Judge Strikes Down OK of Encinal Project : Development: Jurist rebukes Coastal Commission for approving canyon housing plan despite objections of staff over violation of environmental law.

A judge has struck down the California Coastal Commission’s approval of a development plan to grade 1.2-million cubic yards of earth and build 55 luxury homes in Encinal Canyon.

Besides being a slap at the commission, the decision last week by Ventura County Superior Court Judge Barbara A. Lane is a huge setback for the project developers, VMS Realty Partners, and its subsidiary, the Anden Group.

Lane rebuked the state panel for approving the project in 1991 despite the objections of its own staff, which had cited numerous instances of how the developers’ plans violated the coastal protection law.

The judge said that in her view, the concerns raised by the staff appeared to vanish “like (a) Cheshire cat” when the panel voted 6 to 4 to approve.

Although the property is in Los Angeles County, the case was heard in a Ventura County court after the developers asked for a change of venue.

Environmentalists and Malibu officials had argued that approval of the project would have set a dangerous precedent for development of land in the Santa Monica Mountains that until now has been considered undevelopable.

“When you consider that this project represented the most grading per house ever approved (by the Coastal Commission) in the Santa Monica Mountains, it’s quite a victory,” said Sara Wan, vice chairwoman of the League for Coastal Protection, an environmental group.

A lawyer for the developers indicated that his clients will appeal. “We don’t intend to fold our tents and go away,” Timothy Tosta said. “We view this as part of a protracted effort.”

In ordering the Coastal Commission to reconsider the matter, the judge cited a litany of ways the project violates the Coastal Act, including excessive grading and its impact on views from two nearby scenic highways.

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Mayor Walter Keller said the judge’s ruling was “doubly pleasing because it sends a signal to developers that we’re willing to go to court to stop these kinds of projects.”

Coastal Commission spokesman Jack Liebster said the state panel probably will decide at its meeting next month what its response will be. By law, the commission has 60 days to appeal.

In voting to approve the project, the commission dismissed several recommendations by its staff, including one that the project should include no more than 34 homes and about 900,000 cubic yards of grading.

At the time, several commissioners warned that to give VMS-Anden what it wanted would set a precedent for other developers to begin massive grading of the land.

The decision capped an intense three-year struggle by the developers to win approval for the project on 255 acres in rugged hills just off Encinal Canyon Road, two miles north of Pacific Coast Highway.

Malibu’s opposition to the project stems from the developers’ persuading a county commission in 1989 to draw the city boundaries to exclude the property.

VMS-Anden originally had sought to grade 8 million cubic yards of earth to accommodate 69 homes and an 18-hole championship golf course. Los Angeles County supervisors approved the 69 homes in 1990, after the developers dropped plans for the golf course.

The developers later reduced to 55 the number of houses it sought to build and made other concessions in their effort to win Coastal Commission approval.

Opponents of the project as approved by the coastal panel say that if it is built, the new homeowners in an area frequently beset by brush fires would be endangered because the development will have only one access road.

Some nearby property owners also complained that fumes from a waste-water treatment plant the developers want to build at the site would decrease their property values.