LETTERS : Overdevelopment Was Real Issue of Lawsuit

Your report on the dismissal of our Marina Place lawsuit (Times, Dec. 2) was generally accurate except for one key aspect. The article does not mention the essential issues in the lawsuit, and therefore leaves a mistaken impression that the suit was intended simply to block or delay development of a shopping mall.

This is hardly the case. The Coastal Area Support Team filed the suit to win a critical point concerning the impact and limits of deliberate overdevelopment. The key issue in our case was whether massive, inappropriate development that serves the limited special interests of one or two parties can be permitted at an overwhelmingly detrimental cost to the community. While we’re happy that changing circumstances have made the Marina Place mall highly improbable, we are nevertheless very disappointed that our case was decided on a narrow technical point concerning deadlines for filing the action. By doing so, the courts never allowed the major substantive issue to be addressed.

We are certain, however, that this issue of unbridled overdevelopment at irreparable cost to the community and the public will arise again and again, until the law is forced to address it. With our communities becoming ever more crowded and complex, we cannot escape the issue.

TERRY CONNER

Marina del Rey

Conner is on the board of directors of the Coastal Area Support Team, whose suit challenged the plan for development of Marina Place regional shopping mall.