UPDATE! VICTORY!!!
August 12, 2022 - Judicial Decision:
The Bertoni Memo is arbitrary and legally unsupported!
On Friday, August 12, the Honorable Mitchell L. Beckloff granted the Hillside Federation’s petition and ordered the City to rescind Director of Planning Vincent P. Bertoni’s Memorandum limiting the Mulholland Design Review Board’s jurisdiction.
To read To read the full judicial order in support of the petition, click here.
LA'S PLANNING DIRECTOR SLASHES PUBLIC PARTICIPATION AND REVIEW PROCESS OF CRITICAL MULHOLLAND CORRIDOR
These changes by LA City Planning Director Vince Bertoni eliminate in-depth reviews of impacts to parkland, scenic overlooks, scenic road corridors, wildlife corridors, riparian corridors, and the urban forest.
On March 30, Planning Director Vince Bertoni published a memo which removed a large number of land parcels from being included in the Mulholland Design Review Board public process. For over thirty years, this public process has been the single most effective tool for preserving wildlife corridors on speculative development sites, and currently it is the only city policy that is effectively protecting the environment in hillside areas. Without alternative environmental analysis and protective ordinances in place, the Director of Planning has given an immediate free pass to hillside developments.
“The Mulholland Design Review Board and the Mulholland Ordinance have really been singularly responsible for the fact that we have preserved wildlife corridors...And it’s really the only effective tool that we have. ”
This map shows the Mulholland Outer Corridor in gray, which extends from the Hollywood Hills to Encino. Under LA City Planning Director Vince Bertoni's recent memo, the area in gray has lost a crucial public process for review and conservation.
Click on a map below to see a detailed area:
Woodland Hills to Encino.
Encino to Studio City.
Studio City to Lake Hollywood.
Take Action!
Please send an email to Mayor Garcetti and the City Councilmembers that represent the affected Santa Monica Mountains, and voice your opposition to the implementation of this memo.
Send your email to: mayor.helpdesk@lacity.org mayor.garcetti@lacity.org councilmember.krekorian@lacity.org councilmember.blumenfield@lacity.org contactCD4@lacity.org paul.koretz@lacity.org councilmember.bonin@lacity.org
and please CC: info@clawonline.org
Subject: March 30, 2021 Mulholland Scenic Parkway Specific Plan Implementation Guidance Memorandum – OPPOSED!
Dear Mayor Garcetti and Councilmembers Krekorian, Blumenfield, Raman, Koretz, and Bonin:
I am a stakeholder of LA's Santa Monica Mountains, and I am vehemently opposed to Director of Planning Vincent Bertoni’s March 30, 2021 Mulholland Scenic Parkway Specific Plan Implementation Guidance Memorandum. The memorandum, issued unilaterally by Director Bertoni with no prior notice or opportunity for public comment, purports to limit the oversight of the Specific Plan’s Design Review Board (DRB) by declaring that projects not visible from the Mulholland Drive right of way are exempt from review by the DRB. The Director’s action is in direct conflict with the express language of the Specific Plan, exceeds his authority under the City Charter, and usurps the legislative function of the City Council which signed the Specific Plan into law in 1992.
The Director’s decision removes the code-mandated expert and professional advice of the Mulholland DRB from decision-making for most of the Specific Plan area. This decision also reduces public oversight of many projects with potentially significant adverse environmental impacts to parkland, scenic overlooks, scenic corridors, wildlife corridors, riparian areas, and the urban forest, dramatically altering a legislative action of the City Council.
As the elected officials who represent Mulholland Scenic Parkway constituents, and who are responsible for appointing the Mulholland Design Review Board members, we ask that you collectively urge Director Bertoni to immediately rescind and withdraw his illegal memorandum.
For more on the history of this issue, check out our previous newsletters on this subject:
07/28/2021 - Mulholland Corridor Update and Alert: LA City Sued
06/18/2021 - CORRIDOR ALERT: Take action for LA's Wildlife!
06/07/2021 - Wildlife Corridors: Progress and Major Setback
04/19/2021 - Reminder: Your voice needed this Earth Week
OPPOSITION TO THE DIRECTOR OF PLANNING'S ACTION IS GAINING TRACTION
Your voice is being heard by the five city council offices that represent the Mulholland Scenic Corridor, but unfortunately some of you may have received a disappointing boiler-plate response from the Mayor's Office linked here. CLAW disagrees with the statement that the Planning Director's changes are within his purview. The time to challenge or change the City Council's 1992 implementation of the Mulholland Scenic Parkway Specific Plan was 30 years ago. Furthermore, the Mayor's Office wants you to believe that future environmental policies and initiatives justify the Planning Director's action. You can read CLAW’s position letter to the Mayor and City Councilmembers here.
“This Memorandum was written with the assumption that the upcoming Wildlife Ordinance will remove the need for the Mulholland public review process. However, it’s important to understand that the Wildlife Ordinance is at least a year away from being implemented, and even then, it is meant to build upon a review process like the Mulholland Design Review Board, and not replace it. The two processes are meant to be complementary to adequately protect the wildlife and wildlands of the Santa Monica Mountains.”