Neighbors Decry Plan to Restore Pan-Pacific Site

Ice skaters shouldn’t lace up their boots just yet, but plans for restoring their favorite sport to the decrepit Pan-Pacific Auditorium glided ahead Tuesday when the Board of Supervisors voted to open negotiations on the rehabilitation of the 53-year-old building.

The decision came after the supervisors heard objections from nearby homeowners, who said any commercial development in the long-abandoned Pan-Pacific would disrupt their quiet neighborhood.

But Supervisor Ed Edelman said that only a commercial project could save the wooden building and its distinctive facade of towering, streamlined pylons overlooking Pan-Pacific Park. The auditorium is located between Beverly Boulevard and 3rd Street in the Beverly-Fairfax district.

“It would bring some revenue into the county to maintain the park, and we’d be able to restore the Pan-Pacific building and upgrade the community,” Edelman said. He successfully urged his colleagues to open negotiations with developer Joseph Kornwasser, whose proposal includes an ice rink, rhythmic gymnastics facility, two restaurants, a food court and several movie theaters.

Homeowners Groups Object

The board also endorsed Edelman’s suggestion to commission an environmental impact report that would identify adverse effects of the development and suggest ways to mitigate them.

Although they endorsed the idea of having an environmental impact report, representatives of two homeowners groups said they saw no way to mitigate the impact of any commercial project.

“We express our opposition to any development on Pan-Pacific Park. We do not have enough (existing) open space in the area to accommodate the needs of young people, old people or the middle-aged,” said Diana Plotkin, vice president of the Beverly-Wilshire Homeowners Assn.

Steven S. Karic, executive vice president of the Rancho La Brea Neighborhood Assn., said: “Concerns about traffic, noise, pollution, crime and congestion must prevail over the value of preserving a building.

“Plainly stated, people are more valuable than buildings, even historic ones.” He added that his group would support a museum or some other form of non-commercial development that would preserve the Pan-Pacific. However, he said that he did not know where funding for such a project would come from.

But representatives of the Los Angeles Conservancy, an organization devoted to maintaining relics of the city’s early days, argued that the building was just as much a part of the neighborhood as its residents, and they praised the Kornwasser proposal.

“It’s strange that the neighbors want to preserve the neighborhood but not the neighborhood as a whole,” said Mary Kay Hight, president of the board of the conservancy. “The Pan-Pacific has been part of that neighborhood for 50 years, so it’s important to move forward in the preservation of the whole entity,” she said.

Least Intrusive Plan

Noting that the Pan-Pacific is listed in the National Register of Historic Sites and that it was bought in part with federal funds, Edelman said the county is obliged by law to seek a developer who will maintain it.

He said the Kornwasser project was the least intrusive of the 10 proposals for the site. The others included a car dealership and auto museum, movie studio sound stages and a performing arts center.

Although he went along with Edelman’s recommendations, Supervisor Pete Schabarum demanded to know why the project was not yet under way.

Recalling that the supervisors are committed to earn revenue from the county’s unused land, he said that a previous environmental impact report would have allowed a much denser development than Kornwasser’s.

He also said that Edelman appears not to have won local support for the project even though it was first submitted in March.

“I like to move quickly but deliberately . . . my aim is not to ram things down people’s throats,” Edelman responded.

He said the negotiations with Kornwasser would go on at the same time as consultants prepare the environmental impact report, which is expected to be ready in four months. The estimated development cost of the project is $14.6 million.

Eclipsed by Sports Arena

Built as a temporary exhibition hall in 1935, the Pan-Pacific was the site of political conventions, concerts, basketball games, ice skating and radio broadcasts before it was eclipsed by the Sports Arena and other public buildings in the 1970s.

Once part of an entertainment complex that included a Pacific Coast League baseball field and a drive-in movie, the auditorium and the adjacent park passed into public hands when the city, county and state governments joined with the regional flood control district to buy it from the estate of auto magnate Errett Lobban Cord for $10.45 million in 1979.

County officials said the Kornwasser proposal would generate an estimated $3.8 million in rent over the first 10 years of the project.