By Ann K. Williams
Lookout Staff

July 26, 2011 – A development planned to house Lionsgate film studio's executive offices will be up for City Council review Tuesday night, and the project's supporters and opponents are marshalling their forces.

Opponents like the Friends of Sunset Park say the development will lead to too much traffic and will threaten residents of the Village Trailer Park with the lost of their homes, while Colorado Creative Studios developer Jack Walter says his project will be part of a larger initiative built around the Expo Line that will decrease traffic, and that it won't effect trailer park residents.

“Residents seem to have no recourse to stop or significantly modify the huge amount of development planned for Santa Monica and the ongoing loss of housing for our current residents,” Sunset Park resident Lorraine Sanchez wrote to the City Council, referring to the project and its effect on Village Trailer Park residents.

“We need less traffic, less crowding, and more space to breathe instead of more money in the city coffers, no matter how this funding is thought to increase the quality of life in our city,” said Sanchez.

But Walter says there's no way he'd countenance hurting the residents of the trailer park.

“I oppose the displacement or the hardship of the people of Village Trailer Park and would do nothing to hurt them,” Walter told The Lookout Monday. “If I thought that my project would hurt these people, I wouldn't do it.”

As for his project's effect on local traffic, Walter said he's agreed to an “aggressive transportation management” program, including extra electric vehicle stations, bike racks and an Average Vehicle Ridership of 1.5. When the Expo Line comes through town, traffic in the neighborhood is bound to decrease, he added.

Last week, Councilmember Kevin McKeown entered the fray, sending a letter to the press urging his colleagues to think carefully before they approve the project.

“The only way to protect the nearby Village Trailer Park seems to be to coordinate the Lionsgate project with planning for the adjacent parcels,” he said.

When the Land Use Circulation Element (LUCE) was passed, it rezoned the trailer park for commercial use, McKeown explained Monday in an email to The Lookout. McKeown said that while he was unsuccessful in keeping the park residentially-zoned, he was able to forge a statement to protect it.

“It ended up as a statement of intent to get the three adjacent parcel owners (Walter, Roberts, and Luzzato/VTP) to work together so that the Trailer Park could be retained,” said McKeown. “This might involve transfers of development rights among the three parcels, so that the land on which the mobile homes sit might be kept for that purpose. All three would have to participate for this to be possible.”

As it stands now, a vote for the project “would, in essence, be a vote ultimately to remove the Village Trailer Park and all the residents who live there,” said McKeown.

But according to city staff, there's no way to compel the Village Trailer Park to stay in business. In 2007, the Council looked at the park and determined that the owners had the right to sell it, but would have to retain its rent-controlled spaces.

In any case, Walter wants his project – which he points out doesn't adjoin the trailer park – approved.

“I am not displacing residents,” Walter said. “I'm replacing a dilapidated 1942...blighted corner. I'm not tearing down housing to build Lionsgate.

Colorado Creative Studios' 191,982-square-foot mixed creative space/retail development to house Lionsgate has been in the planning pipeline since 2007.

The two four-story buildings would face Stewart Street to the west and Colorado Avenue to the north, and would house retail outlets on the first floor and Lionsgate executive offices upstairs.

Earlier this month, after adding nearly a score of conditions to the Development Agreement, the Planning Commission sent the project on to the City Council for its review and approval.

After responding to the numerous changes to his project at that meeting, Walter said he wanted to work things out to the mutual benefit of his company and local residents.

“You know how hard I've worked to get here,” Walter said at the Planning Commission meeting. “There's a joy in this. I'm not looking to squeeze every penny out of it.”

Tuesday night, City planners will ask the Council to certify Colorado Creative Studio's final Environmental Impact Report (EIR) and approve the Development Agreement.

They'll have in hand letters from Friends of Sunset Park and others opposing the project, and from the Arts Commission, Santa Monica College's Academy of Entertainment and Technology and the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce and others supporting it.

“We need less traffic, less crowding, and more space to breathe instead of more money in the city coffers”
     Lorraine Sanchez

“If I thought that my project would hurt these people, I wouldn't do it.”
      Jack Walter

“The only way to protect the nearby Village Trailer Park seems to be to coordinate the Lionsgate project with planning for the adjacent parcels.”
     Kevin McKeown