City declines to release dollar figures of fines
Malibu’s landmark Nobu restaurant has been allegedly fined by the city for failing to obtain a required Temporary Use Permit (TUP). On July 4, chaos erupted when scores of limousines and other vehicles were parked and abandoned in the middle of Pacific Coast Highway, causing an hours-long traffic jam on one of the busiest holidays of the year. Some 700 people were jammed into the popular restaurant. According to a City of Malibu statement: “It was clearly more than the 100-person threshold for a private event to require a TUP.”
City staff met with Nobu management July 24. Later, the city issued a July 26 “Nobu Statement,” which stated: “Nobu agreed to pay all associated Code Enforcement fines and will be charged for fines, penalties and administrative fees for an ‘After-the-Fact’ TUP.” However, the city indicated it would not be releasing the dollar amounts.
In its statement, the city cited two reasons for withholding from the public the fine amounts. The first reason stated is because it “is an active Code Enforcement case” but a search of open code enforcement cases on the City of Malibu website for the Nobu address from July 4 to the present indicates that there are no open cases. The second reason the city cited was that Nobu could appeal the fines, apparently contradicting its earlier statement that Nobu had voluntarily agreed to the fines and providing no evidence suggesting Nobu was seeking to litigate the issue.
Chris Frost, chair of Malibu’s Public Safety Commission commented, “Businesses get fined all the time. Unless it’s a substantial fine, this isn’t going to affect the way they do business. It would have to be a significant fine to get their attention. A fine is a way of acknowledging that a body, a city is saying you violated an ordinance, so you’re going to pay us a certain amount of money. Does it make them stop violating? In my opinion it just makes them look for another whack-a-mole direction to go.”
Frost also made the point that some celebrity hotspots such as Nobu may not always have control over social media posts that quickly go viral, drawing huge unexpected crowds, although that was not the case with July 4’s planned event.
The public safety chair, still angered by the July 4 event, recounted, “My phone blew up. People just trying to navigate the middle of Malibu couldn’t. There’s absolutely no reason, no excuse for anyone to park their vehicles down the middle of the highway and leave them there.”
“Cars were unattended, parked in the median,” Frost continued. “That median is how emergency vehicles get through. They need that middle lane, especially on a holiday. That could be somebody’s child that’s drowning, or not breathing, or a bad car or motorcycle accident. There’s no call for that.
“The restaurant should have known or seen what was going on. They have parking attendants. They should have notified management and management should have dealt with it. You can’t just keep running a business and run everything outside into the ground around you, the residents, the other businesses. How are people going to get to other businesses? You’re killing someone else’s business for your own greed.”
Frost recalled attending a meeting with Sheriff’s Capt. Jennifer Seetoo years ago and remembered the restaurant was given rules that weren’t followed July 4. He also suggested a fire safety officer be hired by the busy restaurant on weekends and holidays.
“I don’t believe this was just a July 4 problem,” he said. “I believe problems exist there on a much more frequent basis than is being pointed out.”
Frost, who is a retired firefighter/EMT added, “They should never be parking vehicles in the center emergency lane. It’s a left-turn lane at best. I cringe thinking about somebody’s child who needs emergency care and there’s a bunch of limos with people in there enjoying their afternoon blocking the middle of the highway. Any business who wants to be a good neighbor, it goes far deeper than just joining the Chamber of Commerce. You’ve got to be a good neighbor.”
Seetoo, who met with Nobu management July 18, said the restaurant agreed to be proactive by alerting her department to big events. She also said earlier, “Nobu wants to work with us.”
The Malibu Times emailed Nobu management asking if it had a statement to make to the community and so far, has received no reply.