranch links, officials said.

That plan seems to run against the vision of Broome Ranch as the gateway to an unbroken stretch of federal and state parkland sweeping down to the Pacific. But although he has previously declared, with great fanfare, that the ranch will remain parkland forever, the conservancy’s executive director declined to comment on the golf course proposal.

“I’m not sticking my nose into what’s an issue between the city and the park district,” said Joseph Edmiston, who engineered the purchase of Broome.

Local environmentalists, however, didn’t shy away from criticism.

“There’s been no public input at all, and that’s unacceptable,” said Sierra Club activist Cassandra Auerbach. “Decisions are being made before the (environmental review and comment) process has even started.”

Responding to those concerns, Councilwoman Judy Lazar insisted the city will not lock itself into tees and fairways on Broome Ranch. If environmental studies indicate that a golf course would destroy the property, the city can always seek other ways to get its loan repaid, she said.

“I don’t think we’re committed absolutely,” Lazar said. But she added that building a golf course there seemed “eminently reasonable,” especially since intensive grazing has already disturbed the natural ecosystem south of Potrero Road.

Lazar and Schillo both pointed out that fees at a future Broome Ranch golf course would fund maintenance and acquisition of more parkland within the city. In addition, they said building horse stables on the property would fulfill a long-standing promise to the equestrian community.

“I see (many) good things that will happen from this, and I don’t see any downside,” Schillo said.

Local golfers took a similar view. “I can’t understand why anyone would object to a golf course because it manages to retain all the beauty of open space and even enhances it,” said Betty Harwood, a realtor who lives in Newbury Park.

But even some who agreed that a golf course might work well on Broome Ranch expressed dismay at the proposal before the council on Tuesday. City Manager Grant Brimhall and park district General Manager Tex Ward drafted the report calling for the million-dollar loan and conceptual approval of a golf course.

“This is another example of preliminary agreements being formulated outside the public view,” Councilwoman Jaime Zukowski said. “Broome Ranch is a public asset and there should be much more citizen involvement. I’m really disappointed with the process.”

Furthermore, critics said, the city has already poured more than $100,000 into studies on a potential golf course at Hill Canyon, a remote, arid tract in the Santa Rosa Valley. To switch gears and suddenly begin spending money on a possible Broome Ranch links seemed wasteful--and premature without citizen input, Zukowski said.