Soka’s New Expansion Plan

Re “Plans to Resolve 7-Year Soka Dispute Deserve Speedy OK,” Sept. 29.

The public deserves a careful, in-depth review of Soka’s expansion plan--not a speedy, rubber stamp as The Times would have it. Yes, on the surface, Soka’s plans may seem a little like a good compromise, especially in light of fiscal realities. However, even a casual reading of the draft environmental impact report (DEIR) raises serious questions regarding the actual scope of the project. The building area would be reduced from 1.4 million square feet to 440,000 square feet and the number of students reduced from 3,400 to 650. Further, Soka would be prohibited from seeking additional expansion for 25 years. Sounds like a good deal--but apparently that isn’t the whole deal.

Given the reduction in building area and student population, one would expect a proportionate decrease in related entitlements. In the 1995 DEIR, Soka proposed that acreage designated as “institutional and public facilities” under the Malibu Land Use Plan be increased from 31 acres to 113 acres. Under the scaled-down version, one would expect that acres to be designated as institutional also would be scaled back. Instead, however, Soka requested an increase to 169 acres and the Los Angeles Planning Commission approved 144 acres. Why?

Clearly Soka plans to expand its facility as soon as the 25-year moratorium has elapsed, and the Planning Commission appears to be willing to give them a “leg up.” Perhaps it is not for us to dictate the limits of development for the future generation, but neither is it right to bias the outcome of future decision-making processes in favor of the developer. That is exactly what the Planning Commission voted to do when it approved the project.

MELINDA

MERRYFIELD-BECKER

Monte Nido

* Your editorial regarding Soka University and their property in Calabasas is based on a faulty premise. You stated there were “plans to resolve 7-year Soka dispute.” You appear to be unaware that the vast majority of those living within a cannon shot of the subject property wanted no expansion at all. They did not want a “deal.” No large development of any kind should be built on that property! If Soka builds there, now and / or a few years down the road, it will be there long after everyone on Earth at this moment is dead and in their graves. It is an invasion of the heart of the Santa Monica Mountains by a $1.5-billion-per-year, tax-free, special-interest group.

The capitulation by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy violated moral principal and betrayed the trust placed in them by those that opposed any kind of new development.

Your editorial is way off the mark, and it only addresses the superficial aspects of a gigantic problem that won’t go away. Long after the politicians and bureaucrats have gone their way, those of us who live in the sphere of influence of Soka’s proposed school will suffer from it if we are unable to stop it. However, we aren’t done yet. We still have some viable lines of defense open to us. We will use every last one of them.

WILLIAM P. WELLS

Calabasas

Wells is chairman of the Coalition to Preserve Las Virgenes.

* Why isn’t this out-of-control conservancy being made to pay for its blunders? Let the conservancy pay Soka’s attorney’s fees and the land will be saved . . . as the rural ecological treasure that it is for generations to come.

The conservancy must be made to stop this dirty Soka deal to destroy the heart of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreational Area.

MARY E. WIESBROCK

Agoura Hills