Evidence of Developer’s Secret Deal Reported : Lawsuit: City attorneys say a $200,000 offer was intended to gain Pierce College’s support for Warner Ridge plan. A five-month delay is sought in the builder’s case against L.A.

Los Angeles city attorneys claim to have new evidence of a secret $200,000 deal cut by developer Jack Spound to gain Pierce College’s support for the controversial office project he wanted to build on land next to the school’s Woodland Hills campus.

The payment was never made and would not have been illegal. But city attorneys Tuesday said they want to learn more about the deal to defend the city from a lawsuit brought by the developer. They also contend that the deal was part of a broad strategy by the development company to “buy support for its speculative project,” which the city eventually turned down.

The attorneys said in court papers filed last week that evidence regarding the deal with the college, as well as other issues, was withheld by the plaintiffs and justifies a five-month delay in a lawsuit Spound brought against the city. The lawsuit was to go to trial in January, but the city attorneys say they need a delay to adequately prepare their case.

The lawsuit already has produced depositions from City Council members and others that show how thoroughly political considerations shaped the council’s move to block the development. The request to delay the suit is to be heard Nov. 25 by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Kathryn Doi Todd.

Pierce College backing was considered essential for winning the city’s approval for the 810,000-square-foot office complex proposed by Spound’s Warner Ridge Associates partnership. Despite the college’s support, however, City Councilwoman Joy Picus, who represents the area, engineered a zoning change to block the project.

Spound and his partner, Johnson Wax Development Corp., are seeking $100 million in damages from the city, arguing that the 1990 zoning change was illegal and unfairly denied them the value of their property.

Robert I. McMurry, an attorney for the developers, denied Tuesday that he withheld any documents and said that Spound was questioned extensively about his negotiations with the college in a deposition he gave in April.

McMurry has filed papers with the court opposing the delay requested by the city, which he said would cost his client $500,000 a month in legal costs and interest on loans related to the 21.5-acre Woodland Hills property. He also is asking that the city be punished for requesting the delay and ordered to pay the developer’s legal fees.

“This is another desperate attempt by the city to postpone their day of reckoning,” McMurry said. “In their papers they say they have new evidence . . . but it’s the same stuff they had used in Jack Spound’s deposition months ago.”

In his April deposition, Spound said he had discussions with former Pierce College President Herbert Ravetch and his successor, Daniel Means, about his plans for the property. A tentative deal was worked out in which the development partnership would pay Pierce College $200,000 in exchange for the right to dump excess fill dirt on the campus, which includes a large farm operated by the college’s agriculture program.

The money also was to compensate the college for any inconvenience caused by the construction process and for a temporary easement allowing the builder to cross college property.

Because the Warner Ridge property adjoins the college’s farm, several discussions occurred between Spound and representatives of the school’s agriculture faculty. Mick Sears, the chairman of the department, said Tuesday that college officials did not lobby on behalf of the project.

He said, however, there was an understanding that the college would support the office proposal because “this type of development was much less a threat to us than would be residential home construction.”

He said the agreement was not kept secret. “We knew they were telling people what they were going to do for us as part of their project,” Sears said. Ravetch and Means could not be reached for comment.

The new evidence, as cited by the city, of the dealings between Spound and the college involves invoices for $4,350 in payments that Spound made over three years from a Warner Ridge Associates account to the college and its foundation. McMurry said the donations are not surprising, given that Spound has said he is a member of the college’s corporate board of directors and that one of the purposes of the advisory body is to raise money for the college.

But in its court papers the city contends that Spound “had entered into secret negotiations to funnel several hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and benefits to . . . Pierce” and that the invoices further prove its contention of a broad effort to buy support for the project.

City attorneys also contend that documents obtained from Morgan Guaranty Trust Co., the lender for the project, suggest that Spound and his partners knew all along that their investment was highly speculative because they needed to secure a zoning change before going ahead with the project.

In contrast, the partnership has contended that they had been virtually assured of the zoning change by Councilwoman Joy Picus, until she bowed to the political pressure of a local homeowners group and changed her mind at the eleventh hour.