Planning For Future Uses of King Gillette Ranch Park (Formerly Soka University) Has Begun

The wooded valley southeast of the corner of Las Virgenes Road and Mulholland Highway has been known in the past as, Soka University. It has recently been renamed by its new owners - a consortium of state and federal park agencies - as KING GILLETTE RANCH.

After the successful culmination of one of the greatest land use battles in the history of Southern California, this magnificent property has become, and will be forevermore, a great public park, the crown jewel of the SANTA MONICA MOUNTAINS NATIONAL RECREATION AREA, containing within its 600 acres large areas of unspoiled oak woodland and meadow habitat, along with lawns and a few buildings for visitor and interpretive facilities, overnight dormitories for schoolchildren, and one of the most scenic mountain backdrops to be found anywhere in southern California.

KING GILLETTE RANCH is a real community treasure, with its 4000 oak trees, long, open, oak-rimmed meadows, and spectacular mountain backdrop. Now that this magnificent valley has become part of the National Park System, the challenge will be to preserve its fauna and flora and scenic vistas while at the same time making them accessible to the park-starved people of one of the world's great population centers.

KING GILLETTE RANCH is a joint project of the NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, the CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF PARKS AND RECREATION, and the MRCA, an arm of the SANTA MONICA MOUNTAINS CONSERVANCY. Planning for future use of the park has begun with a public scoping meeting in November. Public comments are being accepted now.

For more information on opportunities for public participation in the KING GILLETTE RANCH planning process log on: http://www.smmc.ca.gov/KGRP/publicinvolvement.html

You can submit comments online here: http://www.smmc.ca.gov/KGRP/index.html
or you can email: SAMO_KGR_planning@nps.gov

Snail mail users can send comments to the following address:

King Gillette Ranch Planning Project,
ATTN: Project Manager
401 West Hillcrest Drive
Thousand Oaks, CA 91360
Fax: (805) 370-1850

According to the DRAFT DESIGN CONCEPT PLAN for KING GILLETTE RANCH, management objectives will include the following:

• Conservation of core wildlife habitat and a key wildlife corridor
• Protection of the Malibu Creek and Lagoon watershed
• Protection of a scenic resource
• Public access for nature education and recreational uses
• An inter-agency gateway visitor center for the Santa Monica Mountains
• Identifying and implementing improvements for a joint agency
• Administrative, environmental and cultural education center
• Santa Monica Mountains gateway visitor center

Tentative plans call for a majority of the property - about 322 acres - to be managed as LOW INTENSITY USE NATURAL AREAS, with only passive uses allowed, including trails. About 100 acres of former agricultural lands are proposed for MODERATE INTENSITY USES, while 59 acres of lawns, driveways, and buildings in the cultural core in the northwest part of the park are proposed for HIGH INTENSITY RECREATIONAL USES.

Tentative plans for King Gillette Ranch include an existing trail through oak woodlands to a viewsite with a panoramic view of Malibu Creek State Park, along with two proposed trails, one following the crest of the 400' ridge on the south border of King Gillette; the other following a higher ridge to the northeast. The BACKBONE TRAIL, including a trail camp, is just inside Malibu Creek State Park 500 yards to the west of King Gillette Ranch Park.

Adaptive re-use of some of the existing buildings could include the following:

• Interagency Visitor Center - 6900 sf stable building near the entrance
• Environmental Education Center- Dormitory building near parking lot
• Novitiate - Interagency conservation science center (or, perhaps, park operations center)

Visitors and urban residents often look on the Mediterranean chaparral habitats of southern California as alien environments and tend to avoid them. In KING GILLETTE RANCH PARK the visitor will first be introduced to a more familiar setting of green lawns, trees, and buildings similar to an urban park, but the surrounding oak woodlands and mountain backdrop, along with the deer that graze on the lawns in the morning and the coyotes that howl at night will eventually lure him into the wilder parts of the park and the wilderness of adjoining Malibu Creek State Park, ultimately introducing visitors and the children of Los Angeles by gradual stages to the wilderness values the Sierra Club was created to defend.