Focus on Ownership : Opponents to Ask Judge to Rescind Temple Lease

The fate of a controversial plan to build a Jewish temple on a former Pierce College cornfield in Woodland Hills may hinge on a judge ruling whether the land is part of the campus. Leaders of a Woodland Hills homeowners group announced Friday that they will go to court next week to demand that the Los Angeles Community College District rescind a Jewish group’s lease on a 17 1/2-acre Victory Boulevard site. They claim that the rental is an illegal use of Pierce College land.

District administrators vowed to fight the challenge by arguing that the acreage is surplus district property and is not part of the Pierce College campus.

The pending showdown came as members of the Woodland Hills Homeowners Organization voted not to drop the lawsuit that the group filed four months ago in hopes of blocking the district’s lease with Temple Shir Chadash.

College trustees voted in 1986 to rent the vacant land for 75 years to the temple for $3 million. The land, long used for Pierce College agricultural school crops, is a block east of the main campus.

Angry Homeowners

Homeowners were angered when temple officials disclosed that they needed only about five acres for their synagogue and announced plans to build a residential retirement project on the other 12 acres as a profit-making venture.

Temple leaders later agreed to substitute single-family homes for the residential retirement development. But the homeowners group decided to sue to block that plan too.

Thursday night, homeowners voted to reject a district request to drop the suit. In making the request, the district said it has a new chancellor who “has a different approach to handling real property disposition issues” and might resolve the issue without a court battle.

Rosemary Woodlock, president of the homeowners organization, said her group will seek a summary judgment against the district next week “on the basis of separation of church and state.”

Antonio Cosby-Rossmann, the group’s lawyer, said Friday that the lease violates a state Education Code provision requiring that rental of college grounds to religious organizations be for a temporary period and only when the organization cannot find an alternative site. He said the law also mandates that the rent be set at fair market value.

Cosby-Rossmann said that 75 years does not qualify as a temporary use and that the $3-million rent is far below the going rate for valuable Woodland Hills land.

He accused college officials of sidestepping the question of the lease’s legality when the rental agreement was approved in 1986. “They were basically playing hide-the-ball with their own trustees,” Cosby-Rossmann said.

A college district lawyer refused Friday to discuss the issue.

But David Czamanske, district contracts coordinator, disputed the homeowners’ interpretation of the law.

He said the college district views the 17 1/2-acre site as surplus district land to which the state Education Code provision does not apply. He said it is not part of the Pierce College campus. He said the district stands by the contract and will defend it in court.

“We don’t see it as college grounds, not at all,” Czamanske said. “I would hope the judge would read it the same way we do.”

Constitutional Issue

Czamanske also denied that officials skirted the legality issue when college trustees voted on the lease. Separation of church and state is a constitutional issue and is not governed by the state Education Code, he said.

Caught in the dispute Friday were officials of Temple Shir Chadash, a 400-member Reform synagogue based in Encino.

“I hope and pray this ends soon,” said Anita Green, congregation president. “We want to build on that property. It’s three years already. We can touch it and feel it. This is the community we want to be in.”

The fight between homeowners and college officials is costing the congregation, she said.

“We’re paying $15,000 a month in interest to sit and watch the college and the homeowners fight with one another. We’re sorry we’re in the middle.”