TV Tapings Leave Studio Neighbors Unamused : Warner Bros.: Homeowners object to parking problems. The company and city test a short-term solution.

A public relations nightmare has erupted at Warner Bros. Studios, where Friday night tapings of such popular sitcoms as “Family Matters” have been drawing hundreds of visitors to a pristine adjoining neighborhood whose residents feel under siege.

Homeowners say the studio audiences not only take up every available parking space on their quiet streets, but throw beer bottles, urinate in public and sometimes spray graffiti. Though no confrontations or crimes have been reported, some residents of the Toluca Lake area adjacent to the studio say that the weekly throngs make them uneasy and that they resent the lack of available parking on Warner Bros. property.

“There were people here who have felt threatened,” said resident Stan Hyman. “Whether it was a perceived threat or a real one, no one knows.”

For years, the tapings for Hollywood’s fall lineup have been a late-summer ritual at Warner Bros., as elsewhere, and live audiences are customary. But the number of visitors and competition for parking has escalated in recent weeks as the studio, apparently flush with work, has been taping seven TV shows on Friday nights instead of the usual four.

Tapings last until 11 p.m. and each program attracts as many as 250 audience members, inundating the area of about 700 people with an average of 2,000 visitors.

On Friday, studio and city officials tested their short-term solution to the problem by bringing in $2,500 worth of police and barricades, and adding to Warner Bros.’ own security force to protect affected streets.

As cars lined up to attend three of the six tapings on the west side of the studio, they filled the lots off Franklin Avenue in an hour. Latecomers were directed to a parking lot on Forest Lawn Drive, as well a studio parking lot.

“By this time last week we had bumper-to-bumper traffic on each street,” said Molly Hyman, as she stood near the parking lot on Franklin. “This is so much better.”

But Ann Rimmer sat on her front porch facing Rose Street, unsatisfied as she watched police patrol the area.

“They should be towing those cars parked there,” she said, referring to three parked next to temporary No Parking signs posted by the city. “But instead the police just ticketed them.”

Others in the neighborhood thought the barricades and police presence were overkill for the problem.

“Warner Bros. should have been more responsible with the parking, but they can’t be responsible for every single person out here,” said Liv Johansen, who rents an apartment nearby.

“I am shocked by all the police and barriers,” Johansen said, as she walked her dog. “I think it is more of an overreaction by the city.”

For future shows, studio officials said they will continue to divert traffic to their parking garage on Forest Lawn Drive and a lot near Lakeside Drive, as well as moving some shows to the other side of the studio lot.

“We were as surprised as the neighbors,” said Gary Credle, president of operations at Warner Bros. Studios. Friday night’s shows included “Murphy Brown,” “Step by Step,” “Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper,” “Hope and Gloria,” “Two Something,” “Family Matters” and “Bless This House,” according to Credle.

“It was just something that got out of hand,” he said. “We were not prepared for it.”

Residents of the predominantly white area say they, too, were not prepared for the onslaught of outsiders. Their level of anger is such that a number of flyers have been distributed to unite neighbors against Warner Bros., including one with racial overtones.

It claims the studio invited gangbangers from “all over Los Angeles” to fill its TV audiences and didn’t want them parking on the Warner Bros. lot. “Who’ll be the first in our neighborhood to be mugged, murdered, robbed or raped?” asks the flyer, which was placed in mailboxes and front doorsteps.

The flyer also calls on Warner Bros. to shuttle its audiences from remote parking lots, rather than letting them park on local streets. “Bus ‘em in, bus ‘em out,” the flyer says. “Don’t give them the opportunity to ‘explore’ our neighborhood.”

“They didn’t want those people on their lot,” said Dean Kay, whose name appears on the flyer but would not comment on whether he wrote it. “But they didn’t mind putting them into our neighborhood.”

Credle said the studio has never invited gang members to tapings. “But the shows attract different types of demographics,” he said. “We don’t make the same product for all audiences.”

Nonetheless, Credle said he believed that parking, not prejudice, was at the root of the neighborhood’s complaints.

Robby Shaw is among those residents who claim the recent parking fiasco is part of a campaign by Warner Bros. to get neighbors to accept its plans to build a new, four-story garage in the area.

“They are using heavy-handed measures to get that parking structure built,” said Shaw, who has been circulating his own, anti-Warner Bros. flyer with the word INVASION scrawled across the top. “It is all orchestrated to get what they want.”

The garage, to be built near Olive and Franklin avenues, is part of Warner Bros.’ 20-year master plan that is up for approval by the Burbank Planning Commission Monday night. Also included in the plan are four 15-story office towers, two six-level parking structures and various offices.

Although residents’ approval is not officially required, substantial opposition at a public hearing scheduled for Monday could persuade the commission to delay a vote or simply reject parts of the plan.

Some homeowners and renters have begun a petition drive seeking permit-only parking favoring residents. Backers include Toluca Lake resident and Burbank City Councilman Bill Wiggins, who said he was out of town in the last few weeks but sympathized with his neighbors.

Wiggins added that he did not approve of the gangbangers flyer, which he called “totally out of line” and “racist.” He said he will propose at Tuesday night’s City Council meeting that city staff begin a study of parking in the studio area.

Warner Bros. held several meetings with neighbors after announcing its expansion plans nine months ago. Hyman says studio officials said the new parking structure would be used solely by employees and not visitors.

“They said they desperately needed it for their employees,” Hyman recalled. “They have been lying for years to the neighborhood.”

Credle said the studio never planned to designate the garage for employees and never gave residents that impression. “Nobody has ever tried to hide anything,” he said. “None of this was orchestrated.”

But he added that the problem the neighborhood has faced for the past few weeks would go away if the studio could get the parking structure approved.

“What we need is more parking,” Credle said. “I mean, Burbank is the media capital of the world. This place is going to grow. It can’t remain a sleepy hollow.”