Opponents of Playa Vista Sue Over Environmental Report : Development: Foes of the project contend study failed to consider the impact of traffic and pollution on Ballona Wetlands. Councilwoman Ruth Galanter says they’re ‘wasting their time.’

Contending that an environmental review of the massive Playa Vista development in Playa del Rey was inadequate, opponents last week sued Los Angeles in an effort to block the $7-billion project.

“Many of Playa Vista’s environmental impacts have been either overlooked or whitewashed,” said Salvatore Grammatico, a spokesman for Save Ballona Wetlands, which filed the lawsuit in Santa Monica Superior Court.

The suit alleges that city officials failed to adequately consider the traffic, air pollution and other consequences of the proposed residential, office, retail and hotel project before approving its first stage last month.

The document also contends that developer Maguire Thomas Partners’ plan to restore and preserve the Ballona Wetlands on part of the property will instead result in the wetlands being destroyed.

“We think (the Maguire Thomas plan) will turn the wetlands into a sewer,” Grammatico said.

Save Ballona Wetlands is not to be confused with Friends of Ballona Wetlands, which helped halt attempts to develop the 1,000-acre Playa Vista property by the Summa Corp. in the 1980s, and which was instrumental in securing commitments from Maguire Thomas to spend up to $10 million to restore the wetlands.

Grammatico said the group formed two years ago and he does not know how many members it has.

Maguire Thomas senior partner Nelson Rising defended the environmental impact report--which took 3 1/2 years to complete and cost $5 million--as “the most comprehensive of its kind ever in my experience.”

Meanwhile, Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, whose district includes Playa Vista, dismissed the action as politically motivated.

“Sal (Grammatico) is in the awkward position of saying those who’ve studied this issue for 20 years don’t know as much about it as he does and I don’t know anyone who is going to believe that,” she said. “I guess he thinks it gives him a campaign issue.”

Grammatico has twice run against Galanter for City Council. She faces reelection in 1995.

Officials in the city attorney’s office said they would not comment on the document until they have seen it.

The Los Angeles City Council approved Playa Vista’s first stage--which represents about a quarter of the entire project--on Sept. 21 after 4 1/2 years of planning and public hearings.

As part of the approval, the council also voted to settle a long-simmering lawsuit aimed at ensuring that the developer spends the money to restore the 270-acre Ballona Wetlands.

Although the settlement assures that the wetlands will forever remain off-limits to development, critics said it was inadequate because it allows Maguire Thomas to back away from the restoration if future stages of the project are not approved.

The first stage will involve construction of 3,246 residential units, 1.25 million square feet of office space, 35,000 square feet of retail space and 300 hotel rooms.

Ultimately, Playa Vista is to become a community the size of Hermosa Beach, with 29,000 residents, and serve as a workplace for 20,000 people.

Opponents, including state Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica), have warned that Playa Vista will result in gridlock for parts of the Westside, and have called the project an “economic and environmental disaster.”

Kate Neiswender, an attorney for Save Ballona Wetlands, said the city’s environmental review process was “full of deficiencies,” adding that officials “turned the process upside down” by approving the first stage without first adequately addressing concerns raised by the master plan.

“By approving this one piece the city has irrevocably committed itself to the larger project, and in our judgment that is specifically precluded under (state environmental law),” she said.

Galanter, however, discounted the group’s objections.

“Attorneys for the city and the developers had an interest in seeing that the process was clean,” she said. “If (the opponents) had asked my opinion about this lawsuit I would have advised them that they were wasting their time.”