Amphitheater Foes Given Daunting Task

The attorney for residents in a class-action lawsuit against the Pacific Amphitheatre prepared for the daunting task of notifying thousands of people who live or work near the site that they may join in the suit.

Orange County Superior Court Judge James R. Ross ruled Wednesday that owners and occupants of all structures within a 1-mile radius of the amphitheater--including gas stations, schools, offices and homes--could be included in the lawsuit seeking monetary damages.

The list of potential plaintiffs could reach 30,000, said attorney Richard L. Spix, who is representing the residents. Originally, 40 homeowners in the Mesa Del Mar neighborhood north of the amphitheater filed the lawsuit last year, seeking $25,000 each, after they became discouraged with another lawsuit that is in its seventh year and seeks to reduce the volume of concerts.

A Superior Court judge ordered the operators not to violate county noise standards and directed county officials to take volume readings on concert nights. The plaintiffs said that did not solve the problem, and appealed.

The class-action suit seeking monetary damages recently grew to about 950 homes in the neighborhood, from the original 40. Now that list appears endless.

The judge’s decision this week gives Spix the burden of notifying the people who could be added to the plaintiff list, a task that includes mailing more than 10,000 letters and advertising in a publication to find anyone who has lived or worked in the area since 1987.

The judge also ruled that the original plaintiffs will have to pay for the notification, at an estimated cost of $5,000 to $7,000.

“It’s a big hurdle for us because some of these folks are on fixed incomes,” Spix said.

He expects to send the notices sometime in November.

The judge’s decision, his own idea, came as a surprise to both sides.

“I think the philosophy behind the judge’s ruling is that he wanted to be sure that this would be the end of the lawsuits against the amphitheater,” said attorney Deborah M. Nesset, who is representing Ned West Inc., which operates the Pacific. “From that, I surmised that he wants to make sure that there is no stone unturned, that no one is coming in at a later date saying, ‘I want to have a say in this.’ It’s a very broad ruling.”

The case now becomes more complicated, because the judge, or a jury, will have to determine how much certain plaintiffs have been affected by high volume, based on where they live or work. That would have been done with residents north of the amphitheater in the original class-action suit; the job of questioning plaintiffs on all sides of the venue in a wider variety of circumstances will be more difficult.

“I was proposing that we select two homes (among the original plaintiffs)--one of the very worst affected and one relatively far away--and use them as a seesaw in the distribution of damage,” Spix said. “Now, it’s a 360-degree curve, and I don’t know how to handle that.”

Nesset agreed that the decision has raised a lot of questions about who will qualify for a possible settlement.

“We might have someone on the other end of the freeway who might say they are affected, and it could also include people who don’t live there,” she said. “The judge doesn’t have the kind of familiarity with the case that we do. We’ve lived the case since 1984.

“It should be interesting, if nothing else.”