Builder Sways Panel to Re-Evaluate Project It Killed

A developer who wants to build 74 housing units on land in Calabasas--where Los Angeles County’s land-use plan allows only six--cleared a major hurdle Wednesday in his attempt to revive the project.

Four months ago, three of the five members of the county Regional Planning Commission expressed strong opposition to Jack Bravo’s proposal, which at that time called for 78 duplexes on a 20-acre hillside area at Ruthwood Drive near Alizia Canyon Drive. But Bravo, who maintains that his proposal is consistent with surrounding developments, was able to stall a vote, saying nearby homeowners have been refusing to meet with him.

On Wednesday, two of the three recalcitrant planning commissioners reversed themselves and said Bravo had convinced them that his proposed change in the county’s land-use plan is justified.

Led by Commissioner Clinton W. Ternstrom, who in January called the project “overkill” and said it should be reduced dramatically, the commission voted 4 to 1 to approve Bravo’s plan amendment. But the commission stopped short of approving the entire project, calling for a redesign to lessen its effect on a natural slope. The change could result in the elimination of as many as 16 units.

Bravo is expected to present the redesigned project for the commission’s consideration in July.

The commission’s approval of the plan amendment angered homeowner activists in the Las Virgenes area. If the project is ultimately reduced to 58 units it would still be nearly 10 times the density called for in the county plan, they said.

“It’s an outrage,” said David M. Brown, vice president of the Las Virgenes Homeowners Assn. “We don’t have an area plan if this goes ahead and the supervisors approve it.”

The Board of Supervisors has the final say on plan amendments. Ternstrom is an appointee of County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, who represents the area.

Bravo’s property had been graded by its previous owner, developer Nathan Shapell, during construction of 34 condominiums on seven adjacent acres. Bravo argued--and the commission concurred--that because densities in the county plan are based on the land’s topography, and Shapell’s grading made the topography flatter and better suited to development, he should be able to build far more than the six units allowed by the plan.

Brown said that mode of reasoning “means the bulldozer determines the zoning.”

Voting with Ternstrom and Commissioners Sadie Clark and J. Paul Robinson was Commissioner Lee Strong, who in January said: “If we just took plan amendments like that . . . and said that’s OK, then the plan means nothing.”

Commissioner Betty Fisher cast the negative vote, saying the plan change sought “to put aside what was given a great deal of thought.”

Ternstrom’s suggestion that the project be redesigned was consistent with concerns he raised in January about preserving the natural slope of the hillside.

Bravo had originally sold the land to Shapell in 1979, but he re-acquired the 20 acres five years later from Shapell in a foreclosure sale, said Thomas E. Zeiger, a consultant to Bravo and a vice president of Shapell Industries. Zeiger said there was no other connection between Bravo’s development partnership and Shapell Industries.