Victory Fuels New Building Reform Plans

Hard on the heels of their Election Day triumph, the architects of the city’s land-use reform movement--Los Angeles City Councilmen Marvin Braude and Zev Yaroslavsky--Wednesday announced their most far-reaching proposals to date--a 10-point plan that would dramatically expand the City Council’s powers to decide what can be built in the city.

Describing it as a “reasonable, feasible, practical, doable” package of reforms, Braude said he and Yaroslavsky will push for passage by the City Council within six months. But the two warned that if the council balks, they would resort to the initiative process, the same route they took to secure the passage of Proposition U, their first attempt to place new controls on real estate development.

The overwhelming vote for Proposition U, which restricts commercial building near residential neighborhoods, clearly has emboldened its sponsors to take aim at a much bigger target--one that encompasses mini-malls, high-rise apartments, billboards, hillside housing and a broader category of office construction.

In each case, new controls would be applied. For example, apartment houses within 200 feet of single-family homes would be limited in height to 61 feet and no new billboards could be placed within 300 feet of a residential lot.

In addition, Braude and Yaroslavsky call for ordinances to protect the city’s manufacturing base by declaring industrially zoned land off-limits to other uses. They call for mandatory ride-sharing programs for buildings that employ 700 or more people, and they advocate establishment of citywide design standards for commercial architecture.

The City Council is scheduled to get its first look at the proposals Friday.

Acknowledging that the council has wrestled with some of the issues in the past and gotten nowhere, Yaroslavsky argued that the time is right to push for adoption of wide-ranging land-use limitations.

“Proposition U proved there is finally a constituency for it,” Yaroslavsky said.

An aggressive campaign to win approval of the latest set of proposals could make it a pivotal issue in many of the eight council races that will take place in the next five months. Braude and Yaroslavsky, who are among the seven council members not up for reelection next year, will be in a position to orchestrate a campaign for land-use reform without having to run on the issue.

Heading the councilmen’s agenda is a proposed ordinance that would give the council new authority to veto the construction of commercial buildings containing more than 50,000 square feet, even when such buildings comply with the city’s zoning code.

Buildings of that size complying with the zoning account for about 50% of all building permits issued by the city, according to Cindy Miscikowski, Braude’s chief deputy. Those buildings are approved without a review process.

Subjecting such a broad category of construction to council review, Braude and Yaroslavsky said, would ensure that new buildings are designed responsibly with proper attention to architectural standards, landscaping and parking facilities.

Responses to the councilmen’s proposals were mixed.

Ruth Ann Leherer, executive director of the Los Angeles Conservancy, a group that has filed suit to limit the construction of a 700,000-square-foot office building downtown, hailed the proposals as “progressive sounding” and “badly needed.”

But Doug Ring, a lawyer who represents a number of large real estate developers, said Braude and Yaroslavsky are attempting to give to local government decision-making prerogatives that belonged to the private sector.

“The real problem is that the councilmen are going to mire construction projects in politics,” Ring said. “It will increase the time, complexity and cost of gaining approval. I don’t see that as being in the public interest.”

But Ring said he thinks there is room for compromise.