The Entrada Project – Despite Massive Opposition, Outgoing City Council Approved Monstrosity, Incoming Council Refused to Reconsider

Gary Silbiger

NOTE: This is the first in a series of Culver City Progress election articles detailing the role of former Councilmembers and the views of the challengers on the important issues in Culver City. A Scorecard for each issue is included at the end of the articles.

On April 14, 2008, one of the most complex development projects in Culver City’s history – the Entrada Project – was quickly fast tracked to the City Council agenda for a vote. The big developers knew they had 4 of the 5 Councilmembers on board, but 3 new Council members – a majority - had just been elected 6 days earlier, and were to be officially sworn in on April 28. Unlike the then-current 4 Council member majority, the soon-to-be-elected members had each spoken critically about the massive and complicated Entrada Project.

On February 20, 2008, the Culver City Planning Commission had compliantly agreed to the 13 story office building and parking lot next to the then Radisson hotel. This then led the United Neighbors of Westchester, the residents closest to the project, to appeal the decision to the City Council and Redevelopment Agency. All the stars were aligned.

Yet it wasn’t until April 9 – 5 days before the Council meeting – that the thousands of pages of technical material in support of the City staff’s agenda report recommending full approval of the project as suggested by the developer first became available to the public.

That fateful night of April 14, 2008, the Carlyle Group, a super-wealthy national developer, requested its project, at the Centinela Avenue Radisson Hotel property, now owned by the Doubletree Hotel, be approved by the City Council and Redevelopment Agency. This approval required an Environmental Impact Report, a height exception (the 56 foot height limit approved by a ballot initiative could only be increased in a Redevelopment Agency area by a vote of the Council), a Design for Development, and a Tentative Map (splitting the parcel into 2). Culver City staff found the EIR to have “4 significant and unavoidable impacts” – air quality, archaeological resources, construction noise, and traffic – which could be reduced, but not eliminated. Given the massive amount of materials, the extremely short period of time to prepare for this vote, the 5 days maximum for the public to prepare, the technical nature of these issues, and the recently discovered issues of methane gas in the area and Native American concerns, I asked for a short extension of time to investigate and research the breadth of this development. Not one Councilmember gave either the public or me the common courtesy of allowing us to properly prepare for the vote. This is not the way people should be treated.

At the meeting, the community was clear in their view – 46 individuals spoke and 54 wrote comments in opposition to the Project totaling 100 opponents, while only 5 spoke and 1 wrote comments in support of the Project totaling 6 supporters. 100 to deny and 6 to approve. At the middle of the night, the Council voted to postpone the meeting until the following evening.

On April 15, 2008, Scott Malsin made the successful motion, seconded by Alan Corlin, denying the United Neighbors appeal and approving all parts of the Planning Commission’s decision, including the permission to build a 176 foot building. The damage was done, the people ignored, big business rewarded.

But, there was still another opportunity to keep Culver City’s small town feel. On the April 28, 2008 night of the changing of the guard, then-newly elected Councilmember Christopher Armenta made a request to agendize a discussion about reconsidering the Entrada Project vote of April 15. I agreed, but not one other Councilmember (Scott Malsin, Micheal O’Leary, or Andy Weissman) voted to even agendize the discussion. This exact same scenario repeated itself at the May 12, 2008 City Council meeting. It was clear that the new City Council had the authority to reconsider the topic and vote in a different manner, both City Attorney Carol Schwab and Redevelopment Agency Counsel Murray Kane agreed. Yet the new council did not even offer us an opportunity to review and correct the many mistakes made by the prior council.

The United Neighbors appealed the decision to the California courts and lost, relying primarily on their misinterpretation that the height limitation ballot initiative had precluded the Council from approving a building more than 56 feet high in a redevelopment area.

This is hardly the only time a bad development project was approved by the Council. However, due to its massive size, community rejection, and unfairness of the Council procedures, it ranks high in showing the damage that a few elected officials can cause. The lesson learned is to listen closely to campaign promises and make certain that we hold those elected officials to those promises they made to get elected.

ENTRADA DEVELOPMENT SCORECARD

April 15, 2008 Vote to Approve Entrada Development
Micheal O'Leary: N/A
Scott Malsin: F
Andrew Weissman: N/A

April 28, 2008 and May 12, 2008 Vote to Agendize Reconsideration
Micheal O'Leary: F
Scott Malsin: F
Andrew Weissman: F

Gary Silbiger is the Co-Editor of the Culver City Progress Blog and the Former Mayor of Culver City.