Land Use

Bruce W. McClendon, the chief land use planner for Los Angeles County, was fired Friday by the county's chief executive. McClendon said he was called to a meeting with William T Fujioka and told he was terminated from his $191,028-a-year job as head of the Department of Regional Planning. Security officers later escorted him out of the building. Fujioka said Friday that personnel rules barred him from publicly disclosing the reason behind McClendon's termination, which was effective immediately.

Previously, Out There visited Barlow Respiratory Hospital, which has operated for more than a century, little noticed by the outside world and hidden away near Dodger Stadium. Big changes are afoot; the hospital is leading an effort to redevelop its 25-acre campus. Since the campus is just two miles north of downtown Los Angeles, that represents a big opportunity -- but, judging by reader response, one that will generate no small amount of passion and debate.

Boulder County, Colo., officials acted illegally when they turned down a local church's request to double its size, but their decision was not motivated by religious bias, a federal jury decided this week. Rocky Mountain Christian Church sued the county in 2006 after being denied a permit to expand. Church officials said that county commissioners had violated a federal law protecting religious institutions from discrimination by local governments.

When the bulldozers come to Ft. MacArthur next spring, Joe Janesic will take it personally. For more than two decades, the 40-year-old has been a mainstay of the historic military site in San Pedro that was built in 1914 and served as an Army post until 1974. He organizes events, conducts tours, handles media and even restores vintage phones -- all as a volunteer. A founding member of the Ft. MacArthur Museum, he has dedicated his life to preserving every relic on the grounds.

Irvine is perhaps best known for its master-planned villages, business prowess and designation as the nation's safest city of its size, four years running. In other words, the type of community where you'd expect to find everything running smoothly. But that prosperous tranquillity does not extend to City Hall, which has a reputation for bitter and divisive politics.

Measure A City of Los Angeles What it does: Imposes a $36-a-year tax on each parcel of property in the city to raise money for youth and anti-gang programs. Requires two-thirds vote. Back story: Every property in the city, whether it's a lot with a 20,000-square-foot mansion in Holmby Hills or one with a 700-square-foot cabin in Highland Park -- or even a skyscraper or a Wal-Mart -- would be assessed the same amount.

In downtown Los Angeles on Saturday there were sights and smells and sounds of a milestone event the concrete urban core had not hosted in more than a century. Fresh bark. Tinkling water cascading down a rocky slope. California sycamores and coast live oaks, an expansive meadow of velvety green grass and squealing children everywhere -- in soccer fields and on slides, clambering atop playground snakes and turtles.

The southern half of this swath of grasslands and chiseled pink spires looks untouched from a distance. Closer up, the scars of history are easy to see. Unexploded bombs lie in ravines, a reminder of when the military confiscated the land from the Oglala Sioux tribe during World War II and turned it into an artillery range. Poachers who have stolen thousands of fossils over the years have left gouges in the landscape.

The federal government on Thursday took the first step toward a massive expansion of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area as President Bush signed legislation ordering the Interior Department to consider making additions to the protected area.