Hillside Home Op-Ed Wasn’t on the Level

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As a Benedict Canyon resident strongly committed to retaining the quality of our hillsides, I read with disbelief the op-ed by attorney and City Hall lobbyist Ben Reznik (“Subdivide and Conquer”) in the Jan. 16 issue of the Business Journal.

The Benedict Canyon Association and the Bel Air-Beverly Crest Neighborhood Council have reviewed the commercial-scale residential project proposed by Reznik’s client; they have been clear that they expect all laws and codes to be followed. Somehow, Reznik and his client, a Saudi prince, seem to believe they don’t need to follow laws or codes like everyone else.

Initially, the landowner’s apparently well-connected local team tried to ram this project through the city with no public disclosure or Planning Department review, whatsoever. Worse, they almost got away with it – at least until the community learned the magnitude of the compound, and realized that it could not be built legally or within well-established city building codes.

Reznik, a partner at Jeffer Mangels Butler & Mitchell, has now taken to the opinion page of the Business Journal to tell a tale that misstates and omits critically important facts.

Let’s briefly recount them: His client first proposed a megacompound totaling some 80,000 square feet or more on an inaccessible, steeply graded hillside in Benedict Canyon. Rather than tying the three adjacent lots, as most people would do, Reznik tried to secure a lot-line adjustment, arguing the massive project was actually three independent ones. The lot-line adjustment application was so troublesome and riddled with misstatements that the city attorney referred it to the district attorney for review.

The landowner’s representatives also went to great lengths to hide the identity of the property owner and the true scope of the project, raising suspicions in the community. A far-reaching investigation by the Los Angeles Times revealed the owner’s name, and hard work by the neighbors helped reveal the vast development plans – more Hearst Castle than Benedict Canyon residence.

The property is currently subject to more than 13 orders to comply for illegal grading and construction of illegal structures, including a massive retaining wall running more than 540 feet long and at least 22 feet high. The city has determined that this wall and others were illegally constructed and the property was illegally graded.

This landowner wants to construct his massive compound in a sensitive hillside area – without providing any mitigation measures to alleviate the neighborhood impacts for thousands of construction truck trips up narrow canyon roads, on-site rock and debris crushing, significant air pollution, and irrevocable degradation of the canyon environment, all of which this multiyear project will create.

Reznik and his client summarily dismiss the community’s concerns and openly reject the city’s express findings that discretionary approvals and environmental review are required, expressing his disdain for a fair and open review process most directly in his letter to the city of Los Angeles, proclaiming: “Public input is irrelevant.”

To demonstrate the gamesmanship at play, the prince’s team submitted permit requests for the property just five days before the city’s new Hillside Mansionization Ordinance took effect, a law that would have made his client’s plans impossible to accomplish. In fact, preventing outsized compounds in hillside areas is exactly why the new ordinance was drafted and approved in the first place.

‘New’ code

Even more disingenuous, in his op-ed, Reznik rails against what he calls a “new” code governing large grading sites – different from the Hillside Mansionization Ordinance. However, he fails to disclose that not only is this grading code far from “new” – dating back decades – but Reznik himself actually grappled with it for another client developer about 10 years ago!

The city of Los Angeles has been very clear about this project: Comprehensive environmental review is required. In public statements and writing, City Councilman Paul Koretz and county Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky have expressly supported the community. In a letter to the directors of L.A.’s departments of Planning and Building and Safety, Koretz wrote: “The community deserves, and the law requires, an honest airing of the real and complete project that will be built at Tower Lane, and appropriate environmental review – and appropriate community input – is vital.”

Attempts to push through a commercial scale project on a residential property that has been cited for illegal activity is shameful. The actions in this case provide all of us a valuable reminder that we, the public, must remain vigilant when landowners and their attorneys attempt repeatedly to circumvent the law. And we must continue to demand a full environmental review on this misguided project, as the city has already determined and directed.

Nickie Miner is president of the Benedict Canyon Association and an executive board member of the Bel Air-Beverly Crest Neighborhood Council. The opinions expressed above are hers.

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