Yet Another Delay for Trancas Center

• Adequacy of Its Environmental Review Is Questioned

BY BILL KOENEKER

The Malibu Planning Commission hearing to consider permits and entitlements for the proposed expansion and remodeling of the Trancas Country Market center was again continued, according to city officials.
The matter was first supposed to have been heard on April 21, but was continued at that time. A new hearing date had been set for May 5, but that date was continued to a “date uncertain,” according to planning department documents.
Municipal planners announced this week there would be further delays. The project is being subjected to another environmental review, which begins May 28 and ends on June 27. No hearing date has been set.
Acting Planning Manager Stefanie Edmondson said, based on the public comments received, the staff decided to resubmit the document for further review.
Dan Bercu, who heads up ownership of the commercial property, said he was told the planning department needs more time.
“City staff taking more time to make the Initial Study better and clearer is best,” said Bercu, when asked to comment. The shopping center owner initially said he did not want to hazard a guess when the next hearing might be. “I really don’t want to say after what has already happened with two continued hearings. The longer it takes this, the harder it is for local businesses to succeed,” he added.
While Bercu said he is attempting to get all of the permitting in one phase, plans call for phasing the construction of the expansion. “We have to get the wastewater [systems] first, then the two new restaurants, then the other new buildings,” he said.
Residents on Surfside Way, the street above the old Riders and Ropers site where over 11,000 square feet of shops and offices are planned, met several weeks ago with Bercu to talk about the project.
Some of them expressed surprise when the design plan they were shown earmarked a lumberyard on the site below their homes.
The city had received a 16-page analysis pointing out the defects of the planner’s determination of a Mitigated Negative Declaration from a neighbor on Surfside Way, Hans Laetz, who stated that the Initial Study and MND are faulty and need to be rewritten.
Laetz’s submission indicates that there are many issues that were not analyzed in the MND.
“Although the project designers and owners are undertaking a generally sound renovation and expansion of a neighborhood service that is vitally needed by residents of western Malibu, serious problems are either created, allowed to continue, or simply not addressed in the Notice,” he wrote.
Laetz told the Malibu Surfside News the MND does not need to proceed to an Environmental Impact Report if vital questions can be addressed through the Mitigated Negative Declaration.
Laetz’s report indicates the environmental review fails to answer questions about impacts to the lagoon and the nearby ocean, does not address the lagoon waters on the property, fails to describe the quantity and quality of the water that runs through the site into the Pacific Ocean via Trancas Creek and incorrectly states that there are no known habitat conservation plans for the property. The National Park Service has put the lagoon property on its wish list for acquisition, according to Laetz.
His report goes on to address many more issues that Laetz states were not addressed by the current level of review.
The application seeks permits for the remodel and expansion of an existing shopping center including a 37,372 square foot expansion to the existing commercial shopping center located at the corner of Trancas Canyon Road and Pacific Coast Highway.
The plans call for new parking to be located across the street from the existing center, two new alternative onsite wastewater treatment systems, landscape, hardscape and the temporary relocation of an existing karate studio into a triple-wide modular unit during construction. The project includes a site plan review for construction in excess of 18 feet, a variance for grading in excess of 3000 cubic yards, a variance for the reduction of a required side yard setback, a minor modification to reduce the required front yard setback by 50 percent, and three conditional use permits to allow for two restaurants and the addition of over 500 square feet of an existing commercial development.