A group of developers urge the council to accept the decision in order to improve relations with the state agency.
By Olivia Damavandi / Assistant Editor
The Malibu City Council on Monday night decided to postpone its response to the California Coastal Commission’s recent land-use restriction of a parcel located near Bluffs Park. The council will discuss the matter at its June 14 meeting.
The Coastal Commission at its meeting last month in Ventura finalized a decision to restrict as passive recreation a 1.75-acre piece of land, known as the Crummer property, proposed for donation to the city by a developer as part of a development agreement. The Coastal Commission also approved a decision that future residential development could not have a gate. City officials have spoken against the decision on the donated land because they want the property to be used as a ball field. Normally they would have to wait six months to bring the issue back to the Coastal Commission, but the commissioners waived that time period.
Developer Richard Ackerman had offered the piece of land as a potential ball field as part of a development agreement with the city that would allow him to build five luxury homes on the 24-acre Crummer site. City officials for years have wanted to build a ball field on the property since it is located next to Bluffs Park.
The council members unanimously voted to continue the item to their June 14 meeting so their decision would be made, as Councilmember Pamela Conley Ulich put it, “not in the fog of war.”
To request that the Crummer site be designated for active recreation, Mayor Jefferson Wagner and Mayor Pro Tem John Sibert were selected to form a Crummer LCPA Ad Hoc Committee, and the council directed City Manager Jim Thorsen to allocate $20,000 to contract the services of a consultant to communicate directly with members of the Coastal Commission.
“We need to have city council members talking to members of the Coastal Commission in general about building relationships,” Sibert said. “If we’re going to do that anyway, that [the Crummer site negotiation] ought to be a piece of this whole effort.”
A handful of local developers encouraged the council to accept the commission’s park use and gate restrictions decision because, they said, it would improve the city’s turbulent relationship with the state agency.
“The city would be losing the opportunity to change its relationship with the California Coastal Commission because we truly believe that the commission’s approval of the waiver [on the time period to bring back the issue] represents vote on a change,” project applicant Robert Gold told the council. He added that rejecting the commission’s decision could bankrupt Ackerman, who is in the midst of refinancing the development.
David Reznick, president of Malibu Bay Company, also urged the council to accept the commission’s decision because, he said, rejecting it would “play right into opponents of the city that still sit on the commission that often times view the city as elitist.”
Reznick warned the council that rejecting the decision could affect future decisions pertaining to Malibu that lie in the hands of the commission, such as acquiring temporary night lighting at the Malibu High School sports field.
Council members and city officials, however, said the problem was not with the proposed development, but with its procedure.
The legal problem, City Attorney Christi Hogin said, is that the city has not been allowed enough time to discuss the issue in a public hearing by the Planning Commission or the City Council, at which community members would also have the opportunity to contribute their input.
Hogin added that potential impacts of the project have not been discussed, which could lead to a need to conduct a full blown environmental impact report.
“To accept these modifications is to create land-use policies in these particular areas out of the context of an application and without the benefit of an environmental review,” Hogin said at the meeting.
By accepting the Coastal Commission’s decision, Wagner said, “We may be setting some kind of precedent for future development in Malibu. And were going to be faced with a big dilemma at that point.”
Actions from the May 10 City Council Meeting
– Presented commendations recognizing poll workers for the April 13 general municipal election
– Proclaimed May 16-22 as Public Works Week in the City of Malibu
– Directed staff to bring back an item to discuss encroachments into city easements
– Directed staff to bring back an item to discuss the possibility of a local coastal program amendment to allow field stands
– Directed staff to bring back an item to form an ad hoc committee to discuss better communication during emergencies
– Directed staff to bring back an item to consider forming an arts commission
– Conducted second reading and adopted an ordinance to incorporate the Coastal Commission suggested modifications for a town center overlay district for the La Paz property
– Denied claim filed by Nick Porter regarding an accident he alleges was caused by the unwarranted removal of a green arrow traffic light
– Approved the issuance of bonds not to exceed $3 million on behalf of Broad Beach Road Underground Utilities Assessment District