Less than a week before his company’s long-disputed Legado Redondo project comes before Redondo Beach’s Planning Commission once again, Legado Companies CEO Edward Czuker had the air of a weary man about him.
“We’ve been fighting an uphill battle for an extended period of years,” he said of his company’s efforts to comply with design requests made by city staff, officials and nearby residents of the project.
On Thursday, Legado will again come before the Planning Commission to discuss its mixed-use project at 1700 S. Pacific Coast Highway, looking to discuss what appears to be a completely refreshed proposal.
This most-recent version has once again been downscaled from its previous iteration, placed before the Planning Commission in July. Now, the project has been reduced from 149 housing units and 37,000 square feet of commercial development to 146 units and 23,764 square feet of commercial space. That includes 5,964 square feet of commercial office space, which was not included in original plans.
Legado has also given its project an architectural redesign, moving away from a contemporary look to a Mediterranean design, in keeping with local architecture and reflecting designs members of the community preferred.
Czuker, however, expects Legado’s uphill battle to continue. Members of Save the Riviera, composed of residents from South Redondo and Torrance, have all but waged war on the project, accusing it of promoting increased density and traffic in an oversaturated area.
“We didn’t move here to turn this community into Santa Monica or Westwood,” said Amy Josefek, of Save the Riviera, during a July 16 hearing of Redondo’s planning commission.
At that meeting, the commission’s then-Chairman Nick Biro impressed upon Legado that their attempts at public outreach were, to that point, unsatisfactory and would need to improve going forward.
The company feels it has complied in spades, reporting correpsondence with 12 organizations and at least 25 individuals from around Redondo Beach, including the Riviera area.
Bruce Szeles, a member of Save the Riviera and resident of South Torrance, was among those Legado reached out to. He feels that the new design “just isn’t there yet.”
“It’s not really a balanced reduction,” he said, approving of the cut back on commercial real estate, but disliking their minimal reduction of residential units. “They can go further; I don’t think that the movement on the residential side is far enough for anyone I know on my side of the issue.”
Czuker is frustrated, saying that opponents to the project are looking to stall, and that Legado has been “the good guys” in allowing their permitting process to continue from 2011 to the present. “Time is no longer our friend,” he said.
“We’re at our wits’ end. We feel like we’ve been manipulated, and we’ve worked hard to accommodate everybody’s demands imposed upon us,” Czuker said, reiterating that his project’s most recent design has shrunk, meets all city standards, and is well below the maximum allowed number of residential housing units. Moreover, it is well below an allowed low-income-housing density bonus that the company initially applied for.
However, Legado may still not get the approval they seek on Thursday. The most recent design came after deadlines to have the plan studied by city staff in time for a review by the Planning Commission. Staff has since recommended that a hearing on the project be continued.
As Czuker alluded to, Legado appears to be preparing for legal action.
“At some point, we have to say that we want to preserve our legal rights to our entitlements…we want the city to vote, thumbs up or thumbs down,” Czuker said. “Beyond that, if that’s not acceptable, we need to look at what our alternatives are.”
