A developer’s attempt to use the state’s “builder’s remedy” to erect a mixed-use project near the coast in Redondo Beach has hit another legal snag.
The Los Angeles Superior Court on Thursday, Feb. 8, denied developer Leo Pustilnikov’s petition attempting to get the court to compel the city to approve his application to build an apartment complex at the former SEA Lab aquarium.
Pustilnikov, filing under the company New Commune DTLA, LLC, said in a Friday, Feb. 9, phone interview that he would immediately appeal.
“In spite of the ruling,” Pustilnikov said, “I feel better than ever that I will prevail. It just takes time.”
A year ago, Redondo Beach officials deemed incomplete Pustilnikov’s application to build a proposed project dubbed “Ten21” saying the development could be considered with zoning and other changes to the property.
The mixed-use project would have 35 apartment units, seven of which would be slated for low-income residents, and would also include 8,500 square feet of retail space.
Pustilnikov’s representatives, however, had argued the application was fine as is because of a state law, Senate Bill 330, also known as “the Housing Crisis Act” — often referred to as the “builder’s remedy” — that fast tracks local approvals for housing developments that set aside some units for low-income residents.
But this week, LA County Judge James Chalfant validated the city’s decision, saying NCD should have either proposed a project “consistent with the land uses and zoning” set forth in the city’s local control plan and the coastal ordinance or “propose amendments to change the allowable land uses on the site.”
Since NCD did neither, Chalfant wrote in the ruling, “the City Council correctly determined that the Project application was incomplete under the Coastal Act.”
Redondo Beach, for its part, praised what it called Chalfant’s recognition that it was important for the city to comply with the California Coastal Act.
“A position that the city has always taken,” Redondo Beach City Attorney Mike Webb said in a press release, “is recognizing that the (coastal act) emphasizes the importance of public access to the coast, preservation of sensitive coastal habitat, and protection of coastal resources.”
This isn’t the only battle the city has fought with the same developer.
He also under wants to redevelop, under SB 330, the decommissioned AES power plant into a 3.53 million square-foot mixed-use building dubbed “One Redondo.” That development would have 2,700 apartment units, 300 hotel rooms, retail stores and 550,000 square feet of office space.