City Council Moves Toward Compromise Over Warner Ridge

The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday indicated it may be willing to consider some level of commercial development on Warner Ridge in order to settle a lawsuit filed by the developers of the 21.5-acre Woodland Hills site.

Councilwoman Joy Picus, who represents the Warner Ridge area and opposes anything but a handful of residences on the site, conceded Tuesday that other council members were agreeable to some kind of combined residential-commercial development. But she said they would support such use only if it is “of much lower density” than what the developers originally sought.

In January, 1990, when the Warner Ridge debate was fought on the council floor, the developers sought approval for an 810,000-square-foot commercial-retail project.

Hints of a thaw in the settlement talks came during a council closed-door session to discuss the lawsuit. “I’m hopeful that this signals more of an open mind on the part of the council,” Larry Russ, attorney for the development group that owns Warner Ridge, said when he learned of Picus’ comments. Russ was not allowed to attend the meeting.

Picus said she made a motion during the meeting to direct the city attorney to continue pressing for residential development only, but the motion was not voted on. She explained to reporters afterward that representatives of the city attorney’s office said a vote was unnecessary because they had gotten a feel for the council’s position during debate on the motion.

Meanwhile, developer Jack Spound said that in the past few weeks the Warner Ridge team had dropped the portion of its lawsuit seeking huge monetary damages from the personal financial resources of council members Picus, Zev Yaroslavsky and John Ferraro.

That portion of the lawsuit rankled many council members and helped frustrate negotiations between the two sides.

The lawsuit accuses the city of illegally depriving the developers--a partnership of The Spound Co. and Johnson-Wax Development Co.--of use of their property and seeks tens of millions of dollars in damages. In January, 1990, the council approved zoning that allows 65 residences on the site, according to city documents.

Russ said that while Tuesday’s developments were encouraging, “when you are on the floor looking up, anything is an improvement.” He said the city “needs to adopt a plan that will allow the developers to come out at least even or with a little profit to show.”