Developer May Lose Sunset Billboard OK

Questions in West Hollywood about a developer’s credibility have triggered a City Hall backlash against a controversial $250-million Sunset Strip commercial project.

The City Council took steps late Monday to yank builder Mark Siffin’s permit to erect billboards that would crown his proposed Sunset Millennium development and pump an estimated $4.3 million a year into it. The city’s action could affect the financial prospects of the two-block-long development.

The City Council’s unusual step toward repealing the billboard authorization came during an emotional public hearing.

Opponents accused Siffin of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy the support of neighbors and of secretly scrapping plans to build a 370-room luxury hotel as the centerpiece of the project, which would also include offices and retail shops.

The 3-2 council vote came as officials sidestepped a request from Siffin’s opponents to schedule a public referendum seeking to block the big rental billboards.

Siffin received authorization for the outdoor signboards last September after advising officials that revenue from the signs was needed to help finance his project. A short time later, though, he disclosed that an apartment building would be built instead of a hotel, although it might be converted to a hotel later. Siffin blamed the economic aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks for the change.

He tried Monday to persuade council members that a hotel was still earmarked as part of the sprawling project. But Mayor John Heilman disclosed that he has obtained a real estate broker’s report done for Siffin that touts “446 luxury apartments” planned for the site at the corner of Sunset and La Cienega boulevards.

Siffin depicted the report as merely “a draft of a study to analyze an alternative development project.”

But Councilman Sal Guarriello, a former supporter, was not satisfied. “I want a true answer,” Guarriello said. “I’ve stuck with you five years. But you haven’t been honest with me the last four or five months.”

Guarriello joined Heilman and Councilman John Duran in asking city lawyers to bring a motion to the council on Jan. 22 to repeal the billboard authorization.

Siffin denied lying and said he would like to see a hotel there.

Luxury Hotel Seen as Source of Tax Revenue

City officials have long looked at a luxury hotel as an important source of a predicted $8 million in yearly tax revenue from the overall 662,800-square-foot development.

But project opponents have consistently complained that problems would outweigh benefits. Besides spoiling nearby views of the Los Angeles basin, foes have asserted, Sunset Millennium would put hundreds more cars onto an already jammed Sunset Strip. And a street closure required by the development also might delay firetrucks and ambulances responding to emergencies in the area, some have warned.

Opponents charged Monday night that Siffin had planned to drop the hotel from the project as early as last April, when he negotiated one of what city leaders say may be a dozen “mutual support and benefits agreements” with residents of neighboring condominium associations. Siffin said he was not certain Monday how many have been signed.

The confidential agreements promised payments to nearby condominium associations in exchange for residents’ active public support of Sunset Millennium. Owners of units in one building had to pledge to “conduct information and outreach meetings” and agree to not criticize Sunset Millennium to the city “or in the news media” in exchange for payments totaling $200,000 to their association.

“They are in support of the project because they are being paid,” opponent G.G. Verone complained Monday to council members. “They are lobbyists. They should be listed as lobbyists.”

The hearing was peppered with complaints that a billboard firm with its own signs elsewhere on Sunset Strip was behind the campaign for the anti-Siffin billboard referendum petitions. But Brian Kennedy, head of the Regency billboard company, responded that “We were asked to be involved and were delighted to be.”

Because the council may be taking action against the proposed Siffin billboards later this month, there was no need to set a citywide referendum election.

After the meeting, Siffin refused to criticize Guarriello for casting the deciding vote. He said he would continue the construction now underway. “It’s a great project,” he said.

His supporters also said the fight isn’t over.

Jehuda Renan, whose condominium association is to receive $120,000 from Siffin for a new roof, said supporters may try to block Heilman from voting on the repeal Jan. 22 on grounds that Heilman lives within 500 yards of the Sunset Millennium site.

Under the law, Heilman must recuse himself from voting on the issue, Renan said.

Verone, meanwhile, said her struggle isn’t over, either.

“They’ve got two weeks. They’re going to be putting pressure on Sal to change his vote,” she said.