Expansion proposal for home appealed

Lolita Harper

Adding square footage to a Mesa North home simply gives Greta

Anderson-Davis more room to love, the mother of 10 argued in her application to add a second story to her home.

The Planning Commission will consider her request Monday evening

and review the plans to create an eight-bedroom home for the large

family, which consists mainly of adopted children who have

developmental disabilities.

“We have nine already and are always open to any child who needs a

home,” Anderson-Davis said. “We just need more room.”

Neighbors said they don’t doubt that Anderson-Davis is helping

children who need loving homes, they just think the home is on a

scale much larger than the neighborhood permits.

“We have nothing against her or her family. We are just concerned

about our privacy, our ability to get sunshine in our backyard,”

neighbor Christian Christiansen said.

Plans for the home in the 3000 block of Madison Avenue call for

the addition of a 950-square-foot second story that would include a

master bedroom suite and a bonus room. Anderson-Davis is also asking

to lengthen the existing garage. The total proposed square footage

for the home is 3,982.

City Zoning Administrator Perry Valantine initially approved the

proposed second-story, saying it “would be substantially compatible

and harmonious with the neighborhood, since many other properties

contain two-story houses, and the scale and massing of the proposed

construction would not be obtrusive from the street.”

Neighbor Stan Brown disagreed and appealed Valantine’s approval.

Brown is backed by five other neighbors who sent letters to the city

to oppose the construction.

In a letter to the city, Brown wrote that the neighbors want to

prevent another monstrosity, such as the contentious and costly

three-story Samoa House -- a battle still being fought in court.

Brown is also concerned about the business license that

Anderson-Davis holds for the home and said an addition to the house

means more children, and more children means more staff to take care

of them.

Anderson-Davis confirmed her “small family home” license but

argues it is different from a group home because her home provides

24-hour care to fewer than six children. Seven of her children are

legally adopted and therefore officially part of her family. Two

others are in the process of being adopted, but because of their

disabilities the state requires long-term trial periods, she said.

She said her neighbors are misinformed and acting out of

ignorance. They just don’t understand what she and her husband are

doing to help children who have been deemed “unadoptable,”

Anderson-Davis said.

“They are unsympathetic and simply don’t want this is their

backyards,” she said.”

The mother also confirmed that she hires staff to assist with the

many needs that her challenged children have.

Anderson-Davis said she bought the house because of the

possibility of building on to accommodate her growing family and is

merely trying to provide a larger loving atmosphere.

“Why can’t they just let us live our lives and give our children

the type of childhood that they gave their children,” Anderson-Davis

said of her neighbors. “They say they’re protecting their nice

neighborhood. It still is a nice neighborhood, and that’s why I want

to raise my kids here.”

* LOLITA HARPER covers Costa Mesa. She may be reached at (949)

574-4275 or by e-mail at lolita.harper@latimes.com.