Pepperdine Subsidiary Quits Suit Over Malibu Civic Center

The struggle over Malibu’s main commercial area is headed for trial late next month, without one of the principal players.

Wave Property, a subsidiary of Pepperdine University, has informed the city and its partners in the lawsuit that it would not participate further in the suit--which has a Jan. 20 court date--nor will it continue efforts to develop a cohesive plan for the 125 acres of mostly undeveloped land in and around Malibu’s civic center.

Wave Property, which owns 16 acres of prime real estate in the civic center, also notified the City Council in a letter that it was withdrawing as a member of the Malibu Village Civic Assn., a group of civic center property owners who filed the suit, and would for the time being go its own way in developing its property.

“The decision has been in the works for some time,” Mike O’Neal, president of Wave and vice chancellor at Pepperdine, said Dec. 13.

Wave Property’s withdrawal, O’Neal said, was partly a business decision based on the cost of continuing litigation, but was also based on “how we think it is best to proceed” in working with Malibu, O’Neal said.

Pepperdine’s relationship with the city has been rocky for several years, particularly since the university lobbied successfully in the late 1980s to be placed outside city limits when the boundaries were drawn before Malibu’s incorporation.

There are a lot of issues involved, and working through them “takes time when you have a new city,” he said. “It’s not going to happen overnight.”

In his letter to the City Council, O’Neal cited the lack of progress in two years of negotiations between the city and the civic association over development plans as the reason for bowing out of recent negotiations.

O’Neal left the door open to future talks. “We are confident that someday appropriate planning will take place, and we will continue discussions with the Malibu community, members of (the civic association), and the city toward that goal,” he said.

The association, a group of 15 civic center property owners, also said in a separate announcement that its members were free to pursue their individual development applications, and the group would proceed as planned with its lawsuit challenging the city’s interim zoning law.

The law, designed to keep development options open while the city draws up an overall development blueprint called a general plan, outlaws residential development in the civic center, prohibits new multifamily development throughout Malibu and places limits on other kinds of development.

Fearful that such elements will also be included in the general plan, the association sued the city in April, asking that the ordinance be overturned on the grounds that the City Council should not have approved it without preparing an environmental report.