All Fired Up : Condo Residents Say City Law Requiring Sprinklers Poses Undue Hardship

When Douglas Morrow and his wife sold their Beverly Hills home and moved to a condominium penthouse in Glendale 13 years ago, they thought they had picked the perfect retirement nest--a state-of-the-art, fire-resistant unit with a wrap-around terrace and spectacular views of the Verdugo Mountains.

Then the Morrows, and more than 90 other residents of the 11-story Verdugo Towers at 1155 N. Brand Blvd., were notified by the Glendale Fire Department that they must retrofit the entire building with fire sprinklers. Under a city law adopted in 1989, residents have until July 20 to comply, or face criminal penalties and possibly jail.

The job could cost up to $1 million and require removal of asbestos from the 28-year-old building, which means the residents may be forced to move out--possibly for six months to a year--while the work is done. Most say they cannot afford the expense and that even the thought of having to pack up and move panics them.

“We are all literally sick over this whole thing,” said Morrow, 80, an Academy Award-winning screenwriter who said residents are living a nightmare suitable for a made-for-TV movie. “People are frightened. It is a terrible, terrible thing the city is doing to us.”

Hamlet Nanadjanians, treasurer of the condominium homeowners association, said most residents are elderly and live on fixed incomes--supplemented only by interest earnings on life savings, payments that have steadily dwindled with the recession. He said many fear they will lose their homes if they have to pay the estimated $10,000 to $20,000 per unit to install the sprinklers.

Scott Alberts, 32, a business manager and the youngest and newest resident at the towers, where he purchased a one-bedroom unit 10 months ago, charged the city requirement “is not fair, not equitable. I am completely against the concept that the city can make a law that is retroactive that is going to affect people the way this is going to affect people.”

The plight of the Verdugo Towers residents has rekindled a smoldering debate over the merits of installing sprinklers in older buildings. State and municipal codes adopted since the 1970s require such systems in all new high-rise construction, but it is only recently that the debate has focused on mandatory installation in high-rise condominiums built before the newer laws.

The Greater Los Angeles Condominium Assn., an umbrella organization of 28 high-rise residential complexes, mostly in downtown Los Angeles and the West Side, has argued for years that the costs to retrofit older buildings far exceed any expected benefits, said Glenn Rosten, association vice president.

His organization has successfully blocked proposed legislation at the state level and in Los Angeles that would require the retrofitting of sprinklers in older condominium towers. Rosten said an independent study by experts, expected to be presented to the Los Angeles City Council within a few weeks, disputes arguments by fire officials that sprinklers are crucial to saving lives and property.

Rosten said the report concludes that residents are six times more likely to lose their lives in a single-family or low-rise fire than in a high-rise.

“Every time there is a fire in a high-rise building, you get somebody in every city who has a knee-jerk reaction,” he said. “It is a shame cities tend to adopt laws without looking into the ramifications.”

Fire officials, however, point to other studies that have found sprinklers to be the single most important tool in firefighting.

“Fire history has proven that fire sprinklers are the only effective means to suppress a fire in its incipient phases,” said Glendale Assistant Fire Chief Chris Gray. “They save lives. There is no doubt about that.”

Because of the merits of sprinklers, many cities have adopted laws requiring retrofitting of older buildings. But often, as in Los Angeles and Pasadena, the rules apply only to commercial buildings, hotels and apartments and exempt condominiums because of the hardships imposed on limited owners.

Glendale’s 1989 law is one of the strictest, affecting all low-, medium- and high-rise structures built before 1974, when the city began requiring sprinklers in all new construction four stories high and taller. The retroactive ordinance affects all older buildings--including commercial offices, condominiums and apartments. A total of 29 structures are affected by the retroactive clause, 10 of which already have been brought into compliance, said David Woods, assistant fire marshal.

The ordinance sets three deadlines for compliance, depending on the height of buildings. Only four buildings in Glendale are required to meet the first deadline in July, affecting older buildings seven stories and higher. Verdugo Towers is the only residential building of the four.

Others are Glendale Federal Bank at 401 N. Brand Blvd. and First Interstate Bank at 535 N. Brand Blvd., both of which now have fire sprinklers. The historic Masonic Temple at 234 S. Brand Blvd. also is affected but plans have been delayed because it is scheduled for renovation in the redevelopment zone and is unoccupied.

Owners of existing mid-rise buildings, generally five or six stories high, have until July, 1994, to comply, while all others four stories or less must be retrofitted with sprinklers by July, 1995.

The ordinance also requires retrofitting with sprinklers, including single-family homes, when expansion exceeds 1,000 square feet, or improvements are made worth 50% of the value of the structure. Sprinklers are required in all new buildings, including single-family homes.

All other existing buildings are exempt, including homes in areas of high fire risk such as the College Hills area of north Glendale, where 64 homes were destroyed or heavily damaged in a brush fire three years ago. So are buildings in which plans had been completed or were under construction at the time the ordinance was adopted.

In addition, the law gives the fire chief, with the agreement of the city building superintendent, the power to exempt existing structures from having to comply when “installation and maintenance of sprinklers would be dangerous to life,” or when “other fire-extinguishing systems to protect special hazards or occupancies” are approved.

City officials said the exemptions were permitted because universal application of the rules would have placed undue hardship on many owners.

Residents of the Verdugo Towers are seeking an exemption because they say the concrete and steel building is designed and well-equipped to resist injury or spread of fire. Each of the 51 units is encapsulated in concrete and steel; standpipes, fire hoses and alarms are on each floor; a master alarm system monitors the building; every unit has a balcony or terrace to the outside with a water spigot; and a city fire station is immediately adjacent to the tower.

The odor of overcooked food in the kitchen of one unit last week, for example, brought the neighboring firefighters to the fifth floor within seconds, even before smoke alarms sounded, Nanadjanians said.

But, after almost four years of negotiations, the city has refused to grant an exemption. “The Fire Department does not believe there are any alternatives to fire sprinklers,” Gray said. “They are the most effective means of providing fire protection and have a proven success rate and reliability for over 100 years.”

The assistant fire chief described the Verdugo Towers and other so-called fire resistant buildings as “incinerators,” in which the contents can be quickly engulfed in flames that could spread to floors above and trap people in their homes.

Gray said the Fire Department has been meeting with homeowners to find the most economical and least disruptive methods to install sprinklers.

“We would like to see the homeowners adopt some type of time frame to install the fire system,” he said. “To this point, we have not received a commitment from the homeowners if they are going to proceed or not.”

Gray said the city’s community resources office also has intervened, offering low-cost loans or grants to low- and moderate-income residents, but that no one has applied. Elderly residents say they are reluctant to mortgage their homes.

The Verdugo Towers debate could spur the city to flex its governmental muscle. Violation of the ordinance is a misdemeanor, punishable by fines of up to $1,000 and/or six months in jail for each day of noncompliance.

Morrow, who, with his wife, Margot Stevens Morrow, 78, owns one of three penthouses in the tower, is challenging the constitutional legality of the law. They filed suit last June in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles and said they are prepared to carry the issue to the U.S. Supreme Court, if necessary.

“This is a disgraceful situation,” said Morrow, who filed the suit on his own behalf, independent of the homeowners association. “We are not idiots. We are as much concerned for our safety as anybody. We don’t want to lie in bed wondering if we are going to burn to death. . . . We are willing to compromise; we just don’t want our houses torn apart.

“Our homes are our sanctuary, our refuge. When it’s disturbed, the reaction is sheer trauma,” added Morrow, who said he, his wife and many others are physically ill and emotionally upset by the city’s orders.

“They gave an exception to all the homeowners in the hills who are in a hazardous area,” he said. “God knows Brand Boulevard is not a hazardous area.”

Naomi Norwood, an attorney representing the Morrows, said the Glendale ordinance “is forcing these people to protect themselves. Where does it all stop?”

In a private tour of his penthouse, Morrow--who won an Oscar for the screenplay for “The Stratton Story,” a 1950 film starring James Stewart as a crippled baseball player--pointed out fire standpipes, alarms, fire hoses and nine exits to a terrace where he has a 125-foot hose attached to a spigot.

“All I have to do is turn it on and squirt it,” he said, pointing to the hose.

“Our worst hazard is not a fire; it’s Glendale City Hall.”