Land-Use Dispute Covers New Ground : Rancho Palos Verdes: What started out as a development disagreement now includes allegations of racism and concerns about a threatened species.

Rancho Palos Verdes officials are embroiled in a development dispute with a retired municipal judge that has touched off arguments on everything from the threatened California gnatcatcher to allegations of racial bias.

The dispute involves an ocean-view, 13.6-acre parcel in Indian Valley, where retired Compton Municipal Court Judge G. Thomas Thompson and other co-owners want to build 190 townhomes for sale to low- to moderate-income buyers.

Earlier this month, city officials denied a request for a change in the property’s zoning, saying the land and its natural habitat are too fragile for high-density development.

The argument escalated last week when workers hired by the property owners used a bulldozer to clear the parcel of shrubbery and trees and installed a large trailer on the grounds. The landowners said they are preparing to plant turf on the property to turn the site into a park for inner-city youths.

City officials say the work violated several city and state laws and may have endangered a pair of California gnatcatchers that have a nest with four eggs on the property. The birds, which were recently listed as a threatened species, are protected by the federal government.

To prevent additional work on the land, city officials obtained a temporary restraining order from a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge on Wednesday. City officials say they hope to come to an agreement with Thompson and the other owners in the next week about how the property will be used.

But Thompson, who became Compton’s first housing authority director in 1968, denies his workers did anything wrong. He says he is intent on winning permission to develop the project but that in the meantime, he wants to put a park on the property to help defray his expenses.

Thompson, a Long Beach resident, says he expects to donate use of the park to youth groups such as Young Black Scholars and the Compton YMCA and then write off those expenses from his taxes.

Thompson was skeptical that gnatcatchers were found on his property and accused city officials of using the issue to prevent him from developing a housing project that would bring poor people and minorities into the neighborhood.

“What really concerns me is that city officials are viewing (the project) from a biased, prejudiced point of view,” Thompson said. “It’s like, ‘We’re in now, we’ve made it, so to hell with you.’ ”

The property is in the northern branch of Agua Amarga Canyon, a large natural canyon that provides drainage for the western slope of the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

In the mid-1950s, developers constructing a nearby housing tract used the northern end of the canyon as a landfill. Today, the property overlooks the remainder of the canyon, which slopes to the ocean. There are condominiums on the south side of the property and single-family houses on the north.

In 1991, the parcel’s previous owners, Wallace Pollock and Richard Capellino, sought to build four houses at Windport Drive, a cul-de-sac on the property’s north side. The City Council rejected the proposal, saying construction could erode canyon walls and lead to a potential landslide.

Pollock and Capellino later sold the land to a partnership including Thompson, who became the primary owner about six months ago. Earlier this month, Thompson lobbied the city for a general plan amendment to change the zoning to allow for high-density development.

Council members denied the request April 6, saying they were concerned about the surrounding environment. They also asserted that the city can meet its goals for affordable housing through other projects under development.

The council’s decision came as a relief to several neighboring residents, who for years have enjoyed the breathtaking ocean views offered by the vast acreage of open, overgrown landscape next to their homes.

They said they were shocked and distressed when workers with a bulldozer spent three days last week removing most of the foliage from the site.

Gravel has been spread out over an area surrounding a large trailer resting on supports on the property’s north side. A chain-link fence is set around its perimeter.

“It was an open field--a lot of the flowers were out. It looked great,” said neighbor Donald Vannorsdall. “Now look at it. For no apparent good reason they have taken out all of the natural habitat that was there.”

Neighbor Carolina Oaxaca agreed: “There were trees, bushes and wildlife all over. You had foxes, raccoons, skunks. Now there’s nothing. . . . The fact is, he could take a whole bunch of inner-city kids to other parks in this city. He didn’t have to tear up this land.”

She and Vannorsdall were among the neighbors who summoned city officials and biologists with state and federal wildlife agencies to the site.

City officials concluded that Thompson and his partners had violated municipal codes by failing to take out a permit to grade the site and by grading more land than is allowed. They accused the owners of placing a trailer on the property without a permit.

Officials with the state Department of Fish and Game are also investigating allegations that the workers unlawfully filled the drainage course with graded earth, a civil misdemeanor that carries a maximum $25,000 fine.

Meanwhile, U.S. Fish and Wildlife biologists have expressed concern that the bulldozer came within 50 feet of a pair of gnatcatchers and a nest containing four eggs on the property. They are worried that further work on the site would have brought harm to the birds.

Thompson and his attorney, Jonathan Lehrer-Graiwer, denied that workers illegally graded the land, saying the bulldozer was used to remove weeds to keep the area safe from fires. They also contend the trailer is permitted under city law.

They said workers wanted to remove debris from the drainage course, but that the temporary restraining order prohibited them from doing any additional work on the site. They also described concerns about gnatcatchers in the area as a ruse, saying city officials merely want to deflect attention from their opposition to low-income housing.

“Clearly these people are interested in the gnatcatcher like you’re interested in the man on the moon,” Lehrer-Graiwer said.

“It’s bigotry directed against poor people, people just making it,” Thompson added. “The real idea behind it is, ‘We don’t want people we view as less than ourselves or poorer than ourselves on your property.’ ”

The affordable-housing project would be located in the heart of a neighborhood where houses sell for more than $500,000. The development would contain 190 townhouse-style condominiums that would be sold to families earning as little as $28,000 a year. Buyers would receive low-interest loans requiring a down payment of only 10% of the price.

City officials say environmental concerns, not prejudice, form the basis of their objections.

“That’s a shame that he said that,” Mayor Susan Brooks said of Thompson’s allegations. “This has everything to do with land use and nothing to do with ethnicity, race, class or other human elements.”

Carol Lynch, the city attorney, said Thompson’s arguments were designed to pressure the council to accept a development they deem unsafe. And she said his attitude toward the gnatcatchers is precisely the reason she took him to court to prevent additional work on the grounds.

“If he wouldn’t even acknowledge the existence of gnatcatchers on the site, how can we be sure he will guarantee that any visitors” will not harm the birds, she asked?