A skeleton crew of the Malibu Planning Commission Monday night begrudgingly made a six-year-old’s dreams come true by approving a permit to build a skate bowl in the backyard of a house being built in Point Dume.
Despite fervent protestations from nearby residences, commissioners essentially said their hands were tied and moved the project forward.
Only three planning commissioners out of the usual five were in attendance at the March 7 meeting, with Jeff Jennings and Mikke Pierson both absent. The three commissioners in attendance voted unanimously in favor of the project.
“I want some rationale and some reason and some law to allow me to deny this, but I don’t see it,” Vice Chair David Brotman said before casting his vote. “We don’t have the tools to do anything but accept it, I think.”
The development permit was sought by the parents of two Malibu boys, aged six years old and 17 months, who will undoubtedly be the envy of their neighborhood friends, but perhaps the scourge of neighbors who “want it nice and peaceful,” Brotman said.
“You get an older neighborhood where the character of the residents — the demographics, as you will — are such that some people want it nice and peaceful and some people don’t mind kids running around raising hell all the time, and as one of those who’s getting older, I’m not sure I’d like to have this next door,” Brotman said.
Two Point Dume residents who spoke up to assure the commission they didn’t want it next door to them were Marlene Matlow and Sam Hall Kaplan.
“I think this is setting a terrible precedent,” Matlow said. “I think a proliferation of people who want to make their kids happy by building a skate park is going to be crazy.”
Kaplan agreed.
“This is a residential zone, it is not a sport zone,” Kaplan said. “My God, a child who wants a skateboard park. Thank God their child doesn’t like petting elephants as pets.”
The main complaint from Matlow, Kaplan and other residents was that of noise.
The owners of the lot and future residents, Edward and Melissa Akkaway, employed the help of acoustical engineer Jack Briskey from Veneklasen Associates to project what type of noise the bowl may create.
Opponents retained their own expert, environmental noise specialist Kevin Warner from Ramboll Environ.
The two were grilled by commissioners.
Commissioner John Mazza asked Briksey and Warner what experience they had with other recreational outdoor uses, like halfpipes and tennis courts.
Warner replied that halfpipes, as opposed to skating bowls, were a “different type of sound.”
“They’re usually a little louder … resonating,” Warner said.
Briskey described the difference between basketball sounds and skating sounds.
“The difference is that … noises that tend to cause annoyance in communities are impulsive noises,” Briskey said, “and tonal noises.”
Briskey then went on to describe the difference between the two, stating that basketball courts tend to have more constant tonal noises, “like a basketball bouncing,” compared to the “squeal” of a skateboard, which is “far more rare than the two-times-a-second pounding of a basketball.”
Mazza, when describing why he felt compelled to approve the permit, circled around to Matlow’s complaint.
“We’re not police up here, we’re just permit-givers, and the fact that we have permitted an 18-foot halfpipe on Boniface in the past, I personally think this would be denying what other people have,” Mazza said.
The cement skate feature was approved along with a guest house. A swimming pool, spa, bocci court, cabana and trellis had previously been approved.
