Hahn’s Vote Revives Development Plans in Topanga Canyon : Supervisors: Montevideo Country Club project will be reviewed by planning commission. Critics charge that the developer’s contributions sparked the reversal.

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, at the request of Supervisor Mike Antonovich, voted Tuesday to reconsider a proposed country club development in Topanga Canyon, reviving one of the longest-running zoning disputes in county history.

The 12-year battle over the proposed Montevideo Country Club and an adjoining housing tract had appeared to be over two weeks ago, when the board denied county permits for the project.

But Supervisor Kenneth Hahn, who voted against the project April 18, praised it Tuesday and joined Antonovich and Supervisor Deane Dana in voting to reconsider it.

“I reconsidered,” Hahn said after a lengthy and often heated debate. “I thought it was a good plan.”

Members of the Topanga Town Council, who have long complained that the project would level rustic ridgelines, charged that back-room politics and developer contributions influenced the reversal. According to public records, developer George R. Wojciechowski gave more than $66,000 to county supervisors between 1986 and 1990, with nearly half of it going to Antonovich.

“It’s really checkbook politics,” said council member Bob Goldberg. Some Topanga residents speculated that Hahn’s about-face was a political favor to Antonovich and Dana, a charge Hahn testily denied.

“I came to this in my own mind,” he told reporters.

Wojciechowski also denied lobbying Hahn. “I didn’t do anything,” the developer said. “Mr. Hahn is a smart politician and he knows what he’s doing.”

The board’s action was not a complete victory for Wojciechowski. At Edelman’s urging, the board voted to return the project to the Regional Planning Commission for a public hearing, a time-consuming process that provides Topanga residents with opportunities to continue attacks on it.

The Montevideo project as proposed in 1978 called for 257 houses, a golf course and a hotel in the scenic Summit Valley region of the Santa Monica Mountains. Under pressure from Topanga Canyon residents, the plan has been scaled back, most recently to 97 homes and a golf course.

The hotel was cut from the plan years ago, but Hahn twice cited the hotel Tuesday as an amenity that made the project valuable and a benefit to the Topanga Canyon community.

In 1988, the supervisors indicated support for a 125-house Montevideo development.

With Antonovich in Sacramento last month, the board voted 3 to 1 to deny county permits to the development. Hahn joined liberal Supervisors Ed Edelman and Gloria Molina in rejecting the project, with Dana dissenting.

Antonovich called the denial an abuse of government authority and said the board was “trying to usurp the rights” of private property owners. He said the project would benefit the area by constructing, among other things, a firebreak and sewer system.