Conflicting statements suggest city planners may be fickle
(Editor’s note: This is the last in an ongoing series this week on a lawsuit involving a 6-year-old’s playhouse).
When Dr. David Levy tried to develop a relationship with city planners he soon decided they were as fickle as a first date on a Saturday night.
Conflicting statements within the city’s planning department are the crux of the latest arguments in a lawsuit filed by a Santa Monica family whose 6-year-old son’s playhouse was rendered legal, then illegal, and then legal again.
Now the city says one of its former employees may have had a bad memory when he announced he quit the city in part because high ranking zoning officials reversed his determination that David and Beth Levy’s backyard playhouse was legally built.
Mike Gruett, who served as the city code compliance supervisor until last February, approved Levys’ playhouse, which is on elevated posts. He determined it was a single story structure, allowing it to clear the zoning code. But a few months later he was ordered by his bosses to slap a notice of violation on the playhouse. The move came after the Levy’s neighbor, Tunde Garai, complained to then-mayor Ken Genser.
The Levys claim that Genser influenced city staff into reversing Gruett’s decision. Genser claims he only passed on the complaint and asked if the playhouse was legal.
The city’s latest revelation is a sort of “smoking gun” memo — an e-mail in which Gruett said he agreed with the city’s ruling that the playhouse was illegal.
Gruett testified for the Levys this month that he disagreed with the city’s reversal and said one of the reasons he quit was because the city was “selectively enforcing” the Levys. Chris Harding, the Levys’ attorney, classified Gruett as a classic “whistle blower” at a recent press conference.
But city attorneys Wednesday produced an e-mail from Gruett to his supervisor, Tim McCormick. In the November 2000 e-mail, Gruett said he agreed the playhouse was in violation. The e-mail came two months after the Levys filed their suit and after the city council offered amnesty for the Levys by saying they could keep the playhouse, though it would technically be “non-conforming.”
“(Plaintiffs) have become addicted to their self generated limelight and have forced everyone to watch their act too long. It is past time to turn out the lights. Plaintiffs must be told unmistakably that their show is over.” — — CITY’S MOTION
“I feel the notice of violation issued to Levy is accurate and valid based upon the interpretation of the zoning administrator and principal planner,” Gruett wrote McCormick. “As far as I am concerned, the notice of violation stands.”
Gruett was unavailable for comment late Wednesday. But in an earlier interview, he said at the time he approved the playhouse, he wasn’t aware of an obscure zoning code that relates to basements in the Sunset Park neighborhood where the Levys live.
Gruett ruled that the playhouse had no basement because the area under it wasn’t enclosed and lacked a floor. But after Garai complained to Genser, planning department officials decided the space was a basement.
“I had reason to suspect that someone was advising staff to interpret the code differently,” Gruett said. “To have that technical knowledge of a section for that neighborhood that I didn’t know about... (The notice of violation) just didn’t seem practical or rational.”
However, Gruett said top zoning officials Jay Trevino and Amanda Schacter — who reversed his decision — have more knowledge and expertise than he did. Sunset Park, a neighborhood in southeastern Santa Monica, has many homes which have basements that top out three feet above the ground.
City attorneys argue that Gruett’s testimony not only lacks credibility but is inadmissible because it’s hearsay. “... Gruett now says that he was told by someone who was told by someone that improper ‘pressure’ was put on city staff in effect to harm the Levys,” according to court papers. “If this is all they have, plaintiffs have nothing, in spades. Their ‘evidence’ is little more than the old game of telephone.”
Such strong language, together with a press conference staged by Harding, suggests that the case is now playing to the public as well as a judge. The city said the Levys and their attorneys are using the press and are “demanding center stage” by orchestrating a press conference in which Gruett’s testimony was used as the highlight.
“Plaintiffs time and again have proved unable to control themselves,” court papers say. “They have become addicted to their self generated limelight and have forced everyone to watch their act too long. It is past time to turn out the lights. Plaintiffs must be told unmistakably that their show is over.”
Such artistic language is rarely seen in a motion intended to be read by a judge only.
Harding declined to comment until he reads the latest motion, filed Wednesday.
The city wants the lawsuit dismissed. The Levys want their playhouse with no conditions. A judge is expected to rule Feb. 25.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 21, 2002. Read the original PDF.