Calabasas streamlines environmental agencies

By Michael Picarellapic@theacorn.com

The Calabasas City Council is bent on cutting waste.

Recently, the city council approved the merger of the Calabasas Tree Board with the Calabasas Environmental Commission. Calabasas Mayor Barry Groveman said the consolidation of the two agencies was accomplished in the name of government efficiency and waste reduction.

“The city is more efficient in a couple of ways,” Groveman said. “Every time you have a separate body meeting, you have more staff time required to be dedicated to it. You have two choices: you can increase staff and become more of a bureaucracy, or you can decide to become more efficient. We decided to be more efficient.”

The consolidation of the tree board and environmental commission also saves the city extra CTV (Calabasas TV) money.

“It costs the city money every time we televise a meeting,” Groveman said.

The merger doesn’t create a burden to applicants who come to the city with a proposed project, according to the mayor. In some cases, applicants might have been forced to go before both the tree board and the environmental commission. That’s no longer the case, according to Groveman.

“I wasn’t able to convince (previous council members) of this merger before, but we have a very positive and focused council now,” Groveman said. “I believed all along that if you can do in one meeting what otherwise takes two, you’re better off—so long as you can preserve public access, which we’re doing because we’re creating a commission that can serve both functions.”

All tree board responsibilities will carry over to the environmental commission, according to Calabasas City Manager Tony Coroalles.

“These kinds of efficiency moves are part of what the public expects policymakers and leaders to do, which is to always be mindful of how to be efficient with public dollars,” Groveman said.

Calabasas City Councilmember James Bozajian wasn’t in favor of the merger.

“I voted ‘no’ simply because we have so many people who have volunteered for commissions,” Bozajian said. “As long as we have community volunteers, we should accommodate them and have two separate bodies.”

Calabasas Community Development Director Maureen Tamuri told Bozajian and the rest of the council that the tree board had asked for the consolidation of the two bodies.

“I talked to individual tree board members and that wasn’t my sense of it,” Bozajian said.

The tree board’s decision wasn’t unanimous.

The city council will make more moves to reduce waste and become more efficient, according to Groveman.

One other potential merger could be the Calabasas Education Fund with the Education Commission, officials said.