Beverly Hills OKs Conversion of Waterworks to Film Archives

‘What we are getting is a terrific building at a reasonable price. We are really talking about entering a new era of the academy’s history.’

Bruce Davis, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

In what one city councilman called “an all-win agreement,” Beverly Hills last week approved a 55-year lease under which the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will convert the former La Cienega Water Treatment Plant into a film archives and library.

Bruce Davis, executive administrator of the academy, said the academy will spend more than $4 million to renovate the 28,000-square-foot Spanish Colonial Revival-style building at La Cienega and Olympic boulevards. The academy also plans to build a 10,000-square-foot addition where filtration tanks are located now.

The academy had been looking for a new facility for its film archives and its 18,000-volume Margaret Herrick Library, which has outgrown the space available at the academy’s seven-story Beverly Hills headquarters, 8949 Wilshire Blvd. At the same time, preservationists in Beverly Hills were looking for a way to save the 60-year-old waterworks, which had been slated for demolition.

Davis said construction is scheduled to begin in midsummer and be completed early next year.

The council, meeting Tuesday night, approved the lease 4 to 1, with Robert K. Tanenbaum casting the lone “no” vote. He said there should be more public discussion on the terms of the lease.

But City Councilman Maxwell H. Salter called it “an all-win agreement.”

“We want Beverly Hills to be known as the movie capital of the world,” Salter said. “This is a major coup for us.”

Under the lease, the academy’s rent hinges on the cost of construction. If construction costs $4.1 million, the low estimate, the rent will be $1 million for the 55 years. If construction costs exceed the estimate, the city will reduce the rent by as much as $500,000.

The academy will pay the city $1 million up front, half of which will reimburse the city for a rehabilitation study of the property and for minor parking improvements. The rest will go toward the rent.

The academy also will pay $500 a month, adjusted annually by the consumer price index, for landscape maintenance.

The city will be allowed free use of the building’s lobby for up to six nights a year, and the academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater for up to three nights a year for civic, charitable or public functions.

The academy also will conduct educational programs in concert with the Beverly Hills Unified School District and will coordinate its library’s reference services with those of the city’s public library system.

Davis said the agreement provides “extremely generous terms.”

“What we are getting is a terrific building at a reasonable price,” he said. “We are really talking about entering a new era of the academy’s history. All holdings of the library, including career papers, will be brought under one roof. In addition, our film archives will become something that will become more accessible to our researchers.”

The waterworks was slated for demolition by the City Council last spring after a city staff report said years of corrosion had weakened the reinforced-concrete building. The plant had been used to treat well water, but was damaged in the 1971 earthquake and had not been used since 1976.

A citizens group filed suit against the city arguing that an environmental impact report was required under state law before the city could demolish a historic building. The city settled the suit by agreeing to conduct a study exploring the potential rehabilitation and reuse of the building.

The report came out in January and concluded that the structure could be saved.

Academy President Robert E. Wise, who directed “West Side Story” and “The Sound of Music,” had pledged to academy members that he would find a new facility for the library before the end of his three terms, which end in August.