Ground, Barriers Broken for New Japanese Campus

A planned Japanese university satellite campus, which was once regarded with suspicion by Studio City residents, was praised and welcomed into the community during a ground-breaking ceremony Saturday.

Los Angeles City Councilman Michael Woo and representatives of Studio City neighborhood groups said they were looking forward to the opening of the overseas campus of Osaka Sangyo University at the former site of Corvallis High School.

“This will establish a model relationship, not only for Studio City but all of Los Angeles, to show how East and West can come together,” Woo said at the ceremony, which was held at the 3.6-acre site on Laurel Canyon Boulevard, a block south of Ventura Boulevard.

The festivities, attended by more than 200 business and education leaders, were in sharp contrast to protests heard last year when the university purchased the campus for $9 million from the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Mary order. The religious order closed the 46-year-old high school in 1987 because of declining enrollment.

The purchase of the site ended the fear of some homeowners that the location would be turned into a high-density apartment or condominium project. But suspicions arose about the intentions of the Japanese.

Some residents said they were concerned about the secrecy involving the purchase. The nuns negotiated with a Los Angeles real-estate management firm that worked for a New York law firm hired by an international trading company.

Polly Ward, president of the Studio City Residents Assn., said there were concerns that the university was the front for a cult or a hotel for tourists.

“Those fears were put to rest when the educators came to talk to us and explained what they wanted to do,” Ward said. “A group of us also went over there and saw that there was a real university. We were quite impressed.”

The campus is expected to open in September, 1990. School officials plan to construct a two-story dormitory, a swimming pool and a lighted tennis court.

Up to 120 students from the home campus will be flown in for three-month stays to experience Western culture, educators said.