Plan for Agoura Hills, Westlake : RTD to Vote Today on Service West of Valley

Directors of the Southern California Rapid Transit District will vote today on a new passenger policy designed to preserve bus service to Agoura Hills and Westlake Village--and to prevent the defection of those cities from the RTD.

District directors will be asked to authorize minimum-level bus service for “geographic corridors” such as the Ventura Freeway corridor west of the San Fernando Valley without regard to daily passenger loads.

RTD officials hope that, in return, the two cities west of the San Fernando Valley will quietly drop a state Assembly bill that would let them withdraw from the transit district and use tax revenues to start their own bus system.

The policy proposal would salvage the RTD’s troubled Line 161, which provides hourly weekday daytime service between Canoga Park and the eastern edge of Thousand Oaks. The line was targeted for shutdown late last year as part of a district belt-tightening after an RTD survey determined that only 471 people were riding it each day.

But the new policy would not protect the area’s second public bus route. Line 423 provides weekday commuter service between Westlake Village and downtown Los Angeles and and still could face extinction if the RTD’s budget woes worsen, the district said. The route is used by an average of 151 riders daily.

City officials in Westlake Village and Agoura Hills said the district’s proposed policy may not be enough for them to drop their get-out-of-the-RTD campaign.

At the cities’ urging, Assemblywoman Cathie Wright (R-Simi Valley) introduced legislation Feb. 13 to allow Agoura Hills and Westlake Village to pull out of the RTD and withhold an estimated $900,000 a year in taxes the two cities generate for the RTD.

Her measure, Assembly Bill 3159, is scheduled for its first review April 30 before the Assembly Transportation Committee, according to Michael P. Murphy, Wright’s local field aide. He said Wright will drop, or amend, the bill if officials of the two cities ask her.

“We’re still going to work to get that bill passed,” Agoura Hills City Manager Michael Huse said Wednesday. “There has been no change as far as we’re concerned . . . It’s just an RTD board policy that they could reverse in the future if there’s a funding problem.”

Agoura Hills Mayor Vicky Leary said the proposed legislation “is a safety valve--we’re still not sure the RTD couldn’t still pull out.”

Westlake Village Mayor Bonnie Klove said her city has not decided whether to continue pursuing the bill, although she said city officials “are not happy” that the proposed RTD policy does not guarantee permanent local bus service.

“We haven’t been promised that, six months down the road, the RTD board won’t change its mind and drop our service,” Klove said.

As for the Assembly bill, “You have to play hardball every once in a while,” she said. “You hate to, but you have to do it.”

Officials of both cities said RTD representatives have met several times with them--on one occasion treating them to a bus ride across their two towns--since Wright’s bill was introduced.

An RTD planner huddled with the Westlake Village City Council Wednesday night and scheduled a similar meeting with the Agoura Hills council next Tuesday.

RTD officials have also promised to reroute Line 161 through a residential section of Agoura Hills, something the district had refused to do when Agoura Hills officials requested it last year. The proposed route would send buses along Thousand Oaks Boulevard between Kanan and Lindero Canyon roads.

Stephen T. Parry, RTD manager of bus planning, said Wednesday that the district is studying the possibility of turning Line 423 over to a private operator if cutbacks require its elimination by the RTD.