La Conchita Landowners Settle Lawsuit Over ’95 Slide

More than two years after a massive landslide crushed homes and property values in La Conchita, landowners there have quietly settled a lawsuit they filed against the cliff-top ranch above them.

Lawyers for the 112 property owners in the beachfront community northwest of Ventura have agreed to take undisclosed monetary payments from La Conchita Ranch Co., plaintiffs’ lawyer John F. “Mickey” McGuire said Wednesday.

“I think both sides are happy to put this litigation behind them,” agreed Frank Sabaitis, attorney for the ranch company.

Both lawyers refused to reveal details of the settlement, except to say that the terms depended on such factors as the onetime value of the home, the proximity to the landslide and the amount of damage.

La Conchita residents, afraid to jeopardize the pact, also remained tight-lipped.

On learning Wednesday that both sides had reached an agreement short of a trial, property owner Scott Shapiro would say only, “That’s good, I’m glad to hear it.”

The crumbled roofs of some of the nine homes destroyed in the landslide still poke through weed-infested dirt, and county-issued “geologic hazard” signs still dot outside walls and garage doors.

John Colpitts, a 30-year resident who did not join in the suit, said property values continue to suffer. Anyone looking to sell must find someone willing to pay cash, he said.

No one can get a loan to buy in the area, he said, and buying insurance is next to impossible.

“I do feel sorry about the people that lost everything,” he said. “There’s more under that hill than you know. There’s five or six houses that are completely covered.”

The hillside that towers over La Conchita collapsed in a drenching rain March 4, 1995. About 600,000 tons of earth surged downhill, smashing and burying nine houses, damaging several others and sending property values into a downward spiral for many of the rest.

Although the site had seen several smaller landslides in the past century, homeowners quickly pointed fingers uphill at La Conchita Ranch Co., which for years had been growing citrus and avocado trees in cliff-top groves.

They filed a suit in Ventura County Superior Court alleging that years of over-watering by the ranch had weakened the earth above their homes.

The suit sought unspecified damages and asked the court to order the ranch to clean up the mess and stabilize the hill.

The lawyers finally were able to resolve all of the claims, McGuire said. But the negotiation process had gone slowly, at best.

After nearly two years’ preparation, Superior Court Judge William Peck gave the case preferential scheduling status in April because some plaintiffs were 70 or older and could not wait for the case to plod its way up the waiting list, McGuire said.

The judge put the lawyers on four-hour notice to be ready for trial, and that spurred them to begin negotiating, McGuire and Sabaitis said.

“At first, it didn’t look like anything could be reached, but we started a process of demands and offers, demands and offers,” McGuire said. “And when we would balk, the judge would say, ‘Let’s get ready to come down to the courtroom,’ and we’d start moving boxes, and all of a sudden another offer had been made.”

Eventually, mediator Ross Hart of the American Arbitration Assn. joined in negotiations to help bring the two sides toward common ground.

By Friday, the attorneys had hashed out settlements for 67 of the 77 individual property claims.

They worked through midday Saturday in the borrowed offices of a court reporting firm that had handled all 200 depositions in the case--and managed to settle nine more claims, McGuire said.

And the final claim was settled by noon Monday. After spending nearly two days writing out the settlement documents, lawyers announced the agreement Wednesday afternoon.

“The settlement pie was very complex,” Sabaitis said Wednesday. “And there were a lot of things that compelled the parties to settle the litigation, including the availability of a trial judge, the availability of a courtroom, and many, many other factors. Essentially, it was a compromise by both parties of a highly disputed claim.”

He added: “This thing was set for trial and trailing right up till the last minute here.”

In a prepared statement, McGuire credited Hart, Peck and Judge Barbara Lane, who handled early stages of the suit before recusing herself in April.

“Were it not for the efforts of Judges Lane and Peck and Ross Hart of the American Arbitration Assn., we wouldn’t be able to consummate the resolution we have today,” McGuire’s statement said. “Both judges kept the heat on, but politely and firmly encouraged the parties to seek an equitable agreement so that the matter would not tie up the busy Ventura trial courts for months.”

Correspondent Richard Warchol contributed to this story.