Council Seeks an Inquiry of City Building Inspectors : Carson: Investigation is ordered after a homeowners group charges that an inspector sought a bribe from a supermarket developer.

The Carson City Council has ordered an internal investigation into allegations that a building inspector solicited a bribe from a developer who sought to build a supermarket in south Carson, city officials said Thursday.

The investigation was ordered after the president of a neighborhood homeowners association announced abruptly at the end of Tuesday’s council meeting that the city’s Community Development Department was in need of “a thorough housecleaning . . . from the top right on down.”

Barbara Post, the president of the homeowners group, told the council that she received a call from developer Morrie Notrica last week regarding a recent encounter with an unidentified building inspector, a Los Angeles County employee under contract with the city’s Community Development Department.

“The words I heard were harassment , legalized extortion and an inspector saying ‘I need a key to the liquor cabinet,’ ” Post told the council.

Asked in an interview this week to elaborate, Post said Notrica interpreted the inspector’s comment “as a bribe.” She hastened to add that she does not have first-hand knowledge of the incident but that “this is not the first time we have heard this type of thing about dealing with the city of Carson.”

Notrica could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Deputy City Administrator Scot Yotsuya said the council has directed City Administrator Larry Olson and Community Development Department supervisors to investigate. No criminal investigation has been discussed.

“If this case has merit, it will be investigated further,” Yotsuya said.

Councilwoman Vera Robles DeWitt said the probe would also examine more widespread allegations of improprieties concerning the Community Development Department.

Post’s allegation “is something that didn’t happen this once,” DeWitt said. “I’ve heard rumors of this kind of stuff before. It’s time we took a look at it.”

Mayor Michael I. Mitoma said he doubted the allegations would be substantiated and that DeWitt was “politicking.”

“She’s running for office in April; you’ve got to have some issues,” Mitoma said, adding that he has heard of no previous allegations concerning building inspectors.

Post’s claims of misconduct appeared to be without foundation, Mitoma said, but would be looked into anyway.

“Barbara’s totally out of it,” Mitoma said. “We don’t even know what she’s talking about.”

Gary Nehrenberg, a district engineer who supervises Carson building inspectors, said city officials are scheduled to meet with Notrica today to discuss the allegations.

“We really don’t have any specifics at all,” Nehrenberg said. “It’s unfortunate we could not meet with (Notrica) sooner.”

He said the allegations were “a surprise to me.”

Notrica, who gained national recognition in the grocery industry for turning high profits in difficult demographic areas, recently abandoned plans to open a grocery store on Lomita Boulevard in south Carson, a largely industrial area struggling to attract commercial business. The mayor said Notrica pulled up stakes in anger after an inspector ordered him to make safety improvements at the site. But Post said the businessman left because of the alleged misconduct.

“His words to me were ‘I’m out of Carson; that building can remain vacant. . . . You have a problem in Carson and you will never get good business to come in until things are cleaned up,’ ” Post said.

Post said Notrica’s decision to withdraw plans to open his grocery store is a setback for her homeowners association, which has lobbied the city for years to bring commercial businesses to the area so residents would have a convenient place to shop.

“We have worked so hard and so long on this. . . . Do you have any idea how we feel?” she said, adding that it was time the council “cleaned house” in the Community Development Department.