ml Puts a big emphasis on appearance, no?
Just a Little Trip-Up in the Rush to Approve the UCLA Hotel Friday, October 12, 2012
Readers of this blog will know that the proposed UCLA hotel-conference center has many pitfalls, legal, tax-wise, and financial. And now the Regents and the donors are the target of a lawsuit. This problem, as we have noted oh so many times, might have been avoided by a) scaling down the project to something reasonable, and b) talking and negotiating with those folks and interests in the community that had concerns about the project. UCLA bulled ahead, however, getting the donors to sign a letter stating that no alternative was OK. Ironically, that step opened the door to a legal challenge since state environmental law requires a review of alternatives. Ruling out alternatives meant that the alternative review that UCLA purported to make was essentially a sham. One of the Regents pointed this fact out back at the July Regents meeting. By bulling ahead, in short, UCLA has succeeded in embarrassing a major donor. Read on: ==============Save Westwood Village: A Business-Community Alliance Dedicated to Quality Revitalization SAVE WESTWOOD VILLAGE CHALLENGES UC REGENTS APPROVAL OF 250 ROOM UCLA LUSKIN HOTEL Los Angeles – Save Westwood Village filed suit today in Los Angeles Superior Court to challenge the UC Regents’ September 11, 2012 approval of the 250 room $162 million UCLA Luskin Hotel on Lot 6, adjacent to Pauley Pavilion. UCLA hotel donors Renee and Meyer Luskin are named as real parties in interest. The mission of the University of California is research and teaching, not operating hotels. Save Westwood Village supports a conference center but not a UCLA hotel financed by bonds secured with student housing fees.The lawsuit alleges environmental impacts from UCLA’s failure to pay local taxes for the Luskin Hotel and existing UCLA hotels, inadequate fire protection service in Westwood, pre-commitment regarding alternative projects, and violation of city UCLA Faculty Association: 4th Quarter 2012
37