Woodland Hills Neighbors Favored Demolition : L.A. Orders Builder to Trim Hilltop Condos

A Woodland Hills builder was ordered Tuesday to lower the height of a controversial hilltop condominium project above a 30-year-old neighborhood of single-family homes.

But Los Angeles officials refused to order the entire $7.5-million townhouse structure torn down, as nearby residents have demanded.

Inspectors from the city’s Department of Building and Safety said two lofts atop the 24-unit West Hills Condominiums project must be trimmed by about two feet to meet a 45-foot height limit imposed on the project 11 years ago.

Once those changes are made, the development should meet all city standards, said Robert Kline, the city’s principal commercial property inspector for the Ventura Boulevard area.

“There shouldn’t be any other problems,” he said.

City officials brushed aside complaints by homeowners that the project is illegal because it violates building setback requirements set by the City Council when the development was first approved for construction in three phases in 1978.

Last week, residents charged that the project violated a city requirement that the third and final building of the project be separated from the site’s southern property line by a 134-foot landscaped buffer zone.

Developers Ed Dade and James R. Gary had pledged to plant mature evergreen trees in the buffer zone to screen the building from the view of nearby residents.

Property Line

Homeowners complained that a 121-foot-long section of the building fails to meet the setback requirement because of a slight jog in the property line at its southeast corner, however.

On Tuesday, officials concluded that the setback requirement is being met because the townhouse structure is 134 feet “from the most southerly line”--a point at the southwest corner of the property line, said Cindy Miscikowski, chief deputy to Councilman Marvin Braude, who represents the Woodland Hills area.

“The Planning Department looked at three sets of plans dating back 10 years and said it complies,” Miscikowski said. She said the issue will be reviewed in public “if the community wants to appeal it or discuss it, and I think they may.”

Sid Perry, a leader of a group of homeowners protesting the project, said he and his neighbors plan to do just that.

“We’ve made at least a breakthrough, but the whole neighborhood is up in arms. We feel we’ve been handed a carrot,” he said. “We’re not satisfied with what we see here. We think the city’s trying to stonewall us.”

Perry said residents still believe that the development rises more than 45 feet from the natural grade of the hilltop. And they dispute the city’s interpretation of the way the setback should be measured.