Neighbors, Owner Face Deadline on Party House

A long-brewing dispute between residents of a rustic canyon neighborhood and a professional party host in their midst is expected to come to a head this week when the two sides either announce a resolution of their differences--or get a jury to settle them.

For five years, Triunfo Canyon homeowners in Agoura have lodged hundreds of complaints over the extravagant fetes thrown by entrepreneur Avi Datner, whose family transformed its 23-acre property into a party palace featuring Greek columns, running waterfalls and a huge dance tent.

Neighbors contend that the weddings and bar mitzvahs booked at Fantasy Island regularly subject them to loud music and blocked traffic until the wee hours. The blunt-spoken, belligerent Datner denies causing such disruption, but he has been criminally charged with operating his retreat without the proper permits.

Now, the two sides have until Thursday to hash out mutually acceptable conditions for Fantasy Island to continue business. Otherwise, the judge who ordered them to negotiate the misdemeanor case may send the matter to trial.

Attorneys representing Datner, the homeowners and the county all agree that a settlement as part of a plea bargain would be in everyone’s best interests. For Datner, it would remove the threat of a three-year jail sentence so long as he abides by the terms of the settlement, which would become conditions of his probation.

“We’d much rather work out an arrangement where there are acceptable methods of operation,” said Fred Gaines, Datner’s lawyer. “We’re very hopeful that we can reach an agreement.”

For Datner’s neighbors, it would return a measure of normality to the quiet life they expected to lead beneath the canyon’s ramrod oaks, where the only noisemakers they previously contended with were chirping crickets and croaking frogs.

“If this were happening on Hollywood Boulevard, I doubt very much if anyone would care,” resident Bob Webb said. “It’s just very inappropriate in that canyon.”

Talks so far have produced agreement on such issues as beefing up security and limiting the hours in which Fantasy Island workers can set up and clean up the parties, which can attract hundreds of revelers.

But at a meeting last Tuesday, a gap still yawned between the two sides on points that Datner considers crucial to his venture and homeowners consider vital to their well-being: the hours of operation, how many months the retreat is available each year and the maximum number of guests.

Further complicating the picture are four celebrations Datner held even after the December court hearing in which the judge demanded negotiations and admonished Datner to “obey all laws.”

“As far as I’m concerned, [Datner] cannot operate unless he’s licensed and permitted,” Judge Lawrence J. Mira told Datner’s attorneys Dec. 11, according to court transcripts.

Datner, an Israeli immigrant who has accused some of his opponents of anti-Semitism and who once physically attacked a man delivering a subpoena to him, maintains that he has always operated his business legally. The four parties, including a New Year’s Eve bash, fully complied with the law, said Gaines.

“We believe that the events were legal,” he said. “We believe that he has all the permits he needs.”

But Datner’s detractors consider the recent parties a clear breach of the spirit, as well as the letter, of the judge’s order, a move that illustrates Datner’s continuing defiance and served only to heighten antagonism as the opposing sides were to come together to hammer out an amicable solution.

“What it does is make it more difficult for my clients to want to agree to anything,” said the homeowners’ attorney, Douglas Otto. “They . . . heard the judge say, ‘Thou shalt not do this,’ and then [Datner] just did it with impunity, which is what he’s been doing for five years. We’re curious to see what the court’s and district attorney’s attitude will be in the face of this.”

During two of the four parties, a complaint was lodged over the amplified music that booms from Fantasy Island’s loudspeakers. But each time, sheriff’s deputies who visited the venue found no illegal disturbance of the peace, Gaines said--which makes it difficult for authorities to act against Datner.

“We don’t know what he did. Were they private parties, were they for pay, do we have people who have receipts from the party and say, ‘Yeah, I was there’?” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Al Medina, whose office brought the permit-violation charges against Datner. “Proof is the big thing. We don’t just like to jump on the guy.”

As for the criminal case against Datner, Medina said that regardless of any agreement struck between the two sides, Fantasy Island would still be required to obtain the permits and licenses that authorities say are lacking.

“He still has to follow the rules. He’s not given carte blanche just because he’s been convicted or agrees to follow the conditions,” Medina said.

But some officials say that defusing this particular feud does nothing to address the underlying land-use problem that gave rise to it.

Decades ago, when the area was largely uninhabited, the county zoned Triunfo Canyon for “resort and recreation” uses. The law allowed for such things as a “dance pavilion,” anachronisms that cause headaches for present-day officials, who must apply or adapt them to modern situations. (In this case, planners accepted Datner’s massive party tent as an outdoor dance pavilion.)

County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky has recommended that the Regional Planning Commission hold public hearings on the zoning law and amend it as necessary. The Board of Supervisors is expected to vote on Yaroslavsky’s motion Tuesday.

Yaroslavsky said last week that proper resort and recreation uses for the area would include activities like hiking and horseback riding, which are “compatible with the terrain, the topography, the environment.”

“These areas were not intended to be amusement parks or social halls. No author of the zoning code could have possibly intended for the Santa Monica Mountains to be pockmarked with bar mitzvahs, weddings and graduation parties,” he said. “There needs to be some changes.”

Yaroslavsky said he had been aware of the dispute over Fantasy Island since his election to county supervisor in 1994, but hoped that the matter would be settled quickly. Now that the battle has dragged into its sixth year, the time has come to deal with the underlying problem to preclude such problems in the future.

“I was hopeful that Fantasy Island was just an exception,” he said.