Planners Delay Vote on Warners Expansion : Burbank: Board members, postponing decision until Sept. 18, attempt to allay residents’ fears about project.

BURBANK —  Warner Bros. executives tried to mend fences Monday with neighbors of their studio, who crammed into City Hall to protest plans to expand it.

About 100 homeowners attended a four-hour session by the Burbank Planning Board on the studio’s 20-year Master Plan, which outlines a dozen new office buildings, several new sound stages and other facilities, including a 1,100-space parking garage in the middle of a Toluca Lake neighborhood.

The planning board, which advises the City Council, postponed to Sept. 18 its decision on whether to recommend approval of the Master Plan.

Warner executives apologized for the hordes of people who have crowded nearby streets recently as they flock to see popular television sitcoms made.

“There have been a lot of accusations about this being a conspiracy, that we have organized this to emphasize the parking structure,” said Gary Credle, Warner Bros. president of operations.

“That is absolutely not true. The reason it has gotten so out of hand is that [the shows] have been more successful than we anticipated.”

In all, Warners has proposed nearly 5.8 million square feet of new buildings at its 106-acre main studio lot at 4000 Warner Blvd. and its 30-acre ranch lot at 3701 Oak St.

Studio officials said the expansion will allow them to locate all movie, television and other entertainment-related operations in one place, rather than rent production and office spaces in outlying areas, as the company now does.

At build-out, Warners--which is already Burbank’s largest company with about 3,800 employees--will add about 5,900 new jobs to the studio’s main lot, and another 2,400 to the ranch lot.

But the residents’ main gripe has been Warners’ proposed parking structures, particularly a four-story garage to be located at Franklin Street and Olive Avenue, which would be surrounded on three sides by housing. Some residents said they believe the start-up of a heavy schedule of Friday night shows three weeks ago is part of a plan by Warners to coerce the residents into accepting the parking structure.

Warners officials said they have now alleviated the problem by taping four of the shows in other facilities and diverting the audience to parking lots off Forest Lawn Drive. But they also lashed out at residents who had spread flyers recently accusing the studio of bringing “gang-bangers” into their neighborhood.

Credle said Warners buses African American students from Los Angeles to the studio to watch tapings of “Hangin with Mr. Cooper,” a sitcom about a teacher. “These [students] and groups from the First AME Church are the supposed ‘gang-bangers’ that we have invited,” he said.

The planning board’s decision will rest with only three board members, because members Ed Hill and David Gerred have conflicts of interest.

Hill, an attorney whose firm has had business dealings with Warners, recused himself. Gerred, who has been under fire from a citizens’ group accusing him of violating the Political Reform Act, left at the start of Monday’s meeting after consulting with the city attorney.

Gerred, who was a planning board member when he ran unsuccessfully for Burbank City Council in February, received contributions from Warners and its corporate officers totaling $1,500 during his campaign. A section of the act prohibits appointed officials such as planning board members from taking contributions from any party involved in a land-use matter before the board. Warners’ Master Plan was first submitted to the city for review in October, 1994.