NEWBURY PARK : Lack of Interest Kills Idea for Committee

Committees fold fast when no one wants to serve on them.

That is the lesson Mayor Alex Fiore learned Wednesday when he proposed forming a council committee to draft an acceptable development plan for Albert Cohen’s much-debated 36-acre parcel in Newbury Park.

Although he suggested establishing the committee, Fiore declined to serve on it. Council members Judy Lazar and Frank Schillo promptly disqualified themselves as well, since they had earlier served on another committee trying to work with Cohen.

And the remaining two council members, Elois Zeanah and Jaime Zukowski, rejected the whole idea, arguing that developers should be forced to present their plans to the whole council, instead of cutting deals with smaller committees.

All of which has left Cohen bitter and frustrated.

Instead of trying to reach a compromise with a committee, he will now have to defend his property against a city proposal to downzone it, a move that would cramp the potential for development. A public hearing on the rezoning is set Aug. 2.

“If in the past 10 years Arabs and Israelis could make peace, the Berlin Wall could come down and the Russians could abolish communism, I think we could get a project,” Cohen told the council at 1 a.m. Wednesday, after sitting through a nine-hour meeting to plead for the committee.

“We’re willing to negotiate again,” he said, to no avail.

Cohen’s latest proposal envisions a mix of single-family houses, townhouses and 10 acres of commercial space on the parcel at Reino Road and Kimber Drive. But residents have objected to any intense development on a site they view as a wetland and natural wilderness.