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Neighbors Picket Proposed Site of Multilevel Office

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

More than 200 noisy, sign-toting Sherman Oaks residents demonstrated Saturday against what they said was the silence of a developer who wants to build a retail and office project at Woodman Avenue and Ventura Boulevard.

Jama Enterprises is seeking to build an 85,000-square-foot complex in the 13600 block of Ventura Boulevard, which until earlier this year was occupied by such neighborhood institutions as the Scene of the Crime Bookstore and Mary’s Lamb restaurant. The businesses were evicted to make way for what the residents characterize as a four-story glass monolith shaped like a battleship.

“We don’t feel the developer has been dealing with us in good faith,” said Leonard Liebshard, a member of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn. who helped organize the rally. “They’ve been silent from even before they announced the project to anybody.”

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Jama Enterprises unveiled its plans in August, after months of uncertainty during which the longtime retail tenants were gradually evicted but did not know why. Since August, the residents say, the developer has neither kept them nor Los Angeles City Councilman Michael Woo, who represents the area, informed of its plans and has been unresponsive to complaints about the building’s size, design and amount of parking.

Judith McCurdy, head of a committee organized by homeowners to monitor the development, said: “Silence seems to be the way they do business, even with the city.”

Benjamin M. Reznik, an attorney representing the developer, denied the residents’ claims Saturday. He said the rally was “clearly done to put some pressure on city officials” to order an environmental impact report on the project, “not . . . because the company has not been responsive.”

Reznik said he last met with homeowners Sept. 13 and since then has put an architect to work redesigning the structure “so it doesn’t look like one structure.” He also said the developer has altered the project to respond to residents’ concerns over parking, security and traffic.

The main dispute, however, is over the building’s height. The residents say the proposed structure is four stories, two more than what would be allowed on the site under a proposed draft of a specific use plan for the area. However, Reznik said the structure is only three stories, but has an elevator shaft and a mechanical room on its roof.

Woo and the homeowners are demanding that the developer conduct a thorough environmental impact review before being allowed to bulldoze the buildings to make way for the project. An attempt to get a demolition permit in July was blocked by Woo, but McCurdy said a permit to knock down a gas station that occupies the west corner of the block was secured recently.

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That demolition was set for Wednesday, but was also blocked by Woo. The gas station, the last business in the block that continued to operate, shut down last week.

Reznik said he knew nothing about the permit to demolish the gas station. He speculated that it may have been obtained by the gasoline company that operated the station because it is obligated to remove fuel tanks and clean up the site.

Reznik said the Los Angeles city attorney’s office is reviewing Woo’s demand that an environmental impact report be prepared before demolition permits are issued. He threatened to file a lawsuit against the city if demolition is blocked.

“The homeowners are holding demolition permits hostage” to squeeze greater concessions out of Jama Enterprises, he said. “All requirements have been met for a demolition permit.”

The homeowners say that if the developer were allowed to build the structure as designed, its height would dominate the one-block stretch of Ventura Boulevard and cause unmanageable traffic problems. They say they would accept a scaled-down version.

“This doesn’t go with the neighborhood at all; it’s all glass and four stories,” said Sidonia Lax, who lives nearby.

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“This is a neighborhood, and the stores need to reflect the needs of the neighborhood,” said Marcy Kelly, who lives a block away. Along other stretches of Ventura Boulevard, she said, dry cleaners, hardware stores and markets have been replaced by offices and yogurt shops.

“We want our local government to be as responsive to homeowners as they have been to developers,” she said. “We’re very concerned . . . that this area . . . not become another Westwood.”

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