Erosion Control Edict Drains Developer

Subdivision developer James F. Morning was showing more than his usual professional interest in an Agoura Hills building project Tuesday. How this one turns out will determine whether he goes to jail for four days.

Morning, vice president of Brentwood Land & Sales Inc., was fined $100 and sentenced to five days in jail Friday for failing to install required erosion control devices at an 85-acre construction site where 121 single-family homes are proposed.

He was released after spending five hours in a courthouse holding cell and given one week to finish the drainage work or face serving the remainder of the sentence in Los Angeles County Jail.

“The City of Agoura Hills went bananas, absolutely crazy,” Morning said Tuesday as he returned to the construction site whose problems may send him to jail.

Ironically, Morning’s company no longer owns the site that has angered city officials. The previous owner foreclosed on the property Jan. 4. Morning said he is broke as a result.

On Monday an independent grading contractor came to the 40-year-old developer’s rescue by helping him install $15,000 worth of pipes, sandbags and other material to improve drainage. Workers finished the installation Tuesday as Agoura Hills officials announced plans for an inspection today.

Building inspectors will determine whether Morning has met conditions of the Agoura Hills grading ordinance well enough to stay out of jail.

The city’s move to jail Morning--described as unusual both by prosecutors and developers--came after nearby homeowners complained that storm runoff from his freshly graded tract left their streets littered with mud and rocks.

The developer was convicted last August of criminal misdemeanor charges of violating the grading ordinance. Sentencing was delayed until last week to give him time to complete the erosion control work.

“They got me because I happened to be the one who signed the permit back in 1982,” said Morning, a Pacific Palisades resident. “They wanted somebody to go after and I was the guy.”

Morning said the drainage work for most of the sloping construction site was done several years ago, but he and his company ran out of money before the job could be finished.

He said Agoura Hills is to blame for that.

“When the city incorporated, the first thing they did was impose a building moratorium,” he complained. “We had $18 million in construction loans approved. But when the moratorium came, the lender said sorry, no permits, no loans. We ended up losing $2.5 million.”

Led to Foreclosure

That led to the bankruptcy of a partnership formed to handle the subdivision and, eventually, to the foreclosure, he said.

City officials said they decided to prosecute Morning as an individual because the missing drains were a serious safety hazard for the long-established Lake Lindero neighborhood that lies downhill from his subdivision site.

Paul Williams, Agoura Hills planning director, said the tough city stance also “should send a clear signal to all developers doing business in this city. We take our local laws seriously.”

To drive the point home, city officials announced Morning’s sentencing with a press release.

City Prosecutor Mitchell Abbott said such a prosecution is rare because most zoning violations are cleared up before court action is required. Abbott said he was pleased that, after Friday’s brief holding cell experience, Morning apparently “was inspired to greater efforts.”

Calabasas Municipal Court Commissioner Richard L. Brand, who imposed the jail term, said he will probably cancel the final four days of Morning’s sentence if the report on the new drain work is favorable.

Other builders had sympathy for Morning.

Grading contractor Paul Ebensteiner volunteered to help pay for and install the missing drainage pipe and concrete spillway, even though he said Morning still owes him abut $900,000 for past work at the Agoura Hills site.

“I was shocked. Thirty years in this business and I’ve never heard anything like this,” Ebensteiner said.

Herbert Enoch, whose Sherman Oaks-based ESL Development Corp. foreclosed four weeks ago on the property, said he volunteered the services of a company lawyer to help get Morning out of jail.

“He’s suffered enough,” said Enoch.