Antiquated Zoning Laws Need Updating

Not even Avi Datner disputes that he can be difficult to like. He is, after all, a man who boasted to a reporter that money gave him the privilege of telling off everyone from local politicians to the Creator. Yet, like many of the neighbors who despise him and his mini theme park in the Santa Monica Mountains, Datner finds himself stuck in a Los Angeles County bureaucracy barely able to decipher its own archaic codes--let alone enforce them. Don’t feel too bad for Datner, though. While antiquated zoning codes form the foundation of his predicament, an equal share of Datner’s problems with the county and his neighbors are of his own creation.

Times reporter Julie Tamaki detailed Datner’s story earlier this month, chronicling how the Israeli immigrant opened a kitschy romantic retreat near Agoura Hills and promptly ran afoul of neighbors who complained that his Fantasy Island park was too noisy and generated too much traffic. Despite years of complaints that led up to revocation of Fantasy Island’s business license, the park continues to operate in one of the county’s most precious natural settings. Datner has been slapped with orders to clean up his act, but he refuses to comply.

Much of the confusion stems from the fact that the land-use rules governing Fantasy Island and the surrounding residential areas were written more than 70 years ago, when the area was used as a weekend retreat for city dwellers. A lot has changed since then. For instance, Fantasy Island is allowed to have a temporary dance pavilion. Pavilions may have been common 70 years ago, but modern county lawyers had to look up the word in a dictionary as they worked on Datner’s case.

A judge next month will sort out Datner’s case as a host of county agencies air their grievances. After that, though, county officials need to step up and modernize the outdated zoning that allowed Datner’s case to languish. They must set clear standards that both preserve the natural serenity of the Santa Monicas and allow reasonable public use. Then, they need to enforce them.