Culver City Ties Project OK to Recreation Facilities

In a match to decide the fate of a vacant lot that once featured a sports club with tennis courts, the Culver City Council has volleyed the ball back to the developer, allowing him to build townhouses there only if he gives the city $280,000 for recreation facilities.

The decision Monday has sparked arguments over the council’s timing and over the city’s need for facilities to replace those that the club had. It has also brought to the fore the debate over private property owners’ rights versus public need.

The council seems “to be overlooking completely that they’re not publicly run facilities. . . . It’s our land, it’s private land,” said Mitch Chupack, a representative for property owner Richard K. Ehrlich. Chupack said the developer will proceed with a suit alleging that the city has taken his property without just compensation and has violated his due-process rights.

“These were private tennis courts. (The council members) want (them) replaced gratuitously,” said Fred Gaines, attorney for the developer. “The law does not allow them to randomly extort money from a developer,” he said, calling the $280,000 “way out of line.”

Several council members deny that the request is extortion, saying that the 30-townhouse project at 4901 Overland Ave. entails a substantial loss of recreational facilities. The owner, they say, will cash in on the several zoning and plan changes that are required by the development.

Ehrlich proposed the townhouses when he closed the Westside Sports Club in September, after nearly 15 years of barely breaking even. The City Council in April rejected the plan, 4 to 1, because of concerns over the loss of the facilities. The council also determined that the city could not afford to buy the club to use as a recreation center. A city-ordered study concluded that the club would not be able to compete in today’s market without major renovations.

Councilman Richard Alexander, the only vote for the project, was concerned that the city could be liable for limiting a property owner to a land use that has proved unprofitable.

Last month, the council decided to reconsider its April decision, and Ehrlich sued the city to protect his rights pending the outcome of the reconsideration. Meanwhile, Ehrlich and Councilman Steven Gourley discussed possible settlements, such as the developer’s building four tennis courts on city land.

Designated for Sports Use

The site is designated for use as a sports facility, which Ehrlich had requested in the mid-1970s “because tennis was very popular,” Chupack said. “It seemed like a good use for the site.” The club included five tennis courts, two paddle tennis courts, and a swimming pool.

The council’s Monday night decision came after an hourlong executive session and conversations in which City Atty. Joseph Pannone shuttled between the council members in closed quarters and Gaines in the council chamber audience. Neighbors of the site and a former city planning commissioner called any developer contributions extortion, but the council attached the $280,000 condition to its approval of the project. Councilman James Boulgarides voted against approval, saying that the development was too large.

“If someone’s going to tear down a vacant lot where kids used to play baseball . . . you’ve got to ask what (the developer) is going to do to mitigate the effect on the community,” Gourley said, while praising the project for its “very livable units” and open space.

Charles Blum, who sat on the Planning Commission when it approved the project, said at the meeting that “Culver City is on the take.” Residents said afterward that they had been bothered by noise, lights and partying from the sports club and criticized the council for “trading votes for money,” as neighbor Paulette Greenberg said.

Other sports club entrepreneurs will be scared off, Alexander said, for fear that they will be slapped with fines if they fail and then try to close. He nevertheless voted for the approval. He said later: “I wanted to give him at least the approval of the project. . . . Perhaps the developer can come back to us with a counterproposal.”

But Gourley later said that to label the council’s action extortion was ironic, because the approval of the project will boost the site’s value by more than $280,000.

Decision Called Backhanded

The developer and others also faulted the council for what they said was a backhanded, 11th-hour decision.

Cities such as Santa Monica require developers to offset negative impacts of their projects, such as increased traffic and loss of open space, but such requirements are spelled out “when you walk in the door,” Chupack said. Said Alexander: “You don’t wait until literally the last minute, and have additional fees thrown in (the developer’s) face. In a government of laws, people know what’s going to happen before it happens, not on the whim of an individual city council. That figure could have easily been $2 million or $50,000.”

Any stipulations, Alexander said, should have been raised while the proposal was before the Planning Commission.

But Pannone said that as long as the conditions are reasonable ($6 million, he offered, would not be in this case) and reasonably related to the detrimental impact, the city has a constitutional right to impose them in the public interest. Pannone said the condition in this case was similar to the city’s laws that developers install public art or pay into a public arts fund and that commercial developers pay for mitigation of increased traffic.

The 1965 state Quimby Act requires developers to pay fees or contribute land for neighborhood parks.

In the sports club case, Pannone said, “it’s just a different kind of impact that is being demanded to be mitigated.”

The city does not, and cannot, have specific laws to address all types of mitigation, he said, saying that to his knowledge, this was the city’s first case involving replacement of sports facilities. “You don’t know what the current use (of a piece of property will be),” he said. ‘You need some flexibility to cover that one-in-50 set of facts.”

But whether the city even needs such facilities is also a contested point, with the developer saying the sports club failed because of under-use and competition. Alexander said the city does not “need any more tennis courts. . . . I still can get a court Sunday morning with no more than a 10-minute wait.”

Greenberg said that when the Westside Sports Club closed, 182 members--less than a third of the total--were Culver City residents.

Gourley, however, said that the city had to consider future needs and that the townhouse tenants themselves would be demanding such facilities. And whether the tennis players “standing in front of you (in line) are from Los Angeles or Culver City . . . is (not) important,” he said. “People of surrounding communities have a tendency to use those facilities, and we can’t stop them. . . . We have to provide as many facilities as possible.”

Also disputed is the cost of the tennis courts. The $280,000, Gourley said, is the approximate cost of building four courts at $70,000 each, a figure arrived at by the recreation division in consultation with Los Angeles city and county officials. Council members indicated that the money was preferable to the developer’s building four courts because the council could then choose to build courts, a swimming pool or whatever is most needed. Chupack disagreed, estimating that building four unlit courts would cost $80,000 at most.

With the ball now in his client’s court, Gaines said that the settlement offer of four tennis courts is still good but that he will serve the lawsuit on the city.

Chupack said the council made a serious mistake.

“They looked a gift horse in the mouth and said, ‘Screw you, we want more.’ ”