The quiet of Malibu was broken Sunday morning by a virtual armada of vehicles carrying President Bill Clinton to a gathering at the home of singer/actress/comedian/director Barbra Streisand.

The highway was closed in places for 15-20 minutes while the motorcade passed by, reported to us by surprised spectators as consisting of motorcycles, a presidential limousine without any flags flying, a communications van, an emergency medical vehicle, a fire truck (which they apparently picked up from the Zumirez fire station) and a bevy of Secret Service vehicles.

Clinton had been in Beverly Hills the day before for a large fund-raising dinner. No one was saying whether the visit to Malibu was spontaneous or long-planned.

The president has a number of show business friends in Malibu, and some rumors persist that he may be coming here after his term is over. In his last major trip to Malibu in November 1977, he stayed the weekend at the home of Jeffrey Katzenberg on PCH and went to dinner at Georgio Malibu, along with a few of his Hollywood pals, including Katzenberg, Tom Hanks, Rita Wilson, Barry Diller, David Geffen, Mayor Richard Riordan and Kevin Spacey.

On that Sunday morning, he unexpectedly dropped in to Malibu Presbyterian Church for the 9:30 service.

Two young people were killed and a third critically injured at 4 a.m. Saturday when their speeding car spun out of control on Pacific Coast Highway near Trancas Canyon and hit a parked truck, sheriff’s officials reported.

The driver, 23-year-old Steve Cho from Los Angeles, had allegedly been drinking, although his blood alcohol level was not known, said Det. Hugh Wahler of the Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station. Judging from the skid marks, Cho was traveling at 120 mph, he estimated.

Cho and the rear-seat passenger, 17-year-old Tiffany Davis from Lake Elsinore, were ejected from the sub-compact car as it side-skidded into a small Bobcat bulldozer. The bulldozer acted like a launch pad for the car, which landed on top of a nearby truck, Wahler said.

The front-seat passenger, 16-year-old Michelle Lindley of Lake Elsinore, was airlifted to UCLA Medical Center, where she was listed in serious condition. She was to undergo surgery Tuesday, Wahler said.

Cho and Davis landed near the car after it dropped down onto Broad Beach, Wahler noted. Lindley, who wore a seatbelt, was still in the car.

The three were returning to a party on Corral Beach that had started the night before, Wahler said, where the driver had been seen drinking tequila. There were also several open bottles of beer in the car, Whaler said.

The three left the party just before 2 a.m. and were coming back to pick up the car’s owner, also from Los Angeles, and another Lake Elsinore girl.

The curve along PCH near Trancas is difficult for a driver under the influence, Wahler said. Cho reportedly oversteered the curve and went into a centrifugal skid.

The Planning Commission appears likely to approve a large self-storage facility proposed for Cross Creek Road, but one major sticking point — the actual size of the planned project — remains to be resolved.

Meeting in special session last week, the commissioners unanimously certified the project’s environmental impact report. The commissioners also spoke highly of the design of the facility, planned for just north of Civic Center Way, and its usefulness for the community.

“It’s well-designed, it fits well in the area and it’s a good, low-impact use,” said Commissioner Ed Lipnick, whose comments were largely echoed by the other commissioners.

But each also expressed an unwillingness to grant the variance required for the 56,366-square-foot project without some additional public benefit being provided in return by the developer, Mariposa Land Company.

Under the labyrinthine variance laws, a finding must be made that a variance would not conflict with the General Plan, which permits as dense of a development as that proposed for the self-storage facility but only if a developer provides benefits to the public in return. Public benefits include gifts of land to the city.

Mariposa, owned by members of the Adamson family, has based its variance request for the currently proposed density, in part, on previous gifts and sales of land the Adamson family has made over the years, including land at Bluffs Parks and 900 acres in Malibu Canyon.

But during their discussion of the project, the commissioners said they do not believe gifts made in the past justified the increase over the maximum density permitted without a variance.

“Whatever were the reasons for selling and giving in the past, that was then, and this is now,” said Vice Chair Andrew Stern.

Lipnick said the community recognized the gifts and grants in the past. “But the last time this happened was in 1986, five years before [the city’s] incorporation,” he said.

Trying to coax a final decision from the commission after three meetings on the project, Malibu Planning Director Craig Ewing said that without any additional public benefits from Mariposa, the commission could either approve the proposed facility without the variance or deny it in its entirety.

Chair Jo Ruggles responded she did not want to reject the project outright. “It’s been around too long.”

With that, Mariposa Vice President Grant Adamson volunteered that he and the other owners of the company would discuss whether to offer a new public benefit in return for the higher development density. Adamson agreed to present the results of those discussions at a specially scheduled meeting set for May 25.