Builder Says He’ll Sue City if Project Is Not Approved : Growth: Alleging a conspiracy against the development, an attorney wants it exempted from the Ventura Boulevard Specific Plan, which the council may adopt Tuesday.

The developer of a controversial construction project in Sherman Oaks will seek an exemption to the Ventura Boulevard Specific Plan when it comes before the City Council on Tuesday--and file suit if he is unsuccessful, his attorney said.

Attacking what he called a conspiracy against the proposed offices and stores, attorney Benjamin M. Reznik said city officials are violating a state law requiring action on requests for building permits within a year.

The $20-million project--planned for the former site of the popular Scene of the Crime bookstore--has repeatedly failed to receive demolition and construction permits because of objections by neighborhood residents and City Councilman Michael Woo. The 85,000-square-foot project, which would run the length of the 13600 block of Ventura Boulevard, has been pending before the city Building and Safety Department for about 16 months.

“I have been doing this a long time, probably 12 years, and I have never seen such a coordinated conspiracy between a department and a council office to manipulate the process so as to deprive someone of a building permit,” Reznik said.

Meanwhile, slow-growth activists accused Reznik of his own conspiracy to rush the project through the review process and obtain developer Jacky Gamliel’s building permits before adoption of the Specific Plan.

“Reznik has been trying to ramrod this thing through,” said Tom Grant of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn.

“A building like this only gets built once every 50 years,” said Richard Close, the group’s president. “They should go a little slower.”

The Beverly Hills developer wants to put up a three-story building, a height allowed under existing planning regulations. Under the Ventura Boulevard Specific Plan, however, buildings on Gamliel’s site would be limited to two stories.

The Specific Plan--which could be adopted Tuesday after five years of preparation--would place strict controls on development along all 17 miles of Ventura Boulevard, the commercial strip known as the San Fernando Valley’s “Main Street.”

Both sides have been racing against the clock--the developer eager to demolish existing structures and start building and homeowners trying to stall his plans by demanding an environmental impact report.

Just last week, city building officials issued their final decision that a full environmental report is not necessary. Woo immediately filed an appeal with the city Building and Safety Commission, an action that can temporarily stop permits from being issued.

Complicating matters, Woo’s appeal was scheduled to be heard at the commission’s meeting Tuesday--the same day the Specific Plan is scheduled for discussion by the City Council.

Woo later asked for the hearing to be postponed because of the conflict, and it is now expected to be considered in January.

Usually, there is a delay of several weeks from the time a building appeal is filed until it is discussed by the commission. Both sides accused the other of rushing the hearing for their own purposes.

“I think it’s highly suspect,” Close said. “I’ve never seen them move this quickly. It concerns me deeply as to what their goals are.”

Reznik charged that “in their haste to ambush us, they didn’t realize that this Tuesday at 10 a.m. is the exact same time the council is scheduled to take up the Specific Plan, and Woo can’t be in two places at one time.”

Grant said of the neck-and-neck race: “I’m just pulling my hair out. It’s unbelievable.”