Court Approves Agreement in Warner Ridge Case : Development: Los Angeles starts acting to supply all the paperwork for the project by Sept. 20.

The developers of Warner Ridge, who won a precedent-setting legal battle with the city of Los Angeles, collected their reward Wednesday: an “open sesame” pass requiring the City Hall bureaucracy to lay out a red carpet for their project in Woodland Hills.

Working overtime, if they must.

In return for the developers dropping a lawsuit, the city promised that by Sept. 20 it will provide the developers with all the paperwork they need to build a large commercial project and 125 condos on a 21.5-acre site, under threat of up to $50 million in penalties.

Normally, it takes years to get such permits.

The agreement was approved by Superior Court Judge R. William Schoettler in a brief courtroom session Wednesday, formalizing a settlement between the city and Warner Ridge Associates.

Earlier Wednesday, in an effort to begin complying with the agreement, the City Council unanimously voted to order the Planning Department to begin processing all the amendments and permits needed to meet the Sept. 20 deadline.

But the controversy is not over. Robert Gross, president of the Woodland Hills Homeowners Organization, said his group is likely to challenge the agreement in court. Gross’ group and Councilwoman Joy Picus have been the chief opponents of the developers’ plans.

Picus was vacationing in Virginia and could not be reached for comment.

Warner Ridge Associates sued two years ago after the city, under Picus’ leadership, zoned its land to permit only about 65 single-family homes. The developers cried foul, claiming the area’s community plan permitted a large-scale commercial project on the site, and the rezoning was a deliberate effort by Picus to block the development in response to political pressure from the homeowners group.

The bitterly fought litigation culminated Dec. 31 with a state Court of Appeal ruling that gutted the city’s defense.

In its own words, the agreement formalized Wednesday is “intended to recognize that WRA has substantially prevailed in this litigation to date.”

The skeleton of the agreement was approved in late January by the City Council. In the ensuing weeks, attorneys for the two sides worked out the details.

Under the rigorous terms of the 17-page document, the city has until Sept. 20 to amend its community plan to permit a mixed-use project on the site, to revise zoning ordinances to permit the intense multifamily development and a 690,000-square-foot commercial project on the site and to give the project an environmental clearance.

Additionally, the agreement outlines penalties that Schoettler, who will monitor the city’s compliance, may impose if the city fails to meet the deadline.

For example, if the city fails to provide permits needed for the condo phase of the project in time, it must pay the developers $5 million. If it balks at the commercial phase, the agreement provides that the city will pay the developer the value of the land as of Feb. 6, 1990, plus interest costs and attorneys fees. City officials and attorneys involved estimated that would be $40 million to $50 million.

The agreement also provides that the city will assign a senior Planning Department official to expedite the permit approvals for the project, even if it means “giving priority over other actions under consideration by the agency or department (regardless of when filed) and, if necessary to authorize payment for reasonable overtime charges.”

Finally, the city agreed to designate an official to investigate any allegations by Warner Ridge Associates that they were the target of “discriminatory treatment” at City Hall.

Council President John Ferraro, one of the signatories to the agreement, said top city Planning Department officials believed that Sept. 20 was an attainable deadline.

Ferraro said the agreement was acceptable to him. “You know we weren’t dealt a very good hand in all this,” he said. “Now we’ve got to cooperate and help this project along. We owe it to them. We really didn’t analyze this project very well at the beginning.”