Remaining residents of the motel receive evictions notices.
By Mark Bassett/Special to The Malibu Times
Ray Craig, owner and manager of the 30-room Topanga Ranch Motel for the past 19 years, has decided to make a deal with the California Department of Parks and Recreation and accept relocation compensation and close the motel.
The motel is one of the last of a handful of businesses left operating on 1,659 acres of land at the mouth of Topanga Canyon and Pacific Coast Highway that state parks bought in 2001, with the intention of turning it into a state park. Other businesses still operating are the Reel Inn, the Malibu Feed Bin, Thai Cholada and Wylie’s Bait & Tackle Shop.
There is some disagreement over the details of the settlement, with Roy Stearns, state parks deputy director for communications, saying that Craig has “verbally accepted an offer” from the state, and Craig saying that a final negotiation is still being hammered out. Stearns said that he didn’t have information on terms, whether the contract had been inked, or the date of final eviction as the chief attorney for the state was on vacation.
Also, there is disagreement over who is responsible for the tenants of the motel.
Craig said the tenants of the motel would now be the responsibility of state parks. However, Stearns said the state is not responsible for the tenants of the motel, who he said moved in after the state’s purchase of the land.
“State parks has no lease agreement with the motel tenants, that is between the motel operator, Craig, and the tenants,” Stearns said. “That means we have no legal connection to them, nor them to us.”
In a recent Topanga Messenger article, David Wrightsman, senior land agent for state parks, said residents who moved into the motel after the 2001 purchase are not eligible for state relocation funds, but may be eligible for county relocation funds.
The tenants of the motel had already received eviction notices from the state, and hired attorney Alice Graham to fight the eviction.
Fifty-three-year resident of the motel Aneta Siegel, who died in June at age 86, began residence there prior to 2001. Despite an offer of $43,000 from the state, she would not accept relocation funds.
The project of turning Lower Topanga into a park will commence once all renters/residents to depart the grounds. Stearns said that state parks doesn’t want to have the public wandering through an area where people still live. After all the tenants have gone, state parks plans to plant native vegetation near the creek and on the grounds, rehabilitate the environment, and implement an interim plan that will allow for hiking, biking and picnicking.
Bernt Capra, a longtime Topanga resident and co-chair of the Topanga Community Association, and his family are still living in the area included in the new state parks plan, and has been fighting the eviction. Capra said that the relocation law wasn’t written for such an extreme situation, where low-cost housing is next to some of the most expensive housing in Southern California. The law stipulates that the state must subsidize similar housing the first three and a half years after relocation in a comparable area. But because the cost of living in Malibu is so high, those relocated wouldn’t be able to afford rent after that time.
Capra and 20 others plan to be in Los Angeles Superior Court in November to challenge a previous arbitration decision in favor of state parks.
“After the 42 months they aren’t giving me a penny anymore,” Capra said. “I’m looking forward to our court battle.”